Some Small Threats

Headstone is excited to announce a solo exhibition, Some Small Threats, by Michael McGrath. The show comprises drawings and paintings ranging in scale from intimate to engulfing. McGrath carefully unravels a cataloged group of characters and encounters, perpetually unsure of who exactly is the antagonist. A set of severed hands, an 8-armed bat, and/or a few anthropomorphized clouds are riddled with smirks and awkward salutations. Like a court reporter, one feels as though McGrath’s fictitious musings are moving faster than real-time. Endless dialogue and imperative details of this other world initiates curiosity in the unfamiliar.

McGrath’s practice continues to be informed by his consciously naive experience with mysticism, religion, and cults. In this new body of work, the forced perspective seems closer, sharper, and calculated. Still maintaining a crude sensibility, a kind of blurring of foreground/background, he begins this story focused on the contours of figurative form. In Magic practice, prelude to transfer, 2023, a figure appears on the left, reaching for a ball or perhaps the sun, or pile of mustard, with turquoise cat-nails; it’s peculiar, formally balanced, saturated, and ambiguously funny. Additionally, his mark making is relieving to look at, as it feels like he too is enjoying the pursuit.

With a career spanning over twenty years, it is most interesting to see his progression, a constant test of what is truthful and simultaneously uncomfortable. Afterall, questions are the driving force behind newness and informative thought. Moving from texture and pattern to color block paintings, and now deeply invested in open narrative is remarkable. McGrath keeps his work fresh for himself and that organic process ensures a generous, imaginative experience for the rest of us. His work converses with contemporaries such as Richard Nickel, Esther Pearl Watson, with an urgency that feels a bit like Richard Boseman.

Humans categorize threats into one of the following: direct, indirect, veiled, or conditional. Some Small Threats is messy, nestling itself within the undercurrent of all of them. However, McGrath gently passes the baton to viewership; you are responsible for your fears, desires, dreams, and sometimes the fate of your experience. Some Small Threats hold space for one to follow intuition and enjoy it. A McGrath narrative is yours to devour.

Text courtesy of Headstone.