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Email PageEpigrams
November 4, 2006- December 12, 2006
Michel Alexis
Stephen Haller Gallery
542 W 26th St Michel Alexis Epigram #6 (2006) |
Epigrams are concise poems characterized by a play of the intellect – always succinct, sometimes witty, technique includes inscribing, scratching, slicing, barbed and playful. The word comes from the Greek meaning to “inscribe, write, or carve.” And what a perfect metaphor for both the intellectual and the physical process of Michel Alexis who is inspired by words, alphabets, the deconstruction of language, and whose carving his surface of gesso-soaked paper on canvas to reveal cuts, colors, materials from the layers below.
And in this series of paintings there is often a sense of the playful, and of a distinct idiom, also a more intense color palette. In this work as well as in his previous series, Synesthesia, Alexis is inspired by the workings of the mind – the impulse of the intuitive and the role of the unconscious in the creative process. A play of the mind – of language, the alphabet, the word, the act of writing, of inscribing in order to communicate – these are consistent elements in his work. Not surprisingly this French-born artist first gained prominence in an exhibition of his work inspired by the deconstruction of language in the writings of Gertrude Stein.
Critic Mary Schneider Enriquez wrote in ARTnews, “Alexis very effectively pulls us into his world of personal symbols and communicates the work’s shifting moods.” And Jonathan Goodman in Art in America characterized the work in this way, “A private, deeply personal idiom stands out because of its moody intensity.”
The art of Michel Alexis excites the intellect and delights the senses. We are pleased to present this exhibition of his paintings..
Books and DVDs related to artists in this show
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