An Essential Evening of Music IV

The Essential Evening of Music series was a number of shows put on by David Connors. They combined art and music, and encouraged people from the two circles to mingle and share ideas. I believe this was the last show in this series.

This was a very eclectic show for me. I had very little notice, so I had to throw something together in the limited amount of time I had available. My work was going to be scattered across several different walls in different rooms, so I treated this show like three mini-shows, with each section having a certain theme. If people didn’t know me, they would think that this was the work of three separate artists. The venue was very well suited for showing The Body Room, so I gave it the best spot, and arranged everything else around it.

The Body Room

The Body Room series was inspired by the cold storage room in the basement of a house I was renting back in 2004-2005. While the rest of the house was rather nice, this one room had a very dark, menacing atmosphere. It felt like a crime scene, or something out of a horror movie. Among my friends, this strange room eventually became known as ‘the body room’

I wanted to capture the feeling and atmosphere of ‘the body room’ in an art series. To create these works, I started by photographing every square inch of the room, and capturing each object from as many angles as possible. Using a combination of Photoshop, and acrylic paint on the images, the textures and tone of the body room was transferred to these images.





 

 

Landscapes

 
 
 
Kyle Clements - River (2004)
Kyle Clements - Trees (2004)

 

Abstract

These abstract pieces are kind of random. I just threw these on the wall because there was some blank space left over, and I figured, “why not fill it”. These are probably three of my favourite early abstract pieces. I was really happy with how each of these turned out. Each one represented a major learning curve or achievement for me.




I spent two years working on this piece. I kept thinking that it was done, so I would show it. Then I’d notice something that had to be changed, so I’d get really embarrassed, and repaint it after the show was down. I probably have more hours in this one piece than any other painting.

Event

David Connors helping Kyle Clements unpack and install the art. 2007
Dave not only had to set up much of the music gear, he also helped me unpack and install the art.

 
 

Hanging paintings on a curved wall presented some novel challenges.


After the concert was over, people took the time to stop and look at my art a second time.

David Connors helping Kyle Clements unpack and install the art. 2007
Dave helped me unpack and install the art.

electrified v2.0

After my experience with Electrified, I wanted to keep the ball rolling, so I pulled this apartment show together. I was interested in taking a more minimalist approach this time around. I simplified my paintings by zooming in on small sections of other paintings, and using that as the basis for the next painting. My palette moved away from the primaries, and focused towards the tertiaries. Registration errors were made more prominent. I played around with the viscosity of the paint; going from thin and watery to thick like a drywall paste. I introduced pearlescent pigments. I wanted to see how far I could push this Urban Landscapes series, what would work, and what would not, and a non-commercial apartment showing was a great opportunity to do just that, and solicit feedback from my friends and peers.


Urban Landscape, 16″ x 16″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape, 16″ x 20″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape, 16″ x 20″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 1, 44″ x 56″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 2, 44″ x 54″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 3, 42″ x 52″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.


The apartment, where the show was held.

Electrified

Electrified was my first experience working with a curator. Kelsie Parsons did a wonderful job taking care of everything. I just had to make the art and show up. It was great! Kelsie also worked some media magic as far as advertising is concerned. This show was going on at the same time as the Toronto International Art Fair yet when googling “Toronto art”, information about my show came up first.


Urban Landscape, 18″ x 24″, encaustic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape, 18″ x 24″, encaustic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 1, 44″ x 56″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 3, 42″ x 52″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.

It Happened Here: 2006 OCAD Graduate Show

It Happened Here was the title of the 2006 Ontario College of Art and Design Graduate show. The thesis program at OCAD really drove in the importance of having a clear focus and presenting a cohesive body of work. I don’t think I was quite ready for this. After making three paintings that turned out just as I wanted them, I started experimenting again. I made two that tried to incorporate some techniques from my older paintings, but those techniques really didn’t need to be there. In retrospect, I was just showing off. I was telling the audience, “Hey, I know some fancy glazing techniques, too! Look! Please ignore how out-of-place the technique might be…”

The Urban Landscapes series has been my primary focus ever since this show. It’s hard to explain through words, but painting this way just feels right.

Urban Landscape 1, 44″ x 56″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 2, 44″ x 54″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 3, 42″ x 52″, acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 4, 44″ x 54″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006.


Urban Landscape 5, 44″ x 55″ (approx), acrylic on canvas, 2006. SOLD

Urban Landscapes:

2006 Artist Statement

 

I see my recent art as a dialogue between my knowledge of art history and my experience with the images being made today. The images of today often fit into the digital aesthetic. They remind me of a buzz, of being completely overwhelmed by the amount of stimuli coming at me.

