EXHIBITION PREVIEW
Photography by Kim Curry
CKUT Monday Morning After Radio Montreal - Zeke’s Alternative Art Interview
Interview with Chris ‘Zeke’ Hand, July 27, 2009
Patrick Duegaw show opens at Wichita Art Museum
Wichita Eagle Podcast, March 2009
WAM’s Executive Director, Charles K. Steiner and Patrick Duegaw discuss the meaning of “The Builder” and more
March 2009
The Builder, Removed: Scenes from the Painted Theatre Project premiered in spring of 2009 in the Beren and Graves Galleries.
STEINER: Can you describe your forthcoming show in general terms so that the reader can learn what he or she can expect to see?
DUEGAW: This exhibition, entitled “The Builder, Removed: Scenes From the Painted Theatre Project” will feature between 80-100 representational paintings and drawings executed on surfaces ranging from salvaged sheetrock to old architectural documents and various other discarded materials; depicting portraits, interiors, and artifacts. This concept incorporates my interest in storytelling, and spans several genres--painting and drawing, writing, and architecture. The Painted Theatre Project is an investigation of both the imagery and narrative possibilities of the theater, and how they relate to my environment, and of my own abilities as a multidisciplinary artist.
STEINER: What is the role of narrative in your show? Do the works tell a story as a group?
DUEGAW: I am telling a multi-layered tale of construction; not only within a metaphorical context in the lives of each character featured, but also by making transparent the process involved in the creation of each painted or drawn piece. Spanning ten years, the body of work that is the Painted Theatre Project, or Still Play, is an on-going documentary that is part installation, part theater production, where, in place of thespians, objects, and a stage, it instead features painted characters, props, and set. Likewise, the action taking place is rendered to imply movement, rather than actually performed; the dialog, in the form of accompanying texts, is written rather than spoken.
STEINER: I'm interested in the theatrical references to your work as "static theatre productions", rather like the old fashioned theatrical tableaus. Do you think of your images as being on a proscenium arch?
DUEGAW: Unlike the Proscenium Arch example, an end-on stage model where the audience’s attention is directed to the front of a grand, elevated platform, I would say that my Painted Theatre is more like a reverse theater-in-the-round. Reverse, in that rather than the audience encircling performers on a central stage, it is the other way around, with the ‘actors’ and drama instead surrounding the viewers. In this way, it is more like audience-in-the-round, where it is the audience that supplies the ‘performance’.
STEINER: Who is the Builder?
DUEGAW: The namesake for this most recent Still Play ‘performance’ features a ‘Fifth Business’* type character, known only as The Builder, who has created a multi-faceted interior environment with a series of specific tools. The Builder’s primary role lies not in the actual construction of the lives of his characters, but, instead, in the documentation of their subsequent interaction, defined solely by their co-existence.
*The definition that Canadian novelist Robertson Davies offers in the preface to his book Fifth Business: “Those roles which, being neither those of Hero nor Heroine, Confidante nor Villain, but which were nonetheless essential to bring about the Recognition or the denouement, were called the Fifth Business in drama and opera companies organized according to the old style; the player who acted these parts was often referred to as Fifth Business.”
STEINER: Despite appearances of arbitrariness in the juxtapositions of sheetrock scraps, wood, etc, your work gives evidence of a very academic and traditional training, especially with regard to your fine drawing. Where were you trained? How did you ever get the idea of combining your traditional training with such unconventional materials?
DUEGAW: I was actually trained as an architect, receiving my degree at Kansas State University. The program was fairly regimented, but I did manage to squeeze in some great fine art drawing and print-making classes. However, the majority of my art education came from my years at the Fisch Haus, where there continues to exist a constructive studio environment. The use of salvaged materials is as much inevitable as it is a desire to experiment, based on what we had to work with. This approach to art, as well as to design, in my mind, is as distinctly Fisch Haus as it is my own. Almost all of the artwork, framing, as well as the construction of the spaces and some of the furniture within these spaces, were built using elements that were readily available.
STEINER: Thank you very much, Patrick for sharing your insights on your work
March 14, 2009
Self Portraits (3:51)
a film by Patrick Duegaw