Shawn Burkard: Phantasmagoria

SHAWN BURKARD

bruno david gallery

Phantasmagoria

SHAWN BURKARDPhantasmagoria

January 22 - March 6, 2010

Bruno David Gallery3721 Washington BoulevardSaint Louis, 63108 Missouri, U.S.A.info@brunodavidgallery.comwww.brunodavidgallery.comDirector: Bruno L. David

This catalogue was published in conjunction with the exhibition Shawn Burkard: Phantasmagoria

Editor: Bruno L. DavidCatalog Designer: Yoko KiyoiDesign Assistant: Claudia R. DavidPrinted in USA

All works courtesy of Bruno David Gallery and Shawn BurkardCover image:Primitive Circle (echo replica-voices transmission, 2010 (detail)Chromogenic print20 x 24 inchesEdition of 5

Copyright © 2010 Bruno David Gallery, Inc.All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of Bruno David Gallery, Inc.

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CONTENTS

Essayby Laura Beckman

Afterword by Bruno L. David

Checklist of the Exhibition

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Essay

“Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time,

roughly a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet.” - Arthur C. Clarke

The photographs in Shawn Burkard’s 2010 exhibition, Phantasmagoria, capture precarious moments at the intersection of everyday reality

and the spirit world. After completing his 2008 exhibition of mixed media sculptures entitled Over and Over and Over, Burkard was ready

to return to the raw immediacy of the photographic image. His cut paper sculptures allowed him to become entranced by the tedium of

technical craft, thus distancing him from the initial spark of inspiration. In contrast, his current work allows little separation between the

idea and its inception, the thought and the flash of the camera. Burkard expects that his photographs will make you uncomfortable, or, at

the very least, catch you off guard. He certainly was not comfortable making them. The threat of physical peril adds tension to his work

- whether he is getting singed by a burning umbrella, hanging upside down from a rickety ladder, or tiptoeing over shards of broken glass,

he seems to enjoy flirting with disaster. Burkard poses himself in these scenarios to ensure that his artistic vision is accurately realized, but

they are by no means self-portraits. With the help of masks, capes, and a little stage makeup, he incarnates a series of ghosts, vampires, and

demons influenced by the creative wellsprings of mythology, horror films, nightmares, and popular culture.

Every cloth, stone, and fleck of paint is scrupulously composed to achieve the desired effect. His eccentric, macabre subjects amble amidst

the detritus of modern society - broken bottles, plastic flamingos, anarchic graffiti - like unlikely heroes left to fend for themselves in a cold,

unforgiving urban jungle. In the black and white photographs, he meticulously paints every colored piece of furniture or costume piece

black or white to sharpen the contrast and heighten the drama of his absurdist narratives. His compositions are deliberately claustrophobic

- the cast of characters play and posture in front of harsh concrete walls, gazing directly out of the frame as if daring the viewer to look away.

Before they are printed, he manually damages the film through a variety of chemical treatments, creating a broken, mottled effect to suggest

the dubious, uncertain world of dreams.

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Burkard forces us to move beyond blind fear of so-called ‘monsters’ and consider their humanity by placing them in mundane situations

incongruous with their daunting reputations. In “Dingbat” he pokes fun at the recent popular obsession with vampires as dark, brooding,

sex objects. Instead, he presents us with a dork - an average Joe, like the rest of us, who just happens to thirst for blood. In “Deadling In-

foline” the Angel of Death seems far less intimidating when he is caught gossiping on the telephone. Are these mythological demons really

creatures of wrath, he asks, or are they just lonely misfits stigmatized by their better adjusted peers for being different?

Burkard’s pieces remind us that the legacy of those who came before us continues to shape the patterns of our own existence. When loved

ones pass away, they are never entirely forgotten, but continue to direct our behavior and govern our thoughts many years into the future.

The acerbic piece, “Time Wounds All Heels,” in which an Atlas-like figure strains under the weight of a heavy wooden desk, implies that,

contrary to the tired cliché, some memories do not fade as easily as we would like them to.

