Ardent Mystic: Morris Graves, Mariah Robertson, Letha Wilson
Heroes Gallery is pleased to present works by Mariah Robertson and Letha Wilson in conversation with historical paintings by Pacific Northwest luminary Morris Graves. As the first exhibition of Heroes’ curatorial residency at Seattle’s studio e gallery, this show pairs Graves with contemporary artists exploring landscape, the passage of time, nature’s ephemerality, and materiality.
It’s easy to argue that all artists are mystics; contemplation, self-surrender, seeking a unifying absolute and bringing form to the immaterial are all required, at some level, for an individual to make art. But Morris Graves was truly a mystic in its most traditional sense, going so far as to solidify an artistic movement defined by a 1953 Life Magazine article as the “Mystic Painters of the Northwest.” Isolating himself from the noise of the modern world and heavily influenced by Hinduism, Daoism and Zen Buddhism, Graves found solace from the suffering of the Second World War in the plants, animals and vistas of western Washington.
The two pieces in this exhibition, both painted within months of his release from a military prison for declaring himself a pacifist, depict a waterfall’s riotous white spray and glistening black rocks. Formal meditations on the enlightening and cleansing powers of nature, they express his desire to, “plumb or explode (his) belief that the spirit and content, as well as the form, painting contains—not only sustains but renews the inner meaning of living.”
Mariah Robertson is both a mystic and anarchist. Breaking every rule of photography, from removing the camera entirely to the dissolution of subject and gaze, Robertson’s photochemical galaxy-like works capture the ephemerality of a solitary darkroom performance. Working without light and in personal protective equipment, Robertson hand cuts rolls of paper and treats them with dizzying arrays of chemicals. Inspired by conceptual performance work of the 1970s and traditions of drag, persona and improvisation, her works aim to express an intangible energy in physical form. Forever a rule breaker, Robertson’s opal cosmos is more dark matter than galaxy.
Initially frustrated by the photograph’s inertness, Letha Wilson aims to synthesize landscape photography with sculptural form. The tradition of landscape photography in the United States has built our national identity; reinforcing a Manifest Destiny ethos with steadfast demand for control, dominance and frame. On top of this complicated history, Wilson folds into her work a visceral, occasionally spiritual, relationship we each have with the natural world. She describes her works as “capturing atmosphere” and “recognizing fleeting moments,” a meditation on form, texture and structure very similar to Graves’ quiet moments with the waterfalls of the Pacific Northwest.