Art Lies, Volume 23, Summer 1999 Page: 43
60 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 28 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Jake Gilson
WILLIAM CAMPBELL CONTEMPORARY ART
FORT WORTH
by Joel WeinsteinNo doubt you have heard some variation of the
old blues refrain, "If it wasn't for bad luck, I
wouldn't have no luck at all," and it is hard not to
think of these lines when confronting the heavi-
ness of Jake Gilson.
Gilson makes pictures on steel with gun
bluing, and he sometimes scratches the surfaces
of these pieces with images that resemble bowls,
cups or barrels. He also paints and draws furi-
ously on paper. None of these works look
weighty, exactly. On the contrary, the images of
vessels afloat in stygian ethers, some shining
through the murk as if charged with supernatural
currents, seem perpetually adrift. They hover in
front of you, or lose themselves in a vastness that
may be heaven or may be the great Nada.
From a distance, these spirit craft appear
like shadows or evanescing vapors or, if you're so
inclined, angels on the wing. They can be quite
subtle-look hard at the steel composition Soak
and you might glimpse a faint stain within its
flinty depths, like the once-living lichen on a slab
of basalt-or as brilliant as the twin sapphire
whirlwinds on paper, Blue Cineraries [sic] #31,
whose gay, forthright energy you would never
take for sarcophagi unless you read the title with
a good unabridged dictionary at hand.
Gilson's outlook seems downright sunny if
you consider only the work. You could read him
as an art historical smart guy, full of pop-culture
playfulness. The mighty metallic Lift, for
example, blasts the cozy Campbell gallery like an
alien ship from an effects-crazed Hollywood
scare-fest. It looms heftily and gleams like a brand
new auto body, its great cup swooping through
an orderly constellation of white dots and a
dizzying backwash of grays and rusts and browns.
Result, with its series of bristly energies
ascending into the night like ghost matched
crockery, is glistening and kinetic, in contrast to
its shadowy neighbor, the barely-there Soak, and
both pieces have expertly screwed, hand cut and
welded metal frames that, for all of their rough
patina, are reminiscent of Donald Judd's
polished, precisely machined metal boxes lined
up in the Marfan desert.
But if Gilson is having at us with carefree
bons motts, he tosses them off with no small
amount of consideration aforethought. Howneatly finished all his metalwork is: even the
matte surfaces have the fine, pebbly consistency
of lithography. You might wonder where he is
going with some of his moves-those scratches
may be excellent lines, but they often work
against the lustrous depths and movement he has
fashioned by color alone-though you have to
admire his thorough and zealous curiosity. In
fact, when you turn to the works on paper, you
might finally ask yourself, "Is there anything
Gilson doesn't do with industrial strength?"
Take the window-sized Double Blue Floats.
It is only nominally blue, its replicate vessels
really painted a heavy, waxy black, with
thumbprints of cobalt winking through here andthere like alluring accidents. The inky hemi-
spheres swim in a slather so ruddy you could
imagine it was squeezed from a martyr's still-
beating heart by the artist's own hands.
Laugh, or wince, if you will, but read the
artist's statement. This is when your troubles
begin.
"I am wondering about the intangible
nature of death," Gilson writes. "I look for clues
that will give my own death some meaning. In
that context I try to find a sense of place, mind-
fulness, mystery, solitude, and balance.
Understanding death will allow me to under-
stand my life."
So if it turns out that Gilson's works are not
at all the winsome posers of a typical-and, by
now, tired-postmodernity, they might be quite
nearly perfect for the queasy moment that he
dwells in as an artist-philosopher. He proceeds
with a fury, but also with an exquisite conscien-
tiousness, like someone who believes it is his bad
luck, and his good, to be alive. OJake Gilson
Blue Cinararys #31, 1999
watercolor, oil pastel on paper, 16" x 23"
Photo: Courtesy of the ArtistARTLIES SUMMER 1999 43
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Lightman, Victoria H. Art Lies, Volume 23, Summer 1999, periodical, 1999; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth228053/m1/45/?q=%22Bryant%2C+John%22: accessed May 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .