The Red Toque: historical art

Showing posts with label historical art. Show all posts

Sunday, February 2, 2014

Made With Real Maple Syrup

Jules and I had so much fun creating this 3 minute piece, Made With Real Maple Syrup. It started out as a kind of efolio for a submission but in the end wasn't used. The best part of the project was working artistically with my son, who has become quite a creative force in his own right....wonderful to witness. Some of the work isn't funny but how we choose to stage the piece had us giggling like school kids. The piece is actually three parodies, Gerhard Richter Painting, Andy Warhol - Man Ray Video and Banksy (Exit Through the Giftshop). Hope you enjoy it.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Toronto Bound

I'm off to Toronto in the morning. I'll be attending the Walrus Gala, meeting with my Toronto Gallery and paying a visit to a couple of friends and my uncle in Ottawa. Here's an image of the piece that I donated to the Walrus Foundation. I hope the bidding is brisk and substantial and it goes to a good home. I'm dedicating it to Neil Young.

Weekend Warrior
Acrylic on blanket
44W x 82H inches

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

A SIMPLE LIFE - WINCHESTER GALLERY, Victoria, BC - DEC 3 - 18 - Opening DEC 5th 6 - 8 PM

...looks like the farmhands went for lunch...

List of Works

1) Pink Cowboy – Mixed Media Assemblage – 44 x 72 inches

2) Crazy Horse– Mixed Media Assemblage – 44 x 72 inches

3) Don't Fence Me In– Mixed Media Assemblage – 66 x 48 inches

4) The Homesteaders– Mixed Media Assemblage – 40 x 58 inches

5) Red Ensign - Encaustic/Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 33 x 82 inches

6) My Coat I – Acrylic on Blanket/Panel - 24 x 48 inches

7) My Coat II – Acrylic on Blanket/Panel - 24 x 48 inches

8) My Coat III – Acrylic on Blanket/Panel - 24 x 48 inches

9) The Homsteader - Mixed Media Assemblage – 20 x 58 inches

10) Jacks Toque – Mixed Media Assemblage – 20 x 12 inches

11) Voyager Toque - Mixed Media Assemblage – 20 x 12 inches

12) The Voyager - Mixed Media Assemblage – 10 x 64 inches

13) Treaty Medals 1-7 – Mixed Media Assemblage – 22 x 14 x 6 inches

14)Treaty Medal 8 – Mixed Media Assemblage – 8 x 18 x 5 inches

15) Treaty Medal 9 – Mixed Media Assemblage – 9 x 13 x 5 inches

16) The Good Book– Mixed Media Assemblage – 72 x 26 x 8 inches

17) Golden Stack– Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 48 x 40 inches

18) Making Hay– Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 48 x 40 inches

19) The Hay Wagon– Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 48 x 40 inches

20) Two Stacks– Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 48 x 40 inches

21) Wagon Wheel– Mixed Media on Blanket/Panel - 48 x 40 inches

22) The Future– Mixed Media Assemblage – 6 x 14 x 5 inches

23) Take No Prisoners – Mixed Media Assemblage – 6 x 14 x 5 inches

24) We Are The Magic– Mixed Media Assemblage – 6 x 14 x 5 inches

25) Chocolate Moose– Mixed Media Assemblage – 6 x 14 x 6 inches

PINK COWBOY

CRAZY HORSE

DON'T FENCE ME IN

THE HOMESTEADERS

THE RED ENSIGN

MY COAT - I

MY COAT - II

MY COAT - III

THE HOMESTEADER

JACK'S TOQUE

THE VOYAGER TOQUE

THE VOYAGER

TREATY MEDALS 1-7

TREATY MEDAL - 8

TREATY MEDAL - 9

THE GOOD BOOK

GOLDEN STACK

THE HAY WAGON

MAKING HAY

TWO STACKS

WAGON WHEEL

THE FUTURE

TAKE NO PRISONERS

WE ARE THE MAGIC

CHOCOLATE MOOSE

Friday, November 8, 2013

The Voyager

I'll have a number of mixed media assemblage in the Dec show. "The Voyager" seen below is one of them.

This is a mixed media assemblage built around a found canoe paddle. This particular paddle was a gift from brother Chris Straw. I hauled it back from Toronto last summer. The Voyager toque is constructed from old sweaters and finished off with a healthy dose of encaustic to give it that honey smell.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Journey to an Exhibition

A lot can happen in ones life during the creation of an exhibition. Much of our daily experiences show up in the studio and in our work. I could never have guessed that a conversation with the descendant of a homesteader family in southern Saskatchewan was the beginning of a thread that would lead me through India, Cambodia and back to my studio on Gabriola... all during the creation of "A SIMPLE LIFE". To see all of this work together in the gallery, with all of its differences and idiosyncrasies will literally be a dream come true. Every piece conjures up associations and memories experienced during the creation of the work. Rummaged from the depths of my mind regurgitated as cheesecloth screens that are so dreamlike and delicate to haystacks that could have been painted a hundred years ago. Add altars, toques, pitch forks and paddles and...well you get the picture. There seems to be no limits to the diversity of the creative mind? Some of the associations between the work and the experience are obvious. But its not as obvious with others.

