Graffiti Wall
An exhibition of artworks by David McGrath
This collection features work inspired by Brassaï's photographs of graffitied walls in the run-down areas of Paris in the 1930s. The artist has developed certain recurring themes and archetypes - demons, animals, mermaids, skulls and juvenile 'obscenities' - in order to explore their depiction on a variety of surfaces including roofing felt and treated canvas. David's mark-making excludes the spray-can graffiti of the modern era, and represents the scratches, gouges, and scoring prevalent of the 1930s.
Graffiti Wall, Series of 4
Acrylic gesso, paint and mixed media with roofing felt, fixed onto canvas
92 x 92 x 3.5cm each
Acrylic gesso, paint and mixed media with roofing felt, fixed onto canvas
92 x 92 x 3.5cm each
These images mimic the weathering and damage to urban walls, including their graffiti, which appear often submerged by previous marks. The cracks, breaks and holes in the surface are incorporated into the symbols and scratchings which recur so often in the work of the photographer Brassai in 1930s Paris. The stains and orifices contribute to their anthropomorphic feel.
Amsterdam
100 x 115cm
Acrylic paint on treated canvas envelope with plastic interior
100 x 115cm
Acrylic paint on treated canvas envelope with plastic interior
The elemental female image in Amsterdam is cast as a mermaid in the piece. As she floats above the murky depths - home to myriad creepy-crawlies and disease-like plankton - the words of the Jacques Brel song 'Amsterdam' hover above her. It tells of the carousing sailors who desperately desire the street-girls, but who despise them in equal measure. The song fits well with Brasssai's oeuvre in general and much of the graffiti he photographed related to these themes. Like Demon, the artist wishes this piece to avoid the constraints of traditionally neat geometric framing, and has constructed it to hang loose like a ragged tapestry. The canvas is washed, wrung out and dried to cause a rippled surface like water, which is in turn mimicked by the wavy unsteady lettering of the verse.
Demon
73 x 37 x 4cm Mixed media on acrylic gesso on treated canvas envelope with polystyrene filler |
"This is a very recurrent image in graffiti of the time and I combine it here with anthropomorphic orifices and stains which also suggest a crumbling, decaying wall. I consider this type of image to be similar to primitive depictions of deities which would combine elements of both good and evil." - the artist |
ABOUT THE ARTIST
David McGrath, is from Manchester and is in his final-year of a diploma at the Art Academy, London, UK. His work ranges from portraiture to mixed-media collage, in which he exploit textures, materials and fabrics to 3D or accidented effect, often seeking to explore the porous divide between abstraction and representation.
Much of the work interrogates the contradictions and inspirations of religious spirituality, political conflict, and themes of redemption and renewal. "Annunciation", for example seeks to capture the sublime flights of Fra Angelico frescoes, whereas “Bird”, uses everyday DIY materials - roofing felt, polyfilla, glue, galvanised nails - to conjure the spectre of modern exhumations from the mass graves of the Civil War of Spain - a country close to the artist's heart.
Another topical work from 2015, “Pool", has been inspired by the carpet-bombing of Homs in Syria. It uses household packaging detritus - polystyrene, cardboard, perspex etc. - to juxtapose war zones and children’s play. Taking my cue from Anselm Kiefer, Antoni Tapies, and Hannah Hoch, among others, the dark green and khaki slab, ”Hopscotch", refers to the Troubles in the north of Ireland. A recent commission was centred on the execution of the first English martyr, St Alban, who - curiously - was also a Roman soldier. In these works and others, he looks to confront spectators rather than reassure them.
David is inspired by those artists whose output constitutes a statement against oppression: Max Beckmann, Marlene Dumas, Francis Bacon and their successors. These are practitioners whose stance is often implicit rather than explicit, disrupting or questioning the space their work occupies. As he address the conundrum of separate planes on a two-dimensional surface, his aim is to involve the viewer with contradictory perspectives, gestural colour, and challenging themes. Tied to this is my fascination for gestural marks and damaged surfaces: the Parisian photographer Brassai's brilliant work on graffiti, for example, is a constant source of ideas, with its demonic archetypes crudely and hurriedly gouged into plaster.
The current graffiti series has sparked an ambition to go further into the possibilities offered by pure "materiality", that is, to concentrate on the inherent appeal of these surfaces, their punctures and wounds, and the beauty of their fault-lines. There is a hermetic, anthropomorphic quality about the work of Tapies, the Catalan artist, for example, and his ability to remove the "third person" from the equation (in a narrative sense) and challenge viewers to confront a material for its own sake, and locate themselves within the space it occupies. David feels that this is where his future as an artist lies.
Much of the work interrogates the contradictions and inspirations of religious spirituality, political conflict, and themes of redemption and renewal. "Annunciation", for example seeks to capture the sublime flights of Fra Angelico frescoes, whereas “Bird”, uses everyday DIY materials - roofing felt, polyfilla, glue, galvanised nails - to conjure the spectre of modern exhumations from the mass graves of the Civil War of Spain - a country close to the artist's heart.
Another topical work from 2015, “Pool", has been inspired by the carpet-bombing of Homs in Syria. It uses household packaging detritus - polystyrene, cardboard, perspex etc. - to juxtapose war zones and children’s play. Taking my cue from Anselm Kiefer, Antoni Tapies, and Hannah Hoch, among others, the dark green and khaki slab, ”Hopscotch", refers to the Troubles in the north of Ireland. A recent commission was centred on the execution of the first English martyr, St Alban, who - curiously - was also a Roman soldier. In these works and others, he looks to confront spectators rather than reassure them.
David is inspired by those artists whose output constitutes a statement against oppression: Max Beckmann, Marlene Dumas, Francis Bacon and their successors. These are practitioners whose stance is often implicit rather than explicit, disrupting or questioning the space their work occupies. As he address the conundrum of separate planes on a two-dimensional surface, his aim is to involve the viewer with contradictory perspectives, gestural colour, and challenging themes. Tied to this is my fascination for gestural marks and damaged surfaces: the Parisian photographer Brassai's brilliant work on graffiti, for example, is a constant source of ideas, with its demonic archetypes crudely and hurriedly gouged into plaster.
The current graffiti series has sparked an ambition to go further into the possibilities offered by pure "materiality", that is, to concentrate on the inherent appeal of these surfaces, their punctures and wounds, and the beauty of their fault-lines. There is a hermetic, anthropomorphic quality about the work of Tapies, the Catalan artist, for example, and his ability to remove the "third person" from the equation (in a narrative sense) and challenge viewers to confront a material for its own sake, and locate themselves within the space it occupies. David feels that this is where his future as an artist lies.
LATEST NEWS
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You can see some of David McGrath's latest artworks in the group exhibition on in Coningsby Gallery in London on 18th - 23rd December 2017. Email us at info@emergingartistgallery.com for the guestlist for the Private View on Tuesday 19th December, 630 - 900pm. |