13/10/2005
Jason Clay Lewis
31Grand, New York
Devour. Incorporating history, myth, and his own personal iconography, the artist's multimedia installations are always obsessive, detailed, and highly rendered. His imagination and skill vividly illustrate each chapter of his tale through paintings, sculpture, video, drawings, and any other means necessary to convey his world.
Devour
31GRAND is pleased to present new works by Jason Clay Lewis. "Devour" is the third installment in the artist's four part "Renewal Series", inspired by the allegorical struggles inflicted on humanity by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Incorporating history, myth, and his own personal iconography, Jason's multimedia installations are always obsessive, detailed, and highly rendered. His imagination and skill vividly illustrate each chapter of his tale through paintings, sculpture, video, drawings, and any other means necessary to convey his world.
The first chapter, "The Black Death", shown at 31GRAND in 2003, imagined a modern apocalyptic society confronted with a plague-like disease - peopled with skeletal soldiers battling truth seekers searching for a cure.
Shown last summer at Futura in Prague, the second chapter "God of War" depicted a stark barbed wire landscape and skeletons in SS uniforms, referencing the concentration camps and atrocities of the holocaust.
"Devour" continues the series, this time drawing from the imagery and history of late-Heian period Japan. Works in the show include: "Famine Fields", a monumental gold leaf panel piece depicting an intricately rendered field of skulls engulfed in flames; "Bonsai with Skull",an iconic pairing of mortality and nature fashioned of clay, super sculpey, lichen, dirt, plaster, and aluminum; and “Fur Dragon†a 25 foot long red dragon made of rabbit fur, twine, canvas, wood, and foam, which hovers above the installation.
Image: Bonsai with Skull, 2004, Clay, super sculpey, lichen, dirt, plaster, aluminum, 14 1/4" x 16 1/2" x 7 1/2â€
Opening reception: Friday Oct. 14, 7-10pm
31Grand
31 Grand Street - Brooklyn - New York
Gallery hours: Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday 1-7pm or by appointment
Directions: Subway -L Train to Bedford Ave. walk south on Bedford Ave. to Grand St. Right on Grand St. to Kent Ave. Car -Drive over the Williamsburg Bridge. First exit. Right on Broadway. Right on Kent Ave. to Grand St.