Exhibition

BFA Visual & Critical Studies presents “Adoration,” an exhibition of paintings and drawings by John-Michael Byrd and Wayde McIntosh. Curated by the artists, the exhibition will be on view from Wednesday, October 20, through Friday, November 12, 2021, at the SVA Flatiron Project Space, 133/141 West 21st Street, New York, NY. The gallery is safely viewable from the sidewalk.

Over the last year, like many creative entities, John-Michael Byrd and Wayde McIntosh have reflected on whom and what should be uplifted, supported and revered. “Adoration” and the subsequent works in this intimate exhibition developed from discussions of and witnessing who deserves a place of adoration, admiration, devotion and praise.

In their respective art practices, Byrd and McIntosh, while seemingly different in approach, lay bare and uplift those people, spaces, objects and concepts that might be overlooked or avoided in canonical glorification.

John-Michael Byrd’s work’s mission centers on centrifuging the absurd, poetic, emotional and sacred, anointing banal images into a venerable status. Whether silly, shocking, kitschy, queer or intentionally clumsy, his work captures the cartoonish, outlandish and watery run-off of dreams. His paintings on transparent mylar reflect a tradition of wet into wet painting smashed together with the subversion of traditional animation techniques, art historical erasures and eclectic mystical subject matter.

Wayde McIntosh’s work deals with many social issues that have turned institutions of all kinds on their heads in the last years. Focusing primarily on figural portraiture, his small-scale, highly detailed drawings shine a light on the gaps in historical representation of people in highly documented institutions. His sensual handling of material redirects the viewer to question who should be put on pedestals, who should be knocked off of them and what a sitter role even entails in that process. The portraits featured in “Adoration” depict some of the office service staff at SVA who have been coming in tirelessly during the lockdown and remote working since the pandemic forced many of us to work remotely.

Both artists work at SVA as Academic Advisors, enabling them to guide young artists into exploring their own histories and mine those narratives for their own work.