"Ours is not to reason why. Ours is but to do and die", by Alfred Lord Tennyson.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Upcoming exhibition - A SIMPLE LIFE - opens Dec 5th

Dec 3rd - 18th, Winchester Gallery 2260 Oak Bay Ave, Victoria, BC

Reception Dec 5th, 6 - 8 PM

"We have wandered so far from the land. In a couple of generations we have gone from a relatively simple existence to a life of consumption and disconnection".

Making Hay

Mixed Media on Blanket

48"w x 40"h

Crazy Horse 44"w x 86"h

The Homesteader - The Red Ensign - The Voyager

The Good Book
Mixed Media Assemblage
52"w x 40"h (open)

Don't Fence Me In
Mixed Media Assemblage
66"w x 44"h

The Homesteaders
Mixed Media Assemblage
44"w x 60"h

The Hay Wagon
Mixed Media on Blanket
48"w x 40"h

Golden Stack
Mixed Media on Blanket
48"w x 40"h

Wagon Wheel
Mixed Media on Blanket
48"w x 40"h

Two Stacks
Mixed Media on Blanket
48"w x 40"h

Three Stacks
Mixed Media on Blanket
48"w x 40"h

The Toques and Chocolate Moose

The Treaty Medals

3 - Altars (size of a shoe box)

This latest series honours our heritage while raising questions about our future.

In May 2012, while driving to Toronto, I explored a Saskatchewan homestead with a descendant of its early settler family. This once wild prairie, just 30 kilometres outside Val Marie, abuts Grasslands National Park. It is where heaven meets earth. A Simple Life was conceived as I wandered the homestead, now a bone yard of old wagons and sleighs laden with rusting hardware, weathered and rotting into the rich soil. I utilizes this hardware in many of the pieces contained in this body of work.

In the midst of making A Simple Life, I travelled to Cambodia where I photographed more than 300 haystacks. Spending time in the Cambodian countryside was like going back in time...in my mind I was on the Canadian prairies a hundred years ago .

Both the prairie-based assemblages and the encaustic/mixed media haystacks pay homage to a much simpler time. I'd like to think that this work offers viewers a little peace and quiet...a chance to reflect on a less complicated time. Life is simpler when you plow around the stump. Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply

“Jeff's works are sly love letters to Canada - quirky, capricious, frank, and thought provoking.
His dream-like images probe this country’s soul. ”

Charles Pachter

Detail of Wagon Wheel

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Have art will travel

Canadian Art in Italy

Scarlet and the Rocket

Both of these life size pieces were shipped to a small village in Tuscany. They are prominently displayed in the Labatt's Villa over looking the Tuscan hills. A little piece of home on the other side of the pond.

Horizontal Flag in progress

A few images of my artistic journey

That's a cabinet scrape sitting on the flag, I scrape the surface after I've coated the entire piece.

Detail of the surface that I like to work on...chunky and rugged.

I use a string to get my lines. My reference is a very crappy photo I took of an old flag that hangs at the door of my studio.

Starting to add colour...

Blocking in the four main colours.

Starting to add the subtleties. There are a number of different kinds of line in the piece, It's really important that the lines are correct or the piece won't work.

The finished work
60 x 38 inches
Encaustic on panel

THE WORK

Molloy's work focuses on culture through the use of its stereotypes, traits and artifacts.

Jeff employs a wide variety of distinctive techniques, tools, and personal processes that result in truly unique, instantly recognizable work. Jeff is curious. His creativity shifts and twists in response to his materials. Beeswax, tar, pigments, remnants of human civilization – all react differently to the tools and techniques he employs. Carving, painting, sculpting, applying heat and blunt force all contribute to objects that may resemble paintings, yet may just as easily be mechanical and functional in nature.

To Molloy, line is a physical thing, something that is cut and gouged. His surfaces are built up and scraped away. Jeff uses homemade tools to draw, paint, carve and burnish his surfaces of wax and tar until they reflect their own history.

“I've always believed that experimentation, not technical skill, is at the core of creativity. Artists should be explorers, and the world of art should remain a place without rules or boundaries.” Jeff Molloy

In 1995 encouraged by a photograph of Jasper Johns’ famous encaustic work, Flag, Molloy began to experiment with encaustic. He comments, “I recognized in Johns’ piece a number of aspects that have become paramount in my own work. The impact, power and inherent meaning of cultural objects and how they can be used to evoke emotion and memory...I wanted my work to mimic the real thing but, as an art piece, be more interesting than the motif itself.” Molloy achieves this by tapping into these emotions and memories and presenting them as highly articulated works of art. The encaustic works tread the line between painting and sculpture. Where paintings tend to provide context for their subjects, Molloy’s pieces intentionally strip away everything but the object itself.

“The context for the work is the environment in which it is shown. It just makes sense to me that the space should play a role in the perception of the work,”