• MICHAEL CHILDRESS: HUB

    January 6 - February 28
  • BRIDGES AND TUNNELS SERIES

    “The Bridges and Tunnels series is a variation on a theme. They stem from the Changing painting series which were similarly modular but could be rearranged to make many different forms. Bridges and tunnels are extraordinary feats of engineering, they are man-made connective structures and I have come to consider them as potent symbols for self achievement, access, overcoming obstacles and unification. I’m also interested in the duality of the two forms, over/under, positive/negative. I’m thinking about a painting existing between pictorial image and symbolic form, spanning “abstract” and “representational” categories. Paintings as sigils, having the power/potential to focus the intention of an individual towards a specific goal.”
    - Michael Childress
  • Consisting of rectangular units that are spaced and stacked vertically in combinations of three or four registers, the series explores...

    Consisting of rectangular units that are spaced and stacked vertically in combinations of three or four registers, the series explores languages of minimalism and geometric abstraction as ways to embody and delineate space. Each horizontal bracket forms a kind of grammatical syntax equipped with punctuated voids, bearing likeness to solid and broken lines that encompass trigrams of the I Ching. With his signature staining technique, Childress ushers his viewers across his surfaces through subtle transitions between hues, joining left and right, top to bottom, inward and outward. In Light Blue Lintel, the motif of the bridge comes forward as its symmetrical legs support a continuous stretch above; in Tiny Window, the tunnel takes precedence as concentric fields of color narrow in on a central opening. Depending on one’s vantage point, however, the two forms are also interchangeable. Bridges are shallow tunnels, and tunnels are underground bridges – essentially, two sides of the same coin.

     

    Childress’s interest in how bridges and tunnels serve as conduits extends into the gallery’s architecture. HUB installs eighteen works in a grid spanning 360 degrees around a roughly square room, placing the viewer in a central position like the hub of a wheel. Circles and ovals occur regularly within the artist’s practice, both as an embodiment of centripetal and centrifugal actions and as a means to disrupt the rigid bounds of the square. This open-ended structure is substantiated through multiple combinations of rehangs that will take place throughout the run of the exhibition, which allows for Childress to shift channels and energies in order to achieve various harmonious states.

  • Rooted in ancient cosmologies regarding the origins of the universe, Michael Childress’s kaleidoscopic abstractions of earthly, celestial, and at times,...

    Rooted in ancient cosmologies regarding the origins of the universe, Michael Childress’s kaleidoscopic abstractions of earthly, celestial, and at times, otherworldly landscapes muse on thresholds of knowledge and perceptions of one’s surroundings. Water is an essential component, as the artist wets his canvases before applying pigments, using gravity and surface tension to control the way paint saturates and radiates outward both laterally as well as longitudinally through pictorial depths. This inward recession of color and space engenders a mesmerizing abyss, pulling viewers into an infinite expanse that is symbolized by the ever-elusive periphery of a horizon line. Like that in Nature, order and chaos exist in a delicate balance in Childress’s works, as uniform fields and hard edges are met with prismatic plumes and tonal gradations, creating patterns that resemble trajectories of atomic particles, of orbiting planets, and multitudes of configurations in between.

  • INSTALLATION VIEWS

  • WORKS ON VIEW

    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars varying in length and colors of yellow bleeding into black toward the edges.
      Michael Childress
      Bright Glider, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on two wooden bars varying in length and colors of grassy green and cream.
      Michael Childress
      Grasses, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, two panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on six wooden bars varying in length and colors of green and white.
      Michael Childress
      Green Beam, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, six panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars varying in length and colors of orange, yellow, and purple.
      Michael Childress
      Escalator, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on five wooden bars varying in length and colors of yellow, orange, and mint green.
      Michael Childress
      Tube Light, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, four panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars varying in length and colors of dark green and yellow.
      Michael Childress
      Shallow flight of stairs, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on five wooden bars varying in length and colors of light blue and white.
      Michael Childress
      Light Blue Lintel, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, five panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars varying in length and colors of dark purple bleeding into white toward the edges.
      Michael Childress
      Deep Glider, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on four wooden bars varying in length and colors of black and white.
      Michael Childress
      Propeller, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, four panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars, monochromatic in Yves Klein blue.
      Michael Childress
      Blue Crossbeam, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on four wooden bars varying in length and colors of yellow, white, red, and light blue.
      Michael Childress
      Tiny Window, 2017-2019
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, four panels
      Width: 48 in (121.9 cm)
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on nine wooden bars varying in length and colors of black, red, and blue.
      Michael Childress
      Receiver Antenna, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, nine panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on seven wooden bars varying in length and colors of black, red, green, and white.
      Michael Childress
      RGB Channel, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, seven panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on five wooden bars varying in length and colors of red, black, orange, and white.
      Michael Childress
      Burning Bridge, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, five panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on seven wooden bars varying in length and colors of black, purple, orange, and green.
      Michael Childress
      Drone, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, seven panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting strHorizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on five wooden bars varying in length and colors of red, orange, blue, and purple creating a bleeding sunset hue. etched on five wooden bars varying in length and colors of red, orange, blue, and purple creating a bleeding sunset hue.
      Michael Childress
      Aileron, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, five panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on three wooden bars varying in length and colors of the rainbow.
      Michael Childress
      Spectrum Bridge, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, three panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
    • Horizontal shaped canvas painting stretched on four wooden bars varying in length and colors of black and white.
      Michael Childress
      Twin Tube, 2022
      Acrylic on unprimed canvas, six panels
      width 48 in
      width 121.9 cm
  • ABOUT THE ARTIST

    Michael Childress has had solo exhibitions at HESSE FLATOW, New York, NY; New Release, New York, NY; New Image Art, Los Angeles, CA; Galerie Julien Cadet, Paris, France; Lane Meyer Projects, Denver, CO; and Cuevas Tilleard, New York, and been included in group exhibitions at Future Gallery, Berlin, Germany; HESSE FLATOW, New York, NY; Half Gallery, New York, NY; Pray For This Gallery, New York, NY; False Flag, New York, NY; Radiator Arts, New York, NY; among others. He is a recipient of the Leslie-Lohman Museum Queer Artists Fellowship and has completed a residency at AS220 (Providence, RI). Childress earned a BFA from the University of Massachusetts in 2009. He lives and works in Massachusetts and New York.