Danielle McCullough
Deposits
November 22 through December 27, 2008
The inaugural exhibition to mark the opening of Texan Equities will feature new paintings by Los Angels based artist Danielle McCullough. Titled Deposits, this is McCullough’s first solo exhibition in Los Angeles.
In her art, McCullough moves through a personal sphere of time travel, playing with gestures that signal moments of originary encounters with mineral, tone-producing elements. These gestures produce what appear to be documents of material discovery. The "will" of the material is revealed in paintings that resemble mineral deposits, molten flow, fluid spills and gaseous formations, crystallizing structures and cosmic bodies, and violent landscapes. Some of the colors in these paintings reach startling hues, revealing an over-bruised or dangerously toxic aspect. These are minerals barely tamed by their suspension medium, and beg for the viewer to take of their poison, their intoxicating qualities.
It is out of this separating and re-merging matter that emerge identifiable objects that seem to have grown naturally out of the unregulated mass, but also tentatively with the distinct coercion of human agency. Discarded socks are molted skin; land formations aggress sexually on other unsuspecting formations. A mountainous structure releases momentous bursts of river water in an obvious state of ecstasy, while the clouds dance overhead in infected rapture. And curse.
Because of her highly experimental and exploratory methods and probing approach, McCullough is on a fast track toward locating new vistas for the ancient medium’s application and use. What sets this body of work into motion is the re-examination of the condition of the artist in her element. This proper starting point for all relevant and self-critical art can be termed a "practiced naiveté"—a willingness to let go of the safety of what is known and techniques that yield expectedly positive results. What issues therefrom is an originary poeticism, a re-casting of the language of painting towards capturing, or representing, our contemporary environment, both in terms of content—through examination and formulation—and through movement and process. McCullough work asks, how does a contemporary, tuned in painter make physical gestures with specific materials to affect figures on a blank surface—because these movements, their physical movements, are historical too.
Danielle McCullough has exhibited work in Los Angeles, Joshua Tree, Seattle, Berlin, Amsterdam, New York and other cities throughout the US. She is a recipient of grants from the Creative Capacity Fund, Change, Inc., and an artist residency at the Vermont Studio Center. McCullough has done several projects for High Desert Test Sites including Blast Site: A Workshop for Conjecture, and Panel Shop. She has written articles about art in Los Angeles for Art 21 Magazine, Whitehot Magazine, Art Book Review and In These Times. McCullough is also one of the founders and editors of Los Angeles Art Resource, a website for the Los Angeles arts community to share job opportunities, calls for entry, studio vacancies and regional grant/fellowship deadlines.