Collection: Gordon McConnell: Comic Book Cowboys, Cadillacs & the Italian West

Gordon McConnell: Comic Book Cowboys, Cadillacs & the Italian West features work which has filtered comic books, advertising and movies, into painting through collecting, editing, and collage. These new paintings are translations of fragments from the limitless library of mechanically reproduced pictures that recur throughout his work. The work is rich with color, texture, implied action, and nuanced painting technique. Gordon McConnell references pop culture as well as pop artist Roy Lichtenstein, surrealist Giorgio De Chirico, writer Larry McMurty, and Iginio Lardani, the graphic artist and animator who utilized bold, experimental techniques in the credit sequences for numerous Italian Westerns. They also reveal the seminal and profound impact of Western popular culture on his practice. After his previous exhibition at Kirks’ in 2021, Gordon commented that “For imagery, I returned to the 1953 Lone Ranger comic book I'd referenced for the painting Faster Silver! Someone in my family gave me that comic book when I was three years old. So, before I could read that imagery imprinted itself on me."

June 2 - July 22, 2023