Richard Allen Morris "Morris Code - works from 1957 to 2007"

Peter Blum Gallery

poster for Richard Allen Morris "Morris Code - works from 1957 to 2007"

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Richard Allen Morris: Morris Code is comprised of paintings and objects from the late 1950s up to 2007. Morris often is referred to as a “painter’s painter,” who has throughout his career predominantly explored the potential of painting. The self-thought Morris is based in San Diego, well off the beaten track of the international art scene. Nevertheless, he has always been keenly aware of the history of art as well as contemporary movements. Working in a bookstore for the last fifty years, gave Morris access to a variety of art magazines, which he studied and collected obsessively. His incisive observational skills allowed him to adopt many different styles throughout his career, pushing his work to the limits of the tension between object and relief as well as playfully teasing the border between representation and abstraction. Morris’ work is anchored in a restless engagement with Abstract Expressionism, something he often translates into a more accessible Pop format. These distinctive qualities have made his close friend, John Baldessari, who Morris met in the 1950s, an important advocate of his work.

In the 1960s Morris produced a series of caricature-like close-ups of heads as well as 3-dimensional gun objects. For these guns, which he continued creating through the 1990s, Morris assembles materials that are readily available (cardboard, wood, old paint tubes, recycled canvas) into poignant visual commentaries of our time. Around 1974 his paintings became increasingly abstract and focused on small formats, often using leftover wood as a painting support. In these different series, Morris squeezed paint straight out of the tube onto the canvas, applied thick paint with a palette knife onto long slats of wood, or reused old cut-up paintings to create colorful new collages.

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Schedule

from March 21, 2009 to May 02, 2009

Opening Reception on 2009-03-21 from 18:00 to 20:00

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