FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jim Gaylord: Cliffhanger
February 5 � March 14, 2009
Opening Reception: Thursday, February 5, 5-8 PM
Gallery Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 10:30-5:30 PM
Email: info@gregorylindgallery
Gregory Lind Gallery is pleased to present Jim Gaylord's new exhibition, Cliffhanger. The show will include works in oil on linen, gouache on paper, multi-layered gouaches on paper and acetate, and a lithograph. Gaylord's work is a continuation of his interest in cultivating found, abstract images from special effects and action sequences in motion pictures. Unlike the process of abstracting realistic forms into reductive shapes, these phenomena are naturally occurring, split-second artifacts of collisions, explosions, and other distortions, taking place at rapid speeds.
Using these "literal" abstractions as a starting point, Gaylord combines several frames at once to create new compositions. This is done either by superimposing the film stills digitally or painting the shapes onto transparent overlays, stacking them together like interchangeable animation cels. The composites become the bases for the final works, resulting in obscure forms that are familiar but unrecognizable.
In "The Examples of Our Power," an explosion from the film "Cliffhanger" becomes the backdrop for an uncanny and volatile event. A red cape from "Last of the Mohicans" converges with a monster from "Cloverfield" and a crashing golf cart from "Jackass: the Movie." Falling debris from "Home Alone 2" finally cuts through the scene with jagged flashes. Building on his past work as a filmmaker, Gaylord looks at the continuum between painting as a historical medium and the spectacular visuals we absorb through contemporary entertainment. Further, the work connects the euphoria of witnessing these images with the disorientation of seeing something we cannot easily identify.
Jim Gaylord received his MFA from the University of California, Berkeley, and a BA in Film from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. His recent exhibitions include Art on Paper 2008 at the Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC, and upcoming solo exhibitions later this year in New York and Milan. Gaylord was a 2008 Fellow in Painting for the New York Foundation for the Arts, the recipient of a Joan Mitchell Foundation MFA Grant in 2005, and recently completed a Project Fellowship with the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop. Gaylord's work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the West Collection, and the Progressive Art Collection. This is Gaylord's second solo exhibition with the gallery. He lives and works in New York.