Scientific Progress: Cory Gene Mayes
"Pleasure Island (Study of Athens)," Mixed Media on Canvas.
Cory Gene Mayes
American Scientist
Noon-4 p.m.
VALA Gallery
5815 Johnson Drive
Mission, KS
913.787.7899
Hours: Noon-4 p.m. Wednesday and Saturday, and by appointment.
Runs through: Aug. 22.
Gallery site: http://valagallery.org
It could be said that we go to school to learn who others were, then spend our lives figuring out who we are.
That makes sense. We are, after all, products not only of our own gifts and skills but of the visions and achievements of those who influence us.
Cory Gene Mayes has been an apt pupil, as evidenced by American Scientist, his current show at VALA Gallery in Mission. Mayes, who graduated in May from the University of Kansas, has done what any good scientist would do: dissected his specimens (or influences, in this case), laid them out on tables of canvas, and examined them closely to see what makes them tick.
Mayes, who studied both painting and art history at Kansas, displays a range of influences as wide as the list of media he uses to execute his work. He's in comfortable touch with his minimalist side, as several large pieces in VALA's center room demonstrate, but can also lace up his Willem de Kooning shoes with the best of them.
As he puts it, his work honors the philosopher and the pure scientist who is exploring not the world of the senses, but the world of ideas, and draws from a wide range of influences: diagrams, charts, architectural grids, landscapes, the figure, and The New York School.
But ... and this is important ... American Scientist also shows Mayes beginning to come into his own, to distill and blend his influences into something that evokes what has gone before but also says This is mine.
He's developing his own recurring motifs, one of which appears in today's featured image, Pleasure Island (Study of Athens). (No hints beyond that. You know the drill: Go see for yourself.) He's finding his own approaches to color and composition, which are as integral to an artist's style as subject matter and medium.
And while Mayes is relocating to Brooklyn later this year, it's going to be interesting to follow his career ... and his progress through the University of Life.
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Thanks Steve for another insightful, thought provoking review of an exhibit that one must now go see after reading your comments. Damn, you're GOOD. You're writing some of the best reviews I've ever read.........consistently digging down to what makes art good, what makes art mysterious, and what makes an artist tick..........keep it up and I'm voting for you in the next presidental election...........(well, maybe....)
I don't want to be president! Benevolent dictator, sure ... (bwah hah hahhhh).
Seriously, though, I take it as a huge compliment that the writing made you want to see the show. That's always my goal -- to point to the artists and their work.