JOSIE LEWIS
September 13 through November 15, 2008
Opening Reception: Sat. Sept 13th, 6 – 11 PM
Mandala Protostars and Planets
Click Here to see online gallery.
In a continued effort to promote new and innovative talent, The Gallery @ Fox Tax and guest curator Emma Berg of mplsart.com are proud to present a solo gallery show by recent University of MN MFA graduate Josie Lewis, a trained oil painter whose new works use tiny shreds of magazines and resin as “brush strokes”, creating both painting and collage, deconstruction and abstract expressionism, an image of the organic from the inorganic, a painting from print and plastic. An opening reception will be held September 13th from 6 – 11 pm at the Gallery @ Fox Tax.
“The paper pieces are more dependent on the painterly ‘brush stroke’ than my earlier work in oils ever were.” Explains Josie Lewis: “I use popular print media and cut the paper into small strips…the photograph is disassembled and like a D.J., I mix up its origin, blur it, skip it, speed it up and slow it down.” Like a visual trip-hop experiment, Lewis’ collages challenge the viewer to experience the micro and the macro, the samples and the symphony they create. The result is an organic structure, like a freshly broken agate or aerial topography, being born out of the inorganic—fashion magazines and industrial compounds—whose weight and depth are both literal and figurative; some works are over 40 pounds, 3 inches deep and layered with over 3 gallons of resin.
Josie Lewis has spent the past 15 years studying, creating and teaching art in the Twin Cities as well as traveling extensively around the world. She currently teaches in the Bethel College Art Department and received her MFA from the University of Minnesota in the spring of 2008.
