Stephen Romano Gallery - Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm"

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm"

March 2 2016 - March 29 2016 
Opening reception March 2, 5 - 9 pm, the artist will be present

This exhibition opens concurrently with "Paul Booth: Selected Works" and the group exhibition "Saint Bowie"

Stephen Romano Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of works by renowned American sculptor Matthew Dutton.

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm" 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Created with a multitude of textures and materials, both natural and synthetic, the art of Matthew Dutton drifts into surreal realms, revealing a glimpse of a larger world that dwells within their creator. Matthew Dutton's art employs a hybrid of visual symbols and found objects to create a feral aesthetic through economy of intervention which shares affinities with outsider art, art brut, and neuvre invention - a category of art Jean Dubuffet rationalized as "..of comparable power and inventiveness to Art Brut, but their greater contact with normal society and the awareness they had of their art works precluded their inclusion within his strict Art Brut category." (quoted from RAW VISION Magazine)

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm", details, 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm", detail, 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm", details, 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Matthew Dutton creates a story explained through objects created within a time frame that is chronologically disjointed. only to come full circle within the content of a chance meeting, an available selection, made on impulse. The things that live within, are allowed to escape when disconnected directly from self; the choice to claim these things these things is a balance of honor and terror.

A paracosm is a detailed imaginary world created inside one's mind. This fantasy world may involve humans, animals, and things that exist in reality; or it may also contain entities that are entirely imaginary, alien, and otherworldly. Commonly having its own geography, history, and languages, the experience of such a paracosm is often developed during childhood and continues over a long period of time: months or even years. Paracosms are also made reference to as types of childhood creativity and problem-solving. Some believe paracosm play indicates high intelligence. In the installation "Midnight Paracosm" Matthew Dutton is crating his own world of creative play. The exhibition also embraces the vernacular sensibilities of yard shows, swap meets, flea markets, roadside attractions, and all manner of unfiltered thrift store aesthetics.

While previous exhibitions at the gallery - such as Rik Garret's "Earth Magic (October- December 2014), Lu Zhang's "All The Lost Souls" (October - December 2014), El Gato Chimney and Rithika Merchant's exhibitions as well as all of the ambitious group exhibitions presented by the gallery - were intended to be viewed as whole exhibitions comprised of individual works, with one exhibition often overlapping into the next and shifting and growing in content over the course of their presentation - this exhibition is the first being comprised of a site specific installation presented by Stephen Romano Gallery.

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm", details, 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Matthew Dutton "Midnight Paracosm", details, 2016 mixed media installation dimensions variable

Matthew Dutton was born in Winterpark FL and live and works now in Chattanooga TN. Matthew Dutton' art has been featured in the New York Times, The Worleygig, Dirgemag, Widewalls, BetweenMirrors, Beautiful Bizzare, among many others. His work has been exhibited at Morbid Anatomy Museum, The Metro Show, Copro Gallery, Hive Gallery, La Luz De Jesus Gallery, Augustre Clown Gallery as well as several group exhibitions at Stephen Romano Gallery since it's inauguration.

"Midnight Paracosm" is Matthew Dutton's first solo exhibition.

For further information or visuals please contact Stephen Romano Gallery romanostephen@gmail.com or 646 709 4725

About Stephen Romano Gallery

Stephen Romano Gallery is a new addition to the Brooklyn art gallery community, having opened its doors in April of 2014 in Dumbo and having relocated to Bushwick in September 2015.

Prior to opening the current gallery, Stephen Romano was a private art dealer for 15 years specializing in masters of self-taught and visionary art such as Henry Darger, Martin Ramirez, Charles Dellschau, Bill Traylor, Darcilio Lima, and many others. The Gallery's most recent exhibition El Gato Chimney’s “De Rerum Natura” was well received and reviewed, as was the preceding exhibition "Trypophobia" by Colin Christian. Stephen Romano Gallery also mounted the most ambitious exhibition of works by pictorialist photographer William Mortensen to coincide with the release of the book "American Grotesque" published by Feral House.

Stephen Romano has been a participant in many art fairs including PULSE, The Metro Show, and the Outsider Art Fair.

In 2013, Stephen Romano produced a seminal 330-page monograph on visionary artist CHARLES DELLSCHAU designed by Marquand Books and distributed by DAP. The book generated several positive reviews from a wide variety of publications such as Bookforum, Raw Vision Magazine, The Atlantic, Slate, Antiques, and the arts and Design Observer, among many others. With an introduction by Stephen Romano, the book features the final published essay by renowned art writer Thomas McEvilley, as well as contributions from the founder of The Museum of Everything, James Brett, and the curator of Smithsonian Museum of Aerospace, Thomas Croutch.

In the same year, Romano also published the first ever post-mortem catalog of works by Brazilian visionary Darcilio Lima and most recently a catalogue of an previously unknown photographic series from 1925 by William Mortensen entitled "A Pictorial Compendium of Witchcraft," with an introduction by A.D. Coleman and essay by Tom Pattersen. Most recently, Stephen Romano Gallery had the honor of publishing a catalog of works by Pavel Kraus with an essay by David Ebony, as well as a catalog for Chinese artist Lu Zhang with essay by Robert C. Morgan. In 2015, the gallery produced a catalog of the "TRYPOPHOBIA" exhibition by Colin Christian with texts by Kris Kuksi, Allison C. Meier and Samuel D. Gliner. The most recent catalog was the gallery published was on Italian artist El Gato Chimney with texts by Martin Wittfooth, Pamela Grossman and Michela D'Acquisto.

In the summer of 2015, Stephen Romano curated the highly acclaimed exhibition "Opus Hypnagogia" at Brooklyn's Morbid Anatomy Museum. The exhibition was featured in the New York Times, as well as Juxtapoz Magazine, Hi-Fructose, Beautiful Bizarre, Brooklyn Magazine, among many others. This exhibition was followed up in the new Bushwick gallery with "Lexicon Infernali" and a solo show by Rithika Merchant and "Magica Sexualis" and a solo show by Los Angeles artist Jel Ena, and "Charles Dellschau: American Visionary", the third ever solo exhibition of this seminal outsider artist ever organized and "Hieroglyphica" a companion group exhibition.

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contact romanostephen@gmail.com or 6467094725 for inquiries