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Ellwood T Risk 'Supernatural' pistol target, paint, ink and resin on wood panel 38 x 48inches

There are few more potent, less obscure images than the target. The concentric circles signal the drawing of attention to the center – unwelcome attention, predatory and destructive. In a backhanded homage to contemporary America, Ellwood Risk conflates sex and violence by superimposing the target on silhouettes of (usually female) objects of lust. Oh yes, and then he fires away.

Graphically lucid and balanced as they are, the works in Risk’s “Collateral Damage” series depend on the ferocity of their process and banality of their imagery for their impact. Other artists have interpreted the commodification of the sexual body by fetishizing it, multiplying it, iconicizing it, but Risk literally targets it, and is willing to shoot it.

It’s not the first time the gun has been used as a paintbrush – Risk credits the influence of Sigmar Polke, William S. Burroughs, and Hunter S. Thompson, and to them can be added the efforts of, among others, Niki de St. Phalle and Dick Higgins – but those predecessors by and large exploit chance in the pattern provided by the bullets; in the context of “Collateral Damage,” every shot means something depending on where it hits.

These are political and social comments, but their message, while none too subtle, is hardly pinned to contemporary events. The current state of American polity provokes Risk to this exploration, but does not tie him to the vocabulary of, say, a political cartoon.

One might infer narrative from the position of the silhouette and its target in the ambiguous abstract space containing them, as well as the presence of neatly rendered, and dynamically suggestive, words; and certainly, the pattern of bullet holes fairly cries out for interpretation, no matter how much we take into consideration the vagaries of Risk’s marksmanship.

But one is well advised to stop short of “reading” these forceful graphic apparitions; while they do not profess the indifference of, say, Jasper Johns’ targets and flags – bullet holes have a way of dissolving neutrality – neither do they move us from a beginning to an end. They are animated in their own way, but are hardly cartoons; rather, they are emblems of our condition – or better yet, of our attitudes. In this respect, Risk’s relationship to Johns is more significant than his relationship to Burroughs or St. Phalle; the painting-collages of “Collateral Damage” are as much flags as targets.

Ellwood T. Risk is making a statement, but it’s a statement he wants us to feel even sooner than he wants us to know. The impact of the bullet must be sensed. Our skin must become the surface of the works. Those figures must not simply lure us, but must be us. Finally, Risk insists we get beyond the callous distance that has abetted the moral and cultural, not to mention political, decline of our country. Every image in “Collateral Damage” makes us feel the gun’s recoil – and the bullet’s impact.

Peter Frank
Los Angeles
November 2007

Sam Webster 'Sad Sack Superhero #1' pen on bookprint

First from a new series of moody, dark and franky, pretty troubled Superheroes from artist Sam Webster…these arrive in the gallery on Friday and will be on show until Feb 1st. For all price/size enquiries please contact the gallery.

Chris Milton 'Oriental' graphite and mixed media 160 x 91cm

“Go-Go” is a set of works that were made in response to a series of visits to London’s fetish and dance clubs. When viewing these drawings it is important to remember that no specific person or place is visually depicted. The characters in the drawings are made up, mere figments of the imagination; the works are therefore not a voyeuristic reportage in the traditional sense. They are initiated by memory, feelings and responses; as opposed to the detached critical distance of direct observation.

Allan Switzer 'Shower the People' Chrome plated steel 63 x 43 cm (price on application)

Allan’s recent works are executed in waterjet cut steel and either Chrome or Gold plated. They explore the nature of text and meaning associated with font style and depiction.

Phrases are self written and then placed within the format of distortion and ambiguity in relation to meaning  - of both the actual phrases and the style of font and the information embedded within each in it’s own particular mannerisms.

Born: 1955 Calgary, Canada - Please visit the MMA website for full CV and exhibition history.

Photo courtesy of James Painter Belvin

We’re off to the prestigious SCOPE Miami art fair, flying out on the 29th Nov. and hanging the MAUGER MODERN stand, number 155 for anyone who can get out there - we’ve got a limited amount of VIP tickets (normally $100) to the Preview so email the gallery if you’d like to be on the list for the 3rd December, that’s a Wednesday evening. Look out for pictures of the gallery adventures here, sign up for the RSS feed on the right of this page and keep up to date with all the art fair shizzle as it happens.

Alexandre Orion Metabiotics 3

ALEXANDRE ORION grew up in some of the busiest streets in Brazil. As a child in Sao Paulo, he became accustomed to sidewalks thronged all day, and the din of traffic at night. Orion was quick to respond to the appeal of the streets and his first graffiti was done at the age of 14.

While adolescent instinct drove him, the hard reality of the streets called for new ideals. Now he draws inspiration from multitudes; silence and thought; experiences and memories; happiness and suffering. An artist amid the crowd, the many found within him. Humanity lives in Orion: his time unique, his universe collective space.

Discovering photography in 2000 coincided with an interest in the theory of image in Barthes, Dubois and Aumont. A year later, his Metabiotics project involved finding a place in the city where he would paint the wall and with his camera at the ready, await the decisive instant when people interacted spontaneously with his paintings. Framing the precise situation promoted a joining of painting and real life, encouraging an encounter (or confrontation) between reality and fiction within the field of photography.

This decisive moment of interaction between people and painted image led to Metabiotics, as opposed to traditional photography’s conveying the false idea of all that is photographic being real. Metabiotics questions truthfulness: the paintings were actually done in the walls, people really did pass by and act spontaneously, but what we see suggests a type of montage that did not exist. Everything is both true and false.

Alexandre Orion is represented in the UK by MAUGER MODERN ART