Accompanies the gallery exhibition of the same name, March 17–April 30, 2016
The fifteen oil on canvas works exhibited in Twelve Days are an elegant elegy for what has served as John Moore’s principal subject for the last three decades, the urban-industrial landscape. Looking into and out of panes of glass etched with the patina of time, Moore explores how light enhances and distorts the working environments that resonate deeply with him. Built on memory, these sites reference the artist’s past while the palpable light and atmosphere direct both his and the viewer’s attention to what lays ahead.
These paintings were started in Moore’s loft studio in a former industrial area of Philadelphia, then recomposed and reworked in his newly completed home-studio in Maine. The views are composites woven together with an attention to detail that pushes an illusion of on-site specificity, though no such vantage point exists. Carefully chosen views collapse into each other as Moore paints them, establishing them just as they are—as memories. By forcing us to view what he calls “workscapes” through factory windows, Moore inserts us into his realm, while maintaining a critical distance. We are aware of the spaces and their former use, but here they represent something else. Their significance has shifted and these sites have become allegories for progress, industry, and above all, time.
The catalogue is soft cover, 24 pages, with 13 full-color illustrations, and an essay by John Yau.
ISBN 978-1-937941-09-3
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