Casey Gray
Still Life with Flowers No. 40 (Tangled Up in Blue), 2020

aerosol acrylic, fluid acrylic, molding paste, aerosol glitter, ink on panel
48”H x 61”W

ARTWORK STATEMENT:

My work has always dealt with the organization of experience as a way of processing. While first and foremost a still life of flowers, my goal with this painting was to imbue it with additional layers of meaning beyond just a pretty arrangement, as a response and reflection on what has been one of the most difficult years of our lives. The monochromatic tones are a direct metaphor for the loss and melancholy of the last year, and of course a nod to Picasso’s famous blue period. The flowers burst out of a figurative vase, classically symbolic of the body and human spirit, in a chaotic tangle of color, pattern and texture, representing the collision of thoughts and emotions inside one’s head. Dystopic and optimistic all at once.

Artist Bio:

Casey Gray (b. 1983, Palo Alto, CA) is a contemporary artist working primarily as a painter, but he also makes sculpture, illustration, and site-specific murals. His work examines and celebrates our collective entanglement with the dignity and reality of the everyday. He engages the symbolic potential of objects and symbols to tell stories and inform identity. Gray received his MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2010 and has exhibited extensively across the United States and abroad.