Artist Pete Grady’s exhibition “Legends and Topographies” is as alluring as it is mysterious.
Grady entices the gallery patrons to view his work by offering them the curious juxtapositions of the conventional connecting with the strange and the digital modernism playfully dancing with the old and antique.
Each one of Grady’s work has been gridded with careful precision in order to create a chaotic and fractured structure. This structure at first seems loud and obtrusive to the eye, but with a closer look one can begin to see the subtlety each one of the box forms create.
Within every box in these grid systems, Grady is able to capture the essence of the subtle yet fragmented nature of the human mind. Much like the title of the exhibition suggests each piece maps out the inner-workings of the subconscious and gives rise to a dreamlike story of vast and highly interpretive portions.
A striking work to note in particular is “Stumpteeth.”
It’s a piece that depicts a simple stump, yet by displacing color and the placement of photograph, Grady creates a three-dimensional and jagged texture. Vibrant and strongly distorted colors run alongside the grey and heavily-shadowed panels. With this simple manipulation of shape and color Grady can call into question the very nature of the stump’s form.
Much in the same vein, Grady’s piece “Saturday Night on Cannery Row” abstracts and fractures wood as it were a puzzle waiting to be solved. Bold flames scattered across the ashen logs in a random manner, giving a strong feeling of motion and impermanence to the work.
The exhibition, overall, displays Grady’s power as an artist to create a vision of the intangible, defy preconceived visual perceptions, and to give a subtle narrative to the world.
The “Legends and Topographies” exhibit is located in the Boswell Hall Corner Gallery. It’s free to the public and will be open Monday through Friday until September 20 where there will be a closing reception from 5 to 7 p.m.