The prints in Phantasmagoria evoke the comedic spectacle of theater of the absurd. His visions seem preposterous not because they are

foreign to us, but because they are so intimately familiar to our private lives. In “Primitive Circle (echo replica-voices transmission), he

employs a haunting double exposure to mimic the circuitous interior dialogue of a troubled mind. These images remind us that we do not

need to take recourse in folklore and fairy tales to satisfy our thirst for the extraordinary. Legend can be strange, but to quote once more

one of Burkard’s muses, Arthur C. Clarke, “The truth, as always, will be far stranger.”

—Laura Beckman

Laura Beckman is a writer and painter. She lives and works in St. Louis, Missouri. This essay is one in a series of the gallery’s exhibitions written by fellow

gallery artists and friends.

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Afterword

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I am pleased to present the work of Shawn Burkard at the Bruno David Gallery. Support for the creation of significant new works of art

has been the core to the mission and program of the Bruno David Gallery since its founding. Shawn Burkard’s remarkable and compelling

work makes him one the most impressive artist of the gallery. I would like to express my sincere thanks to Laura Beckman for her thought-

ful essay. I am deeply grateful to Yoko Kiyoi, who lent much time, talent, and expertise to the production of this catalogue.

His current photographs are Influence by horror movies, gothic novels, and such dark folklore as the Brothers Grimm, Burkard’s work

makes visible a legacy of cultural darkness. Burkard photographs scenes of his own construction, whose uncanny attributes of light, scale,

and physiognomy recall nothing so much as the psychological space of fairytales—and the nightmares such tales once provoked in all of us.

Within each of his photographs, Burkard creates a fantastical but convincing storybook world. The artist meticulously plans the lighting

and staging, hand crafts the settings, makeup, and costumes for the bizarre characters he plays in each supernatural scene. Though the artist

manipulates his film images by hand, they remain untouched by digital alterations. Burkard invites us into a realm of disturbing visions

whose creative vitality is understood once we recognize how close these dreamworlds may be to our own.

Burkard’s other work has been variously described as Pop Art, because of its source from functional objects and incorporation of commer-

cial and industrial materials; and as Minimal Art, because of its geometric forms and solid presence.

—Bruno L. David

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Checklist & Images of the Exhibition

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Hinkydink (play pin ramshackle), 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Primitive Circle (echos replica-voices transmission), 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Spades (silent fury), 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Jitters, 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Jitters, 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Hackenbush, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Dingbat, 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Skivvies, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Yitrozzu, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Cindemned / the grip of the fiend, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Pillory/Sarcophagus, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Gossip Ghoul, 2009Chromogenic print20 x 24 inches (50.80 x 60.96 cm), Edition of 5

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Time Wounds All Heals, 2009Chromogenic print24 x 20 inches (60.96 x 50.80 cm), Edition of 5

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Shawn Burkard: Phantasmagoria at Bruno David Gallery, 2010 (installation view - detail)

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Shawn Burkard: Phantasmagoria at Bruno David Gallery, 2010 (installation view - detail)

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Shawn Burkard: Phantasmagoria at Bruno David Gallery, 2010 (installation view - detail)

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Margaret Adams Dickson BeallLaura Beard Elaine Blatt Martin BriefLisa K. BlattShawn Burkard Bunny Burson Carmon Colangelo Alex Couwenberg Jill Downen Yvette Drury Dubinsky Corey Escoto Beverly Fishman

Damon Freed William Griffin Joan Hall Takashi Horisaki Kim Humphries Kelley Johnson Howard Jones (Estate) Chris Kahler Bill Kohn (Estate) Leslie Laskey Sandra Marchewa Peter MarcusGenell MillerPatricia Olynyk

ARTISTS

brunodavidgallery.com

Gary PassaniseRobert Pettus Daniel Raedeke Chris Rubin de la Borbolla Frank Schwaiger Charles Schwall Christina Shmigel Thomas SleetBuzz Spector Lindsey Stouffer Cindy Tower Mario TrejoKen Worley