I enjoy looking at a lot of the art that came out of the Modern era. Abstract Expressionism in particular is a favourite of mine. I go into galleries and museums to spend time with several pieces that I really like.

I also enjoy looking at images that come out of our era. Subway ads, billboards, posters, magazine layouts, internet pop ups, photo blogs, screen shots from streaming videos, and digital camera preview screens. Images from these new mediums are far more prevalent in my life than what I see inside a gallery. I briefly glance at these images when I am passing by, and I notice that they often share a certain aesthetic, something not seen in the works of the past. I find this new aesthetic to be very interesting.

It is my goal to understand and capture this new aesthetic in my paintings. I brush, scrape, and squeeze acrylic onto the canvas, using what I see around me to inform my decisions as I build my paintings.

 

Kyle Clements

Victoria Fenninger and Kyle Clements

Victoria Fenninger looks at one of my encaustic paintings.

 
Encaustic on canvas. When working with texture, it is hard to avoid encaustic, it is a wonderful medium.

 

The Texture Series I had been working on let me towards appreciating the value of unique supports for a painting. For a while, I would head down to a wood shop and raid the scrap bin, looking for random chunks of wood to assemble into interesting shapes to coat with globs of paint.


 

By the end of this series, I was struggling to keep pure textures interesting, leading me to really work the surfaces. Sometimes, I would scrape the wax down o a flat surface. Other times, I would brush paint over the same area hundreds of time, building up interesting textures.


This painting doesn’t fit with the rest of the show, to be perfectly honest, it was thrown in as a space filler. Y.O. Media Gallery had a very large front window, and we liked to put something big close to that window, to draw people into the gallery. I was also still fairly young at the time, and the importance of having a strong focus and cohesive body of work in a show hadn’t sunk in yet. I was still throwing together whatever I had been working on at the time. I could see that there was something special in this piece, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. I had several big ones to chose from, but something had me sort through the stack and pick this one. Little did I know that this painting would mark a turning point in my artistic development.

Event Documentation


 

Three Point Turn

Three Point Turn was held in OCAD’s Transit Space Gallery, and featured artist’s Brad Blucher, Kyle Clements, and Mark Zydaniuk.

I was still working on my Texture series at this time, including some oil/alkyd paintings that I had been working on for several years, building up countless layers of transparent paint. This labour-intensive technique creates a glowing pearlescent effect when the painting is viewed under the right lighting conditions. Unfortunately, Transit Space didn’t provide those lighting conditions, but it was still nice to have my work on display in Toronto



      

I was also working with acrylic at this time. Acrylic doesn’t have the same transparency as oil, so the glazing technique wasn’t nearly as impressive. I threw in some pearlescent pigments, and had a stronger pearl effect after 15 minutes than the oil paintings had after two years of work!


      

Installation Pictures

The plinth in the centre of the space presented a CD player, which contained Brad Blucher’s sound piece. You would not believe how much use Bard has gotten out of that plinth. He still has it to this day, and its been sanded and repainted so many times, it looks better today than it did when it was first constructed. Four of Mark Zydaniuk’s paintings can be seen in the background, along with one of mine on the right.


Brad Blucher takes a close look at one of my paintings. Brad, I miss the awesome hair!

The Kyle and Brad Show II: with Mark

Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Oil and Encaustic on Canvas, 2005.

Back

Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Oil and Encaustic on Canvas, 2005.

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Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Oil and Encaustic on Canvas, 2005.

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Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005.

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Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005.

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Geometric Abstraction, 12″ X 12″ X 3″, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005.

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Texture Series, 8″ X 10″, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005.

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Texture Series, 24″ X 24″, Acrylic on Canvas, 2005.

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Texture Series, Acrylic on Oak Pannel, 2005.

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Texture Series, 16″ X 16″, Oil and Encaustic on Canvas, 2005. SOLD

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Texture Series, Oil and Encaustic on Board, 2005.

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Texture Series, 16″ X 16″, Oil and Encaustic on Board, 2005.

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Event Photos


Collin spent quite a while in that corner, looking at every detail of my paintings.

 

This art show occurred while I was in the midst of my Texture Series. which explored surface quality and unconventional paint application techniques. Warm/cool, transparency/opacity and gloss/matte were the primary focus, rather than form or composition. Unfortunately, several of these traits, especially the gloss/matte contrast, cannot be accurately recreated in a photograph. The series is more successful in-person.

  
John Blaise and Brad Blucher, with Victoria Fenninger’s paintings in the background.


