Gavin Perry Glacier
2247 NW 1st Place Miami, Florida
Opening Reception Friday September 10th, 2010 7 – 10 pm

Fredric Snitzer Gallery is pleased to present Gavin Perry: Glacier, opening Friday, September 10th, 2010 to launch the new season of exhibitions in his gallery at 2247 NW 1st Place. Comprised of a new series of paintings and sculpture, this exhibition will be Perry’s third at Fredric Snitzer Gallery.

A glacier is a large, long-lasting river of ice that is formed on land and moves in response to gravity. A glacier is formed by multi-year ice accretion in mountainous or sloping terrain. In this instance, Glacier is used metaphorically as a referent to the processes employed to create the objects within the exhibition. Perry makes complex paintings and sculpture whose subject is ultimately the process of their creation. Through a series of pours and spills, the artist’s control is relegated to the ideals of chance. Each layer a frozen moment that maintains a sense of fl uidity and movement.

The paintings in the exhibition are comprised of new work and existing pieces that have been re-addressed by Perry. In a departure from previous signature works, Perry has introduced new and aggressive agitations to the austere surfaces. Pours of resin, circular saw cuts, and various scratches act not merely as cancellations to the existing subjects but they resuscitate the stoic past work. Perfection is sterile. The most recent paintings embrace history with a tongue and check look at action painting. Reduced in scale these works needle the masculinity of the epic painters of the fifties and early sixties.

Sculpture, while not new in Perry’s oeuvre, takes on a much stronger role than in exhibitions of the past. By encasing found objects in layer upon layer of resin, previously discarded rubbish is given a new lease on life. The history of their decay forever sealed in resin. The pour off from the objects has been collected to form large columns that reveal their growth like rings of a tree. Frozen monuments that belie their minimalist associations through imperfect fl uidic layering.

Gavin Perry (b. 1971 Philadelphia) lives and works in Miami. Perry has had numerous solo and group exhibitions both nationally and internationally. Since receiving his BFA from the Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia PA, Perry has developed a large body of work that has been recognized by many publications including Flash Art, Art in America and Art Papers. Perry has recently exhibited in Mexico City and Paris France both with Buamet Sultana Gallerie. Spring 2011, Perry will have his second solo exhibition in Houston, TX with the Barbara Davis Gallery. In 2009, Perry was awarded the prestigious South Florida Cultural Consortium which included an exhibition at the University Galleries of FAU.