Take Me to Your Leader
by Gordon Carlisle
Toaster
by Gordon Carlisle
Femme Repose Avec Une Saucisse Fumee
by Gordon Carlisle
October 1 to November 30, 2008
Artist Reception: Saturday, November 4, 5pm
prior to performance of "In My Head I’m Thin"
Gordon Carlisle is the October visual artist in the Firehouse Gallery. If you have loved his sets and props for Poolyle Productions performances, you won’t believe his paintings and collages. His work is filled with humor, whimsy, irony and political commentary…sometimes all at the same time!
I create all kinds of things.
I make my living primarily as a commissioned artist, with an emphasis on murals and public art. Secondly, I’m a theatre artist, creating music and sets, and acting with my wife Susan Poulin in original plays of ours, which we tour around the region.
I suppose one could divide my Fine Art into “ironic” and “non-ironic” works. The collages, Paint-By-Number and many of the odder paintings would fall into the “ironic” category, while the wood-scapes and other, small plein aire paintings seem more “non-ironic” to me.
I began collaging in my final year of college at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1973. A planner by nature, I’ve always found the free-associative quality of creating collages liberating. From the beginning, I’ve let the collages tell me where they want to go.
When I look back at some of those early collages, I’m struck by how contemporaneous they look to my recent work. Their surrealistic, sometimes dark but often ridiculous nature is much the same. I grew up in the 1950’s, when Life Magazine arrived every week at the house, B-Science Fiction movies flooded the screens, and printed color looked generally a little more washed out than today. This is still one of the central lenses through which I see the world.
The ironical paintings are more deliberate, more planned than the collages. I believe humor and politics belong in Art, and many of these paintings reflect that belief.
I’m still inspired by Nature, though, and get tremendous satisfaction interpreting what I run into in the woods. There’s a purity to it that’s actually not unlike creating collages. Years ago, my Father dabbled in plein aire painting, and I was fascinated watching him as a kid. He’s primarily a wordsmith by trade, and continues to inspire me as I jockey words around to make songs for our shows.
So, am I a “pluralist”? Most emphatically, yes. But the thought of only expressing myself one way, in one medium, scares the daylights out of me.
Gordon Carlisle (born 3/11/51) has been actively involved as a visual artist on the Seacoast since 1982, when he moved to New Hampshire from Montreal. A graduate of the San Francisco Art Institute, Gordon was a member of Portsmouth's Mural Works for ten years before starting his own mural painting business in 1994. He currently makes his living as a muralist, portraitist, theater artist, painter and illustrator, with a studio in Portsmouth’s Button Factory. A 1999 recipient of a New Hampshire State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship for his achievement as a muralist, Gordon's artwork has been exhibited across the U.S.
603-431-3639
info@gordoncarlisle.com
www.gordoncarlisle.com
NOTE: There is a “slide show” of Gordon’s latest outdoor mural in Somersworth, NH, in the “murals and public art” section of his web site (listed above).
"Gordon Carlisle: Woodscapes & Out-Of-His-Mind Scapes" is co-produced by the Firehouse.
Visit the artist’s web site
The Firehouse Center for the Arts Art Gallery
The Firehouse Center for the Arts features twelve gallery shows a year. Each show is selected from submissions each Spring for the following year’s shows. Gallery exhibits have included local, national and international artists and have given our community the opportunity to view a variety of artwork including photography, paintings, monotype and sculpture.
Call for Artists
Artist Submissions now being accepted. Contact Pamela at 978-499-9931 or email pamela@firehouse.org for details and an application.
