Damien Meade

2 Mar-27 Apr 2018

Overview

Damien Meade’s paintings begin as mud, but live on as creatures of dirt. Minerals suspended in water are made compact—first by time, then the artist’s hand—and transform into something that Meade cannot, or at least does not want to name. Paint shifts onto linen panels like dried-up play doh curling at its edges, creating what looks like hair, pairs of lips or the surface of skin, perhaps. In an unusual twist of tradition, this clay will never see the inside of a furnace. Instead, it stays wet and, once he is through, will be crushed and churned into the shape of Meade’s next model. These faces are consumed by an assumed role—as though, each portrait is actually an actor’s headshot auditioning for a play called ‘High Art’—so much so, that they have become indifferent to the eye that is beholding them. From the exhibition text by Olivia Fletcher.