CAPRICE
IAN MACKAY
THE REDHEAD GALLERY
October 02 to 26, 2019
Nuit Blanche Opening Preview
Reception: Saturday, October 5, 2 to 5 PM
Evening Reception: Thursday, October 10, 6 to 8 PM

Pointing Fingers, 2018 Oil on canvas, 24 x 36 inches A phalanx of camera lens, point at hands pointing back. Observation meets accusation. $1400

News Crowdsourcer’s Hand, 2018 Lithographer’s crayon on paper, 24 x 18 inches A hand bound by a portable video camera decides what is newsworthy. $200 unframed

Judge Shrug, (Help!), 2019 Oil on wood, 25.5 x 21.5 inches On a fictional plain undergoing catastrophe, a beatle-esque figure in judge’s robes raises open hands, feigning blamelessness. A tiny mouth offers no further clarity or opinion. $800

The Squad Going Back, 2019 Charcoal on cotton rag paper, 30 x 22 inches A critical imagining of the four female congresswomen known as The Squad, on a dingy seen from above, forced to leave America after the President’s insulting tweet “Why don’t th

White’s Island, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper, 30 x 22 inches Part oil-rig, part shanty-town, a future where polluting and isolating tribalism meet climate change. $350 unframed (SOLD)

On A Pedestal, 2019 Oil on wood, 21.5 x 18 inches Two women, or is it one? embrace or assist a puppet-like boy sculpture crouched on a pedestal.His blank eye and submissive posture suggest an internal negation of his position. $550

Learning to Dance, 2019 Oil on linen, 54 x 48 inches Two people, one of high anxiety, the other curious and open, meet to dance for the first time under a bandshell. Arms and legs swirl about in ineptitude and clumsiness. An allegory about the begin

Hard to Swallow, 2019 Oil on wood, 21.5 x 18 inches A lone figure clutches his throat, choking in disbelief about the careless “spin” given to stewardship of our planet and peoples. $550

Selfie Crying, 2016-2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper, 30 x 22 inches Based on an image of the artist’s face, Selfie Crying imagines a wide-eyed stunned sadness about the turn of events and change we are experiencing in our current world order.

The Happy Astronaut, 2019 Oil on linen 22 x 22.5 inches A portrait painted from an image of Harrison Schmitt, floating “upside-down” while returning from the moon during the Apollo 17 mission. The first scientist to walk on the moon, he described it

Apartment Arsonist, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper, 44 x 30.5 inches Inspired by the horrific and tragic 2017 Grenfell tower fire in London, this work features a figure with limbs of fire and a body of a blackened apartment building, surround

Owl-Spirit with Bell-Bottomed Foot, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper, 44 x 30.5 inches An internal landscape is seen with a river flowing forward transforming into a leg and foot. A moon hovers above forming one eye of the owl-spirit. The other

Zoomorphic Redaction Series #1, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper 30 x 22 inches Solid flag-like rectangular blocks obfuscate gesticulating animalistic forms, suggesting that human-kind organized into nations over biological forms of organizatio

Zoomorphic Redaction Series #2, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper 30 x 22 inches Solid flag-like rectangular blocks obfuscate gesticulating animalistic forms, suggesting that human-kind organized into nations over biological forms of organizatio

Zoomorphic Redaction Series #3, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper 30 x 22 inches Solid flag-like rectangular blocks obfuscate gesticulating animalistic forms, suggesting that human-kind organized into nations over biological forms of organizatio

Zoomorphic Redaction Series #4, 2019 Chalk pastel on cotton rag paper 30 x 22 inches Solid flag-like rectangular blocks obfuscate gesticulating animalistic forms, suggesting that human-kind organized into nations over biological forms of organizatio

Drawing on the legacies of both figurative and abstract painting, Mackay presents a series of works depicting subjects and scenarios that resonate with larger issues in our current political and cultural landscape. Caprice means a sudden, unpredictable change, a whimsy, without apparent or adequate motive. It aptly describes the daily unreason, the falling apart of our current social, political, and spiritual order. It also describes the artist's approach to art-making for this exhibition. Exploratory and provisional, these works combine humour, accident, automatic drawing, and expressionistic colour, to vivify anxious states of mind or soul that should surprise no one these days.

Influenced by early 20th century Expressionist artist groups, Die Brucke and Der Blaue Reiter, this exhibition features some of Mackay’s large semi-abstract pastel works and smaller “portrait” oil paintings of figures in crisis. In the Zoomorphic Redaction series, Mackay places vertical stacks of colour reminiscent of his earlier block paintings, on top of gesticulating organic forms suggesting that animal morphology is being overlaid by the human-made. The anonymous figures in the portrait paintings are caught in some kind of struggle with the present conditions of life on a faltering planet. Mackay’s use of vivid colour and emotional tension intensify the experience of the viewer.