McKay- Exhibition Announcement

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MINDBENDING LIGHT PROJECTIONS

by GLENN MCKAY
at
San Francisco Museum Of Modern Art

An exhibition presenting four projected light installations by legendary Bay Area artist Glenn McKay will be on view from February 4 to April 25, 1999 at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). The exhibition Glenn McKay: Altered States-Light Projections 1966--1999, organized by SFMOMA Curator of Media Arts Robert R. Riley, features one light installation from each of the last four decades, demonstrating the artistic innovation and revolutionary application of image and communication technology to art.

Glenn McKay (b. 1936) developed his concept for light shows in the 1960s as a result of his exposure to the light projections at Ken Kesey's "acid tests." It was then that the young artist realized the great creative potential of light as an immediate, spontaneous form of expression. In 1967, McKay founded his light show company Head Lights, which produced live light performances corresponding to the electronically amplified music of the era. McKay's light projections created fluid, abstract imagery from biological stains, aniline dyes and oil-resistant techniques of watercolor, resulting in shifting, biomorphic forms on the same large scale as cinema. In 1968, the Whitney Museum of American Art presented a "multi-sensory evening" and showcased Glenn McKay's Head Lights with music by Jefferson Airplane and noted classical pianist Raymond Lewenthall. McKay's innovation popularized. the art form of the "light show," which he described as painting with light. Riley states: "This exhibition stresses the investigation of light and time as content in art expressed in technological media. The collection of original materials, slides, film, and images that McKay has produced since the 1960s--archived by the artist--establishes the conventions of the medium and provides SFMOMA with an unprecedented opportunity to review the history of a fugitive art form. The artist's most recent works with projected light and sound combine original photographic processes with new computer technologies and electronic-image projection."

In his early works, McKay worked with a bank of ten slide projectors and two oil-dish projectors, two motorized color wheels, overhead projectors and a library of thousands of hand-painted slides, all from more than 30 years of dedication to his art form. Each hand-painted slide incorporated what the artist considered the basic elements of this art form: composition, form, color and movement. The projected myriad colors, textures and patterns, took the viewer through strange and beautiful landscapes fusing sight and sound. McKay preferred rear-screen projections to create his moving paintings so that colorful shapes were beamed through rather than reflected from the screen. A 45-minute show may have used over 500 slides.

With the proliferation of computer-based imaging in the 1990s, McKay continues to explore innovations in digital technology. Currently, he creates complex textures and forms in a liquid medium using a variety of dyes and paints at the molecular level of resolution, translated as digital information at a level of clarity not afforded by photographic projection technology.

The installation at SFMOMA will feature one piece from each decade--1960s, 1970s, 1980s and 1990s--each projected on a 20-by-16-foot screen. Hand-painted slides and digital works displayed on liquid-crystal and plasma screens--the newest image-display technology--will also be presented as complement to the large-scale works.

McKay's earliest work on view, from 1966, was created with over 100 apparatuses including hand-colored slides, slide and overhead projectors, and color wheels. The ten-minute piece is set to the music of Jefferson Airplane. This work was designed to enable viewers to see themselves through the medium, conveying the sense of living in an ecstatic era released from restrictions of society.

In the 1970s, McKay continued working with a saturated colors, but he began incorporating images of contemporary cultural icons and newsmakers. The piece from 1973 on view in the exhibition contains images of pills, marijuana leaves and the Zig Zag Man (an advertising figure), to name a few. The music in this work is synthesized electronically, anticipating the disco culture.

In the 1980s, McKay worked with a kaleidoscope of contemporary music ranging from African drumming to jazz to ambient electronic music, which vitalized and contextualized his visuals. The artist experimented with shapes, silhouettes, patterning and light-and-dark contrasts using images inspired by his world travels. His installation from 1983 depicts linear, geometric designs, calling to mind the color studies of Josef Albers, who considered color a primary pictorial element equally important to form. McKay believed that the simplicity of color allowed a true and direct expression of his forms at the most elemental level.

McKay's latest work, from 1998, is created with two slide projectors combined with one source of moving light. In recent years McKay has achieved a careful balance between the spontaneity and exuberance of his earlier work and the more disciplined approach to form and color exemplified in his work of the 1980s and early 1990s. Featuring brightly pulsating colors juxtaposed with rough black brushstrokes, McKay's new set of discoveries reveal how light relates to darkness by constructing a balanced palette of painted light and negative space. Multi-disciplinary sounds of the North Indian sarod, Celtic harp, contemporary cello and synthesizers accompany this work.

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is a private, not-for-profit institution supported by its members, individual contributors to Donor Circle, corporate and foundation support, federal and state government grants, and admission revenues. Annual programming is sustained through the generosity of the Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund.

Hours: Open daily (except Wednesdays) 11 a.m.-6 p.m.; extended summer hours (Memorial DayÐLabor Day) 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; open late Thursdays until 9 p.m.; closed Wednesdays and the following public holidays: Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New YearÕs Day Admission prices: Adults $8; seniors (62 years and older) $5; students with valid ID $4. SFMOMA members and children twelve and under are admitted free. The first Tuesday of each month admission is free. Thursday evenings, 6-9 p.m., admission is half price.

Visit our website at http://www.sfmoma.org or call 415/357-4000 for more information.

Created by jeremy
Last modified 2005-08-24 17:58