Heather Phillips, Kyle Clements, Victoria Fenninger, and Brad Blucher


Heather Phillips, Kyle Clements, Brad Blucher’s back, and John Blaise

Get Bent Days of Yore

We didn’t pick the title for this show. The owner of Y.O. Media Gallery thought that our art had an edgy, contemporary look, and he wanted to really play it up. He wanted our art to be a big kick-in-the-pants to the traditional art that was so common in our town. He insisted on a dramatic show title. We couldn’t really think of anything, and Tim started firing off suggestions at us. Since we all had a good sense of humour, we didn’t shoot this one down.

Biomorphic Forms, 54″ X 108″ Acrylic on canvas, 2005.


Cubist Deconstruction of a face (version 3), 46″ X 46″ acrylic on canvas, 2005.


Texture Series, 16″ X 16″ acrylic and encaustic on canvas, 2005.


Texture Series, 16″ X 16″ acrylic and encaustic on canvas, 2005.


Scrape Painting, 9″ X 12″ acrylic on masonite, 2005.


Texture Series, 16″ X 16″ acrylic and encaustic on canvas, 2005.


Kyle Clements, standing in front of the second largest painting he’s made to date.

Junk_etc: An Exhibition of Contemporary Art by Acta Victoria

Getting myself into this show was perhaps the strangest and most serendipitous experience I’ve had. Someone was curating an art show at the University of Toronto. She ventured down to OCAD in search of artists. Not knowing the layout of the building, she got lost wandered through the Design departments, and didn’t come across any artists. She had just left the building, when Brad caught her attention. At the time, Brad had some nice dreads, which let her know he wasn’t a practical designer type person. “With hair like that”, she thought, “he must be an artist.” After a few seconds of chit-chat, Brad had charmed his way into our very first Toronto show.



Cubist Deconstruction of a Face (version 2), 46″ X 52″, acrylic on canvas, 2005.


Lego, 46″ X 56″, acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Biomorphic Forms, 46″ X 46″, Acrylic on canvas, 2004.

 
My parents are supporting me at my first Toronto art show.                              A group of people admiring my work.


Blaze and Brad Blucher talking about their art.



Kyle Clements and Blaze sip coffee and discuss art.


The Barn Show. (Presented by Art Source)

The Barn Show was a two-person show with Kyle Clements and Victoria Fenninger that was held in the Fenninger Barn in Sharon.



Biomorphic Forms, 42″ X 52″, Acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Biomorphic Forms, 46″ X 46″, Acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Texture Series, 16″ X 20″, Acrylic and encaustic on canvas, 2004.


Texture Series, 8″ X 10″, Acrylic and mixed media on burlap, 2004.


Texture Series, 10″ X 10″, Acrylic and mixed on burlap, 2004


Texture Series, 16″ X 16″, Acrylic and mixed media on canvas, 2004. SOLD


Texture Series, 16″ X 20″, Acrylic and mixed media on burlap, 2004.

Untitled Show

Artists Kyle Clements, Heather Phillips, Victoria Fenninger, Brad Blucher, and gallery owner Tim.

The four of us had many shows together at Y.O. Media gallery in Sutton over a number of years. The experience gained from these early shows turned out to be very helpful years later. Very few young artists stick with it, but the four of us are still very much involved in the art world.



Biomorphic forms, 46″ X 46″, acrylic on canvas, 2004


Biomorphic forms, 42″ X 52″, acrylic on canvas, 2004


Georgin Bay, 12″ x 12″, acrylic on plywood, 2004.


Lego 46″ X 56″, acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Selections from the Texture Series Acrylic and mixed media on burlap and canvas, 2002-2004


Kyle raids the snack table while Joe checks out the art.





Brad Blucher and a very silly looking Kyle Clements


Kyle Clements explains how the “texture series” was created to several guests

The 3rd Annual Y.O. Media Environmental Exhibition


APC Live, 22″ x 30″, acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Clock, 16″ x 16″, acrylic, ink, and fabric transfer paper on canvas, 2004.


Lava Lamp, 8.5″ x 11″, acrylic on canvas, 2004.


Light 2, 8.5″ X 11″, acrylic, ink, and fabric transfer paper on canvas, 2004. SOLD


Light 3, 8.5″ x 11″, acrylic, ink, and fabric transfer paper on canvas, 2004.


Light 3, 8.5″ x 11″, acrylic, ink, and fabric transfer paper on canvas, 2004. SOLD


Trees, 52″ x 46″, acrylic on canvas, 2004.