MATT MORRIS

The Perfect Kiss (QQ)*
                                     *questioning, queer
Matt Morris with James Lee Byars
Contemporary Arts Center,  Cincinnati, OH
May 15 – October 11, 2015
 

Bouquets of roses, love notes, commemorative snapshots, boudoir décor: typically associated with romantic courtship, how might these gestures be read when used to remark on relationships that connect the art world? In this installation of works, Matt Morris interprets these forms literally and abstractly in order to consider how connections are made between art histories and contemporary praxis, between exhibitions and the museums who host them, and amongst a global network of collectors, curators, couturiers, and other cultural producers complicit in the scripting of stories that characterize how an artist is understood behind his work. In Morris’ research-driven practice, examinations of recent artistic pasts compel the shape of his work, conjoining conventional modes of object-making (like drawing and photography) with shifting roles of artist-as-curator and scholar.

For his most recent project, Morris considers the life and work of American artist James Lee Byars (1932–1997), seeking to depict an alternative, more softly intimate portrayal than what has been represented in dominant canon. Over several decades, Byars was committed to posing poetic questions and the pursuit of ideas of perfection, problems that are placed here into conversation with Morris’ own inquiries into queer identity. Subverting easy categorization, Byars’ oeuvre includes post-minimalist formal investigations, performance, and a daily ritual of correspondence that merged drawing and flirtatious letter writing. He wrote profusely to curators, collectors, and art world luminaries such as the German artist Joseph Beuys. In many cases these valentine-like texts went unanswered. Morris’ selection of Byars works looks closely at the ephemerality, rejection, and absence that permeates the cultural field in which both artists are positioned—seeking to trace where personal histories and social contexts meet.

–Two hurricane lamps given by the artist’s parents, used for floral arrangements decorating the reception for Morris’ BFA thesis exhibition at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, 2007.

–Square bud vase with etched striping, gift from parents during freshman year of undergraduate studies. Sibling was given a matching vase.

–White pitcher, delivered with bouquet of sunflowers on the day Morris and Eric Ruschman moved into their first apartment in Chicago in 2011.

–Cylinder glass vase, bought by the artist at Target in 2012 for an art project during graduate school, brought home from studio and used most often for bouquets of two dozen white roses.

–Textured white ceramic cylinder, held arrangement of dahlias given to Morris by Heidi and Matt Joynt as a housewarming gift after a move to his and Eric Ruschman’s current apartment in Chicago, 2013. Morris and Heidi Joynt have previously collaborated on floral components of art projects. 

–Brandy glass vase, arrangement of tulips, jasmine, and hydrangea by Heidi Joynt of Field + Florist. Gift on the occasion of my MFA thesis exhibition in 2013. 

–White and pink vase that belonged to the artist’s maternal grandmother, Dot Rogers, who passed away in 2006. Vase was damaged and repaired before it was acquired by Morris (and given her frequent visits to garage sales and thrift stores, possibly before his grandmother acquired it).

–White enamel coffee pot that belonged to the artist’s maternal grandmother, Dot Rogers, who passed away in 2006.

–Square glass vase, held floral design by Heidi Joynt of Field + Florist as a gift from the artist’s father.