CHRISTOPHER BALES
Archetypal Memory
Showing with Click Mort, Aaron Rivera, Edward Robin Coronel
July 3 – August 2, 2015
Artist reception: Friday, July 3rd; 8-11PM
LA LUZ DE JESUS GALLERY
4633 Hollywood Blvd,
Los Angeles, CA 90027
(323) 666-7667
www.laluzdejesus.com
Garage sales, flea markets, antique stores, junk yards: these are places you might find me rummaging over display tables or inside water stained boxes looking for any object that asks me politely to take it home. I place my excavations on one of dozens of dusty shelves where they may sit for years waiting to be put to use.
My sculptures are created in a similar way. I start by collecting a pile of objects. The artwork defines itself as these seemingly unrelated items are constructed. Sometimes the concept is immediately clear, other times I have to wait for it to be finished to find the meaning. This subliminal way of working preserves the mystery and spontaneity in my art, managing to keep the process fresh.
My work represents oddities I have discovered stumbling around the attic of my subconscious, touching on universal icons that find their way to the surface. My hope is that the viewer will be disturbed, amused, intrigued, or at least curious about what I have created.- Christopher Bales
It seems cheap to pigeonhole assemblage artist Christopher Bales‘ work as merely steampunk: His aesthetic is older than that. Although he sometimes uses antique and vintage materials associated with the genre, such as metal cogs, the final product often looks more like an altar constructed from the rubble of a pre-Victorian cathedral. Bales, who has been assembling these intricate sculptures since 1989, said he sources “an enormous amount of objects”-like broken wooden boxes, dolls, clocks, picture frames, figurines-from his weekly visits to flea markets and thrift stores. When he starts a new piece, he says he doesn’t have a preconceived notion of what the end result will be, but following his intuition when layering cutouts of classic paintings over etchings with skulls and religious imagery creates enough detail for the viewer to stay engaged but not overwhelmed. -Shoka, Sacramento Bee
