Yesterday at Second Street Gallery I went to a "Forum" featuring Michael Fitts. It's a new thing the Gallery is doing for memebers - having a lunch and conversation with an artists. Fitts is open and engaging and we all sat around talking about his work.
I have seen some of his paintings around - they're very realistic things painted in the center of a piece of scrap metal. I never knew what to think about them. There's mileage in rusted metal, there's a wow factor in the well done photo-style paint and the centered composition makes anything he places there feel special and holy.
His answers about content were about intuition and following his instincts, and he denied any specific agenda. To me the work is about spotlighting the everyday, making the mundane holy. He spoke about Warhol and Schwitters, and those fit right in.
UPDATE: Two things - First, there's been some trouble commenting on this post. I have not been deleting any comment - I think Blogger ate tham. Try again and maybe it'll work.
Second, in re-reading this post I want to make it clear that I like Fitts' work - I think he's a good artist and the questions he asks himself are the ones I ask myself. I've been under a crazy deadline recently so I'm blogging lightly, and writing quickly when I do post, so I don't think my opinion of his work got though clearly.
1 comment:
Michael Fitts is a God.
If only he would have followed through on the trade we were supposed to do. At this point it's probably 3 of my pieces for one of his small ones.
;)
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