Kevin Paulsen: Migration

Kevin Paulsen. Urban Acrobats. 48” x 60”. Courtesy of the artist and Kelley Roy Gallery.

Kelley Roy Gallery - Wynwood Art District, Miami

November 21, 2008 - January 31, 2009

By Denise Colson

Kevin Paulsen recently exhibited his series Migration at Kelley Roy Gallery in Miami. Hanging on the walls of the gallery, Paulsen’s pieces are reminiscent of mural fragments from 19th Century New England houses. His works are, in fact, inspired by the naïve imprints of 19th Century itinerant American painters, such as Rufus Porter and John Avery, whose frescoes he came to know while working as a restorer in Nantucket.

Paulsen has achieved a variation on the charcoal and pastel-on-sandpaper drawings that immortalize Rufus Porter. Utilizing layers of plaster on polystyrene, the artist brilliantly achieves the texture of a fresco and then captures current themes on these backgrounds, which imitate bygone techniques.

With the Migration series, Paulsen pays a kind of homage to the life and work of these itinerant artists. Above all, Migration alludes to what has characterized the very foundation of American lineage. It is the spirit of a nation made up of people who came from all over the world to form the country that we are today, a process that continues even now. I refer not only to those who immigrate from abroad, but also to the “migration” that is a fact of life in today’s world, the constant moving in search of better opportunities, the adapting to new conditions. In his works, Paulsen blends intricate iconographies, incorporating elements symbolically associated with the idea of transit, such as birds, angels or members of a circus troupe.

Placed on the walls of the gallery, Paulsen’s pieces evoked a sensation of bearing witness to an old yet strangely-familiar scene.