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Art & Culture
November 17, 2005
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Full Spectrum
Michael Salerno comes to Upfront Gallery and brings an infinite universe of light and matter with him
by Stacey Wiebe
At first glance, the works of famed Los Angeles artist Michael Salerno appear to be little more than colorful dots and swirls of paint on swaths of canvas. At third, fourth, fifth and sixth glances, however, those dots and swirls morph into something else, or many somethings that look less like dots and more like the tiny, infinite systems that make up the building blocks of the universe.
Full Spectrum, now on display through Nov. 20 at Ventura's Upfront Gallery, is the first solo exhibition of Salerno's works in the area and offers seven pieces of art rendered on paint, wood and laminated digital print over synthetic substrate. "This is the most contemporary work being shown in Ventura," said Carolyn Friend, co-owner of the Upfront Gallery, of the Salerno exhibit.
In one of Salerno's untitled paintings, one with many dots and colors, a close inspection reveals the infinity of dots to also be, perhaps, the millions of citizens of the planet Earth, working and fighting, dancing and playing tug-of-war against a common and intricate backdrop. Those multitudes are viewed from a distant vantage point, a point from which those dots could be ants, ideas, atoms or particles as easily as they could be people.
Salerno said he's not "goal-oriented" when he paints, but instead strives to put his thinking mind on hold to give his brain free reign to create. "It pretty much runs the gamut of what anyone would think about when not focused on a task," Salerno said of his thought process while painting. He said those thoughts might light on anything from childhood memories to the day's chores, old and new images and ideas. But he insists that he doesn't paint in a trance-like state in that he is well-aware of his surroundings and his own actions. "The paradox is that I am extremely attuned to what my hands are doing," he said.
For Salerno, the experience of painting is not quite like operating from stream of consciousness because "I'm not so sure traditional consciousness is an adequate description of the experience," he said.
Though many presume some of Salerno's works are a nod to pointillism (a form of painting in which tiny dots of primary-colors are used to generate secondary colors), he said that simply is not the case. The technique by which he created the many-dotted piece, for instance, is far removed from pointillism in both technique and intention. The piece, which was painted on wood panels, began with small, square sections rendered in spray paint. Atop the paint were drawn many multi-colored lines with oil-based paint sticks that Salerno likens to "very rich crayons."
As layer upon layer of color was added, a thick texture was created over the wood. And as that texture grew more and more complex with each stroke of the oil paint, the surface became bumpy. Eventually, only bits and pieces registered on the surface as Salerno made passes with the paint.
"The work has a three-dimensional quality to it," Friend said. "You can see it kind of popping out from the canvas. No other painter really paints like that today."
This effect, both random and painstakingly precise, is exactly what Salerno was after. Not one to wax rhapsodic about the deep, inherent meanings of his works, he is far more apt to allow viewers to assign poignancy themselves. "As soon as you make a mark, you see a picture," Salerno said of his painting process, "but I resist manipulating the viewer to instead see what my brain can do - and I'm not 100 percent sure what I am doing."
Paul Benavidez, co-owner of the Upfront Gallery, said the gallery is "lucky" to be showing Salerno's work - which has all kinds of inherent meaning for him. "They evoke space," he said. "They evoke both the macro and micro in terms of astronomy or just being. When you go into the subatomic nature of things, there is something connecting all matter."
Benavidez said that, when cosmologists mapped the galaxies, the product very closely resembled some of Salerno's works. "We're looking at something that's real on different planes," he said. "It brings different things to different people."
Benavidez also believes that Salerno's kinetic works evoke the angelic, but that taking concrete messages away from the art isn't the name of the game. "They're a pleasure to look at," he said. "Art has many different ways of getting to people. You don't have to gain insights or messages, or grasp symbols."
There is an energy to Salerno's works that isn't obvious at first. While the message or lack thereof can be found in the eye of the beholder, the layered and textured affects of the pieces make them undeniably complex. One untitled painting appears to be rendered in primarily black, pink and green, and a viewer - this viewer, anyway - might imagine looking up and into a forest of black trees as they catch fire. Still, there's a tangible difference between Salerno's fire and the fire of every day reality. Salerno's pink fire is whimsically implied rather than scorchingly real.
"It's not like abstract expressionism of the '40s, when artists were trying to reveal heroic human qualities," Salerno said. When Salerno began painting, "relevance" was the buzzword of the time - but he couldn't decide what to focus on in terms of concrete, socially relevant subjects. Instead, he opted to "let the brain do the work."
A few of Salerno's works on display at Upfront are digitally rendered images with roots in traditionally painted pieces. "Somewhere in the process I was able to maintain the integrity and personality of the images," he said. The digital images were created very much in the same vein as the paintings, but the smooth surfaces have taken the place of the intricately textured wood panels and canvases. "The digital works are born out of the paintings," Benavidez said. "These works begin with source materials from the paintings and he works into them digitally."
The textures and colors of Salerno's pieces present countless layers of tiny, infinite universes in which viewers can get lost. Both abstract and sometimes hauntingly real, the pieces welcome philosophical thought as well as walking meditation and a chance to merely space out. Whatever is read between the lines is for the beholder to discover - a full spectrum of what can be imagined.
For more details and information on hours of operation, contact Upfront Gallery, 267 S. Laurel St., at 805-240-1448, or 805-405-4954.
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