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JAMES AUSTIN MURRAY My current body of work is about, both the subject and material. Each point to the other to derive their meaning. Several years ago I began painting thickets and brambles. I focused on the patterns that are found in them, that are also not exactly patterns. The pattern of chaos. Images repeat (nearly). My focus has been on the interaction of time and space, in the visual form. Both time and space have this same repetition, or pattern, that's not exactly a pattern. One can predict, what the next part of landscape or skyscape or starscape might be, as one can predict what the next day may hold. However there are no certainties, and we are constantly finding exceptions to these patterns. There are things that the pattern hides from us. My focus is now on those things that are hidden. These things that are hidden become as important as what we see. For instance, what we don't know of people, places, and things are as important to them or more so than what our limited knowledge holds. As such, a good friend is someone you are familiar with, traits and personality and history. However, there are things that make up their personality that is unknown to us, and can never be known. Everything around us has more of a story than what is available to us. My current work uses graphite drawings with paint or gesso leaving a hint of what is not readily seen. Some have covered drawings or painted portions with gesso to hide much or at times all of the painting. Gesso is also a symbolic material. It is what most painters use as primer for their canvas. I often use it as a final cover, the opposite of what it is most often used for. In some the texture gives us a hint of what might be underneath. Sometimes there is no hint. Yet on other paintings the graphite is not obscured. I think of myself primarily as an abstract painter, however sometimes I need to reference an image to accentuate the abstract concept. That concept being obscurity and reference of space or people. James Austin Murray Solo Exhibitions: 2005 Over-On, Dam-Stuhltrager, (Brooklyn, NY) 2004 Visiting Artist, International Gallery of Contemporary Art (Anchorage, AK) 2001 On and Off White, L.I.C.K. Ltd, Fine Art (LIC, NY) 2000 Goodbye, Hello, Markham-Murray, (NYC) 1999 Solo Show, The Lafayette, (NYC) 1993 Solo Show, Ludmanska Gallery, (Kosice, Slovakia) Group Exhibitions:
Bibliography: November 2001, The Tribeca Trib, Tribeca Personal September 2001, ABC Evening News, Interview and discussion of exhibition September 2001, New York Post, Page Six mention of opening that evening November 2000, Bloomberg Business News, Interview: “Silent Auction Fundraiser for The Burn Center Foundation' Summer 2000, Arts4all.com, “Murray headed east, an American in Kosice” June 2000, The Tribeca Trib, “Out of the Flames”, review by Jeanne C. Wilkinson May 2000, New York Contemporary Art Report, review of “Hello Goodbye” April 2000, Arts4all.com, Review of Paint Club project March 18th and 19th 2000, NY1, Television interview and review of Paint Club project February 2000, Makta Opas (Finish cultural magazine), Article about NY artist as curator November 21, 1999, New York TImes, Interview as artist, dealer, firefighter |
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