The first image you see here is from Brian Scott Campbell's MFA thesis show at Rutger's university. Sometimes it's important to understand the scale of a piece, something that is easily lost when looking at art via the internet. Bigger is not better, and I've posted plenty of artists who work meticulously small. But then, sometimes it is. The scale of these graphite on paper drawings is well matched to the monumental imagery he portrays. "The Complex" strikes me as a kind of utopian fantasy, a blend of grand architecture and natural beauty. But there is something subtly ominous about it as well, that recalls Coleridge's Xanadu before it's destruction. But maybe that's just me. I'm prone to apocalyptic fantasy. The stars that girdle the mountaintop seem to echo the logo of Paramount Pictures suggesting it's all some hazy Hollywood projection? And the strange vortex that may or may not be forming in the upper right is open to anyone's guess. His earlier drawings reveal more obsession with monumental future/modern architecture. But it's his slightly hazy dreamlike technique that breathes real life into it all. See more at his website: www.brianscottcampbell.com
(please click on the images to view them larger. Sometimes it really matters)
Installation view of "The Complex"
"The Complex" 2010 MFA show
"The Complex" detail
part of a series entitled "Fugitive Kind" 2010 MFA show
"Overlook" 2009
"Finer Passing Days" 2009
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Brian Scott Campbell
Posted on 9:05 AM by Unknown
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