Press

Seemingly from nowhere, Scotland-based artists have achieved a sustained level of international prominence in the past decade. A pluralism of ideas and media that defies any singular definition is perhaps, ironically, a defining feature of their work. The relative lack of artistic tradition combined with the absence of private patronage has created a spirit of self-determination that has resulted in artists establishing their own structures – opening their own galleries, forming discussion groups and organizing events. Such an independent spirit also directly informs practice, as artists apply similarly unique approaches to their material, economic and social surroundings. …

Alan Michael’s paintings and drawings recall works made by adolescents who fastidiously reproduce images of their idols in pencil and paint on paper. Michael’s works however draw from a more idiosyncratic canon, framing an unlikely succession of figures to create a variety of fantasy groupings. Michael is interested in the ways in which other industries such as advertising, cinema, and design adapt iconic images freely and unselfconsciously. In his attempt to apply a similarly free approach to his work Michael has composed complex images in different styles and media utilizing figures appropriated from works by an eclectic mixture of twentieth century figurative painters including Balthus, Lucien Freud, Modigliani, and Phillip Pearlstein. Such works recall in some way Paul Thek’s Television Analyzations (1963).

While the ‘mechanical eyes’ that distort culture fascinated Thek, Michael’s interest lies in the wider distortion of received ideas of cultural heritage as he revitalizes over-exposed, familiar imagery.

Recent works by Alan Michael have appropriated similarly well-known works by twentieth century photographers. An extensive group of paintings, which includes Untitled (Captain) (2001), recycles the distinctive works of the photographer Horst P. Horst. The paintings merge Horst’s own process of appropriating the works of others – his dramatically lit photographs of classical sculptures – together with the fashion work that they so directly inspired. The painting Misty in Roots (2001) is a proposal for a fictitious magazine cover. The work takes its name from the legendary British dub band of the 1980s.