Mark Calderon | Greg Kucera Gallery



ARTISTS EXHIBITIONS ABOUT RESALE FRANCE

Mark Calderon | Sculpture

Show of Hands
November 3 - December 23, 2016

Seattle Magazine, December review:
A 'Show of Hands' for Enduring Seattle Artist, Mark Calderon
Celebrated artist Mark Calderon marks 30 years in Seattle with his 10th solo show at Greg Kucera Gallery
by Florangela Davila

The Seattle Times, November 22 review:
At Greg Kucera, catch 2 Seattle artists at the top of their game
Reviews of two masterful exhibitions at Greg Kucera Gallery: Mark Calderon's "Show of Hands" and Jeffrey Simmons' "Open Work: Recent Watercolors."
by Michael Upchurch

Seattle Met, November 29
A Fiendish Conversation with Mark Calderon
The Seattle artist creates hands of stone and fighters of felt for his new Greg Kucera Gallery exhibit, 'Show of Hands.'
by Seth Sommerfield

Show of Hands
The Fighters focus on the body—its heroic power, agility, expressiveness, and its vulnerability, pain, and ultimate demise. Both images are based on iconic photographs of Muhammad Ali. In exploring the issues of human victory and defeat, I was drawn to work with industrial felt, a soft, warm, and yielding material not typically associated with masculine iconography.
—Mark Calderon

PLEASE FORGIVE ME, 2023
Beads and fabric
91 x 38 inches
$8,000

2016 exhibition, Show of Hands through December 23.

HAND, 2016
Acrylic modified gypsum
8 x 7 x .5 inches
Edition of 3
$2,000

FANNING, 2016 (installation view on left wall)
Acrylic modified gypsum
8 x 33.5 x .25 inches as installed
Edition of 3
$2,500

Additional view of FANNING

GREATEST, 2015
Cast bronze
9 x 15.75 inches
Edition of 5
Price on request

UNTITLED, 2016
Gilded bronze and polycarbonate
62 x 23.5 x 1.25 inches
Edition of 3
$9,000

FIGHTER (Blue), 2016
Dyed industrial felt
50 x 23 x .5 inches
Edition of 3
$5,800

FIGHTER (Orange), 2016
Dyed industrial felt
62 x 22 x .5 inches
Edition of 3
$6,500

UNTITLED, 2016
Cast lead
5 x 4.25 x 2.25 inches
Edition of 5
Price on request

Show of Hands
I am aware that my hands are always in front of me, so maybe it was inevitable that they would become a subject for my work. The Manus series was created after I cut out a tracing of my hands and forearms, pinned them to my studio wall, and kept looking at them for months as I read and thought about hands as an emblem of human existence and activity. In the prehistoric North American "Hopewell" culture, there is a well-known and beautiful example of a hand, cut from mica. This was the inspiration to use mica for this series. Initially I envisioned them as apparitions from a post-human future--temporary, fading away, powerless, apologetic (Crossed, Protective, Resigned). As I moved through the series the hands became more active, political and about race. In Cry, in which the hands are positioned to amplify the voice, I used a dark amber mica. Reversal of Fortune is based on a painting by Caravaggio called The Fortune Teller in which a wealthy and naive young man is having his palm read by a seemingly innocent girl. While he flirtatiously gazes into her eyes she slips the ring off his finger. In my version it is the lighter-toned hand that plays the deceitful role.
—Mark Calderon

MANUS (Cry), 2016
Mica
12 x 30.5 inches
Edition of 3
$2,500