large-scale painting

Raw Reckoning Gallery Talk July 28, 2019

We are pleased to announce that Michael will be having an Artist Talk connected with his current one-person exhibition Raw Reckoning. He will be joined by Dr. Robert Cohen, an international expert on black lung. Moderator for the talk will be Adrienne Kochman, Curator of UIMA and the driving force for this exhibition. Hope all can attend Sunday, July 28th from 1 to 3pm at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago. https://uima-chicago.org/events/2019/7/28/raw-reckoning-gallery-talk

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Raw Reckoning Exhibition at UIMA Chicago

Opening Reception: 6-9pm, June 7th, 2019
On display from June 7th-August 4th, 2019

Raw Reckoning is veteran Chicago artist Michael K. Paxton’s one-person exhibition of large-scale paintings and works on paper that derive their structure from the study of slide sections of the effect of black lung disease on coalminers. Paxton, a sixth generation West Virginian creates pillar size fields of chalk, charcoal, gesso and acrylic on raw canvas that embrace this ongoing devastation from coal in an effort to point to a place and people not heard from often in contemporary art. Through a well ingrained working process of size and materials, the open-ended approach of how each painting is developed produces a colorful and awkward work of aggressive mark making that refuses to stand still. Pushing hard against expectations an otherness surrounds his work as he looks for the exact point where his bone deep Appalachian heritage can carve out a place for a heart’s desire to speak of something important, personal and yet as common as dirt. More information at https://uima-chicago.org/raw-reckoning-1

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