Everything Mark Calderon makes, no matter how odd, has a languid
beauty. Although drawn to Christian symbols of sacrifice, in his
hands the final product is gorgeous. He puts a top hat on his influences, which he describes as:
African sculpture, Japanese aesthetics, Mexican folk
arts, nature, personal experience and relationships, family, music,
Christian art (both Gothic and Medieval) and other artist’s creations,
are some major influences I draw from. I do not like to create images
that read as only one thing, but try to create works that have both
power and mystery.
The tension that runs through the cast lead and bronze sculptures at Greg Kucera Gallery appears to come from a source close to hand who is not specifically on his list: the slippery, dark-moon-and-muck sensibility of Morris Graves.
(Graves, Waning Moon, #3, 1943, Seattle Art Museum, via)
(Calderon Untitled, skink twins, 2009, cast lead)
Graves, Snake and Moon, 1938-39, via
Calderon, Untitled, (snake 2), 2009, cast lead
Graves
appreciated river rats, artists who lived on rotting boats moored in
the Skagit Valley, although everywhere he lived was lovely. There might
in moss in the garden but never mold in his closet.
Like Graves,
Calderon makes light work of heavy subjects. The suffering face imprinted in sweat on
Veronica’s Veil is gone. All that’s left is the hair, ropey black and
alive.
(Calderon, Trophy, cast bronze, 2008)
In
larger sculptures, such as Globo in the current show, Calderon
positions himself somewhere between Jun Kaneko, Peter Millett and Peter
Shelton, all West Coast masters of fluid sculptural line, yet for Calderon, the
action is on the surface, as if he intended a kind of eroded Braille
that had lost its literal meaning through weathering.
(Calderon, Globo, lead on Styrofoam and modified cement, 2009, 85″x33″x33″)
Through Sept. 26. Reception, Sept. 3, 6-8 p.m. Artist talk in the gallery, Sept. 5, noon.
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