district aesthetic.

Art and the Everyday in Washington D.C.

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District Checkers [S street]

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THE ABSURD

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Reflecting upon Jameson Magrogan's "Oil, Then Acrylic"

Exhibited at the Transformer Gallery [DECEMBER 13 - FEBRUARY 14 2015]

After digesting Jameson Magrogan’s works and attending the gallery talk on January 24th, the Transformer gallery’s exhibition seems to evolve pleasantly each time I return to it. While directly referencing the hierarchy of mediums within Art History, Magrogan is poignantly placing his style within the digital age. With bold, seamless gradients and space-suggesting grids, several objects evoke the disorienting graphics and dimensions of increasingly popular “Internet Art.” The formation of this aesthetic is certainly where he displays his technical skills with acrylics and various surfaces, moderating the size of the brush strokes with impressive care in spite of creating his works in a “hurried” and instinctual manner. The artist was sure to develop this statement of his creative practice as being somewhat of an “immediate” process. Completing the show in a six-month period, Magrogan blurs the lines between painting and sculpture in his search for what it meant to be genuine in the era of contemporary art. 

Adding additional layers to his commentary on the history and expansion of art mediums, Magrogan very lovingly discussed his inspirations from the greats of modern art and expressionism. Cleverly describing the intentions of his conversation with the canon of Art History as “passive affection,” the artist utilizes his own “angst” and desire to create something new: Oil, Then Acrylic. 

Transformer's exhibit is a well-curated and wonderful accomplishment for this fresh artist who saw absurdities in the everyday and found beauty in innovation. In the end, these characteristics surrounding James Magrogan resulted in the successful subversion of the symbolic nature and broad history of the art medium.

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District of Columbia Art Center on a snowy night.

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Ani Bradberry, Molly Visits, 2014

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Welcome to district aesthetic // Discussions of the art existing in the American Capital