Adam Mysock
Our Legacy of Engagement

Name: Our Legacy of Engagement
Brand: Adam Mysock
Price: 12500 USD
Availability: InStock

About the Item

after: “La Lutte” by Émile Friant, 1889 Framed: 10h x 8.50w in As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been particularly struck by the staggering number of unintended consequences political (and typically military) actions tend to have for decades after they’re made. You’d think that we’ve been a country long enough to recognize that our decisions matter now AND in the future. We have enough data, enough history, to evaluate the trends accurately. And we can observe other nations’ consequences from afar and take heed. But that’s not the context in which we live. Our political leadership seems to be required to function in the “now.” We make decisions with concern for their effect on tomorrow, not next year. And yet, time, space, nature, any number of cosmic-scaled phenomena don’t care about our myopia. Time knows that our behavior has ramifications. Whether we’d like it to or not, the battles we wage now influence the relationships of members of the next generations. For this piece, I’ve stacked two boys wrestling in Émile Friant’s La Lutte into a diminishing pyramid. Early foundational actions are repeated through future generations, with each new layer becoming less than its ancestors simply because it continues a struggle without pause. The smaller figures simply imitate the maneuvers of their supporting predecessors, never looking upward or outward. Decisions made by the base reduce the substance of the highest members of the lineage. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been particularly struck by the staggering number of unintended consequences political (and typically military) actions tend to have for decades after they’re made. You’d think that we’ve been a country long enough to recognize that our decisions matter now AND in the future. We have enough data, enough history, to evaluate the trends accurately. And we can observe other nations’ consequences from afar and take heed. But that’s not the context in which we live. Our political leadership seems to be required to function in the “now.” We make decisions with concern for their effect on tomorrow, not next year. And yet, time, space, nature, any number of cosmic-scaled phenomena don’t care about our myopia. Time knows that our behavior has ramifications. Whether we’d like it to or not, the battles we wage now influence the relationships of members of the next generations. For this piece, I’ve stacked two boys wrestling in Émile Friant’s La Lutte into a diminishing pyramid. Early foundational actions are repeated through future generations, with each new layer becoming less than its ancestors simply because it continues a struggle without pause. The smaller figures simply imitate the maneuvers of their supporting predecessors, never looking upward or outward. Decisions made by the base reduce the substance of the highest members of the lineage. ABOUT THE ARTIST Adam Mysock was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1983 - the son of an elementary school English teacher and a lab technician who specializes in the manufacturing of pigments. On account of a steady stream of folk tales from his mother, his father's vividly dyed work clothes, and a solid Midwestern work ethic, he developed an interest in painting and drawing all things Americana from a very early age. Mysock earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Painting and Art History by 2004 from Tulane University. He then received an MFA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. After his studies, he became the mural coordinator for the City of Cincinnati's MuralWorks mural program and worked as an adjunct drawing professor at Sinclair Community College in Dayton. In the summer of 2008, Mysock became a Professor of Practice at Tulane University where he currently teaches and maintains a studio. Mysock's work has been exhibited in Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois, Georgia, Mississippi and Louisiana and is in private collections across the US, including those of Thomas Coleman and Michael Wilkinson. He was a 2009 jury winner in the annual No Dead Artists juried exhibition. On August 4th, 2012 he was awarded first prize “Best in Show” in the Ogden Museum’s Louisiana Contemporary Annual Juried Exhibition. Mysock exhibited at Pulse Miami Art Fair in December 2012 with Jonathan Ferrara Gallery and he was selected for the 2013 Edition of New American Paintings. Mysock was exhibited in a solo project booth at the VOLTA9 Art Fair in Basel, Switzerland where he was acquired by the SØR Rusche Collection. In 2016, Mysock’s work was featured in a Baroque and Contemporary group exhibition from the SØR Rusche Collection, Oelde/Berlin at Kunsthalle Jesuitenkirche as well as in a solo exhibition entitled When Everything Was Wonderful Tomorrow at Galerie Andreas Binder in Munich, Germany. His work was also featured in EXCHANGE, an international exhibition at Galerie Jochen Hempel, Berlin. Furthermore, Mysock was recently selected as one of two recipients of the fifth Manifest Artist Residency (MAR) Award upon his return to his hometown. Mysock currently lives and works in Cincinatti, Ohio. "I’m a revisionist history painter. Rather than rewrite the narrative of the past to justify an ideology, I repaint yesterday’s imagery in order to rationalize our present circumstances. Telling stories is a part of human nature; it’s how we relate to one another. The stories we have in common help us create sincere connections to our neighbors and our surroundings. What’s more, storytelling – for better or worse – typically involves hyperbole. We tend to exaggerate; we tend to lie. Generally, we believe we control our narrative embellishments. What gets exaggerated from one telling to another gets exaggerated to challenge our listeners. What gets repeated gets repeated because it resonates with them. What gets omitted gets left out because it’s lost its meaning. We actively use embellishment to keep our audiences engaged. Given enough distance, however, sources and accuracy fade out and substitutions become the new norms. Quietly, time redefines what is truth and what is fiction. As a painter, I’m preoccupied by the undeniable role that the image plays in creating this acceptance of the fictional. A painting has the authority to make the intangible concrete, and a series of them has the ability to authenticate a fabrication in our collective memory. When I begin a piece, I typically start with preexisting images, artifacts from this collective remembrance. I look for images that shape my pictorial consciousness, that are hard to question because when I first saw them they were presented as the truth. They have to capture my imagination and they have to feel largely descriptive of a greater story. From them, I’m given my task – I have to “disrepair” them. I have to consolidate an earlier world of historical and cultural visual-fact with an evolving understanding of subtlety and gradation. I find that the discrepancies I discover between the absolute and the nuanced inspire me most. The resultant work is largely about storytelling, the ownership and authorship of our culture’s visual narratives, and the parallels between those tales. It’s meant to challenge the truth of “source” and the source of truth. After all, as Franz Kafka once wrote, "It is hard to tell the truth, for although there 'is' one, it is alive and constantly changes its face."

Creator:

Adam Mysock (1983, American)

Dimensions:

Height: 8 in (20.32 cm)Width: 6.5 in (16.51 cm)

Medium:

Panel,Acrylic

Movement & Style:

Contemporary

Period:

21st Century

Condition:

Gallery Location: