| Background: |
Alchemy, The Cross Projects, features 150 mixed
media, cross paintings by Los Angeles-based artist
Craig Keith Antrim. Of these, 144 crosses belong to
a specific installation, with the remaining six paintings
representing the artist’s ongoing fascination
with a symbol that traces back to the caves of our
Neolithic ancestors. There is probably no symbol laden
with more meaning than the cross, which has manifest
in nearly every religion and culture around the globe.
The cross points to a mystery that evokes a sense of
the spiritual paralleling our ongoing emersion in the
realm of the material.
Alchemy
had, as one of its intentions, the transformation of that material world, called
prima materia, into the purest element then known, gold, a symbol of spiritual
enlightenment. The alchemical processes, involving water, heat, drying, evaporation
and other techniques, is at the heart of Antrim’s work. By taking wax,
oil, acrylic, pigment, canvas and wood, he transforms this prima materia, into
multi-layered, corporeal works of art, each, an individual encounter with the
psyche and the mystery of the unconscious. For Antrim, creating each painting,
is similar to cutting a diamond, each facet revealing the nature of the stone
more clearly, and making it more brilliant and true to its nature. In the context
of this exhibition, alchemy is the process of real physical transformation
of matter, and the revealing of the content and nature of the unconscious. |
