Brooks Museum Press Release
Memphis, TN (November 19, 2012 by Andria Lisle) – Employing discarded building materials and house paint as his medium, self-taught artist Caleb Sparks transforms the tools of his day job into uniquely textured large-scale paintings.
“I’m working towards painting full time, but there’s conflict, because what I do for a living fuels this,” says the 37-year old Memphis native and current Midtowner, who works with Nate Mitchell and David Stubblefield demolishing and rehabbing old houses when he’s not playing guitar with local band El Burro.
Sparks has a shed that’s stacked top to bottom with construction refuse that he sourced for his work on view at the Brooks, which culminated from nearly three years of work. “You could drop these paintings, hang them outside, or have them around a toddler, and not have to worry about it,” he says.
The wooden materials combined with bright colors, graphic overtones, and strong linear compositions bring to mind the graffiti found on buildings and railway cars. Sparks enhances this urban quality though the creation of rough, almost gritty textures that are distilled into singular works such as “Father Ponkey,” a 2012 mixed media composition that was created days before the exhibition opened.
“It’s an homage of what it’s like to work in the construction business, which can be violent and angry,” Sparks says. “And it came in [to the Brooks] soaking wet, which evokes that thing of working up to the minute.”
The nine works included in Sparks’ exhibition embody many personal symbols and narratives: most frequently, parrots and donkeys figure into the work.
“Parrots are very intellectual, very emotional, and not very efficient. Community is very important to the majority of them. The donkey is a beautiful beast of burden. Its elegance is in its servitude,” says Sparks, who drew imagery from both for works like “Good Ole Pois,” “One of Many,” and “Ponkey Wing,” which feature rough layers that are added to, removed, and incised before completion.
Brooks Introduces is an annual museum program, which highlights emerging and promising young artists attending or recently graduated from art school. Since its inception in 2002, the series has showcased the work of several up and coming artists from the Memphis College of Art, Rhodes College, and the University of Memphis. The exhibition, sponsored by a Jeniam Foundation grant administered through ArtsMemphis, is on view through March 17, 2013.
Written by Andria Lisle of the Brooks Museum
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