Everything is Radiant: Gary Brewer
Wonzimer Gallery is delighted to present "Everything is Radiant," a solo exhibition of new paintings and sculptures by Gary Brewer.
Life is an incomprehensible mystery. The forces that have shaped the infinite variations of living things are vast, and our understanding of what we see as reality is a mercurial slipstream of shape-shifting phenomena. Brewer's paintings and sculptures express his deep love of life and a desire to engage in articulating a spectrum of forms that reveal a glimmer of the metaphysical order in life's rich pageant.
Inherent in each of the life forms in Brewer's paintings or in the abstract biomorphic shapes of his ceramic sculptures, there is a quality that conveys the tenacity and complexity of this animate universe. Orchids, corals, gold formations, and lichens are a part of the lexicon of images that he uses in his paintings. In each of these subjects, we see something that instantly engages our mind, bodies, and imagination. The animated character of these shapes has intrigued Brewer for years. They express in their elemental designs, a life force that begets the complex unfolding of our world, adapting and metamorphosing to flourish in an ever-changing environment.
Brewer's ceramic sculptures are polymorphic; they suggest sea life, the body, and erotic orifices. The rich overlay of glazes excites the mind and suggests lichens, mosses, encrustations from the sea, dried salt flats, and myriad other phenomena. The sculptures are created without a design in mind. They unfold in an intuitive process; the sensual experience of feeling and shaping form through his hands guides him; Brewer creates his sculptures more through touch than sight.
Brewer feels as though the colorful and dynamic glazes in this body of works are a form of 3-dimensional painting. These ceramic sculptures are a recent and fascinating new development in his life as an artist; they are a reflection of the subject matter in his paintings transformed into a new physical expression.