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Mikael Kennedy

Saltwater River Guard

Mikael Kennedy: Saltwater River Guard

JUNE 2010


SALTWATER RIVER GUARD Mikael Kennedy Gallery 37-A is pleased to presentMikael Kennedy’s SALTWATER RIVER GUARDJune 4 -July 30 2010 - Opening Reception First Friday June 4th 6-10pm.‘Saltwater River Guard’ is a selection of Kennedy’s Polaroid work as well as C-Prints from his ongoing series of American landscapes titled “The Odysseus”. This will be the first time that these two projects will be shown together and a unique opportunity to engage with one of America’s most inspired young photographers in the intimate space afforded by Gallery 37A.Artist BioMikael Kennedy is an artist living and working in New York City. His Polaroid work has been widely exhibited and published in the US and abroad. Kennedy’s Polaroids are represented by the Peter Hay Halpert Fine Art Gallery in New York City and recently the subject of a solo show at the historic Chelsea Hotel in New York City. Kennedy’s Polaroid work has gathered international attention with Kennedy exhibiting at the International Polaroid Symposium in Cardiff, Wales this year where he was invited to lecture on his practice and motivation as an American Artist and were recently acquired for the permanent collection at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas.About Gallery 37-AGallery 37-A is a new project space, initiated in December of 2009 by Brook DeLorme and Daniel Pepice. Presenting exhibitions of the work of emerging and established artists, Gallery 37-A is Located at 37A Wharf Street in Portland, Maine’s Old Port District and is open to the public Thursday - Monday 12 - 6pm and by appointment.For Further Information, Please contactDaniel Pepice, danieljohnpepice@gmail.comNotes on ‘Saltwater River Guard’In ‘Salt Water River Guard’ we are invited along with Kennedy on his extensive travel viewing through the window of a focused moment: the summer of 2009 and two trips that took him to the rivers and shore lines of New England. Kennedy’s landscape photography in recent years has been likened to the work of the Hudson River Painters; described as a blending of the sublime and the vision of Trancendentalists, it is a view of man’s search for his place in nature, of a spiritual elevation of that moment of the quest. Drawing upon the classic myth of The Odyssey for its title; “The Odysseus” presents us with the vision of a solitary man on a quest for Home. In Kennedy’s vision of the world, Home becomes more an emotion and a sense of place than a physical space in which one lives; it is in the longing and the lack that define this space, and it is deeper into this journey which are stunningly captured in Kennedy’s Polaroids.Kennedy’s Polaroid work — a documentation of his life, travel, and surroundings, began in 1998 with the discovery of the Polaroid SX70 camera and quickly turned into an obsession that led to 12 years of a constantly documenting and cataloging his life. It is in this blending of these two bodies of work which gives the viewer both the journey and the destination as vantage point from which we can interpret the artists vision.www.thirtysevena.com / www.mikaelkennedy.com

SALTWATER RIVER GUARD

Mikael Kennedy


Gallery 37-A is pleased to present
Mikael Kennedy’s SALTWATER RIVER GUARD

June 4 -July 30 2010 - Opening Reception First Friday June 4th 6-10pm.

‘Saltwater River Guard’ is a selection of Kennedy’s Polaroid work as well as C-Prints from his ongoing series of American landscapes titled “The Odysseus”. This will be the first time that these two projects will be shown together and a unique opportunity to engage with one of America’s most inspired young photographers in the intimate space afforded by Gallery 37A.

Artist Bio

Mikael Kennedy is an artist living and working in New York City. His Polaroid work has been widely exhibited and published in the US and abroad. Kennedy’s Polaroids are represented by the Peter Hay Halpert Fine Art Gallery in New York City and recently the subject of a solo show at the historic Chelsea Hotel in New York City. Kennedy’s Polaroid work has gathered international attention with Kennedy exhibiting at the International Polaroid Symposium in Cardiff, Wales this year where he was invited to lecture on his practice and motivation as an American Artist and were recently acquired for the permanent collection at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas.

About Gallery 37-A

Gallery 37-A is a new project space, initiated in December of 2009 by Brook DeLorme and Daniel Pepice. Presenting exhibitions of the work of emerging and established artists, Gallery 37-A is Located at 37A Wharf Street in Portland, Maine’s Old Port District and is open to the public Thursday - Monday 12 - 6pm and by appointment.
For Further Information, Please contact
Daniel Pepice, danieljohnpepice@gmail.com


Notes on ‘Saltwater River Guard’

In ‘Salt Water River Guard’ we are invited along with Kennedy on his extensive travel viewing through the window of a focused moment: the summer of 2009 and two trips that took him to the rivers and shore lines of New England. Kennedy’s landscape photography in recent years has been likened to the work of the Hudson River Painters; described as a blending of the sublime and the vision of Trancendentalists, it is a view of man’s search for his place in nature, of a spiritual elevation of that moment of the quest. Drawing upon the classic myth of The Odyssey for its title; “The Odysseus” presents us with the vision of a solitary man on a quest for Home. In Kennedy’s vision of the world, Home becomes more an emotion and a sense of place than a physical space in which one lives; it is in the longing and the lack that define this space, and it is deeper into this journey which are stunningly captured in Kennedy’s Polaroids.
Kennedy’s Polaroid work — a documentation of his life, travel, and surroundings, began in 1998 with the discovery of the Polaroid SX70 camera and quickly turned into an obsession that led to 12 years of a constantly documenting and cataloging his life. It is in this blending of these two bodies of work which gives the viewer both the journey and the destination as vantage point from which we can interpret the artists vision.

www.thirtysevena.com / www.mikaelkennedy.com

PRESS
"I love that dawning of the moment inside of awe that you are talking about.
I get it often, it’s the moment of cresting the hill and watching the world
open up infront of you.
-Mikael Kennedy"

— you have been here sometime: Mikael Kennedy

PRESS
"Mikael Kennedy is a NYC photographer who has a keen eye for capturing landscapes with a polaroid camera. He is having a show in Portland, Maine at Gallery 37A titled Saltwater River Guard. Please be sure to stop by and check it out if you are in the area. The show opens June 4th and runs through the end of July."

— DQM - Saltwater River Guard

PRESS
"Mikael Kennedy’s portraits of his maunderings through the American landscape harness a transcendental concurrence of vastness and intimacy. As drenched in hazy and thick atmosphere as in nostalgia, Kennedy’s photographs stand as rosary beads, marking haloed moments of confrontation between contentment and restlessness. “Saltwater River Guard,” on view at the appropriately rustic-chic 37-A Gallery, is comprised of two series of Kennedy’s work, both documenting travels during the summer of 2009. Seven Polaroid images taken in Bristol, Vermont, and Lincolnville, Maine, hang neatly in a row on the back wall of the gallery, flanked by seven larger scale C-prints from his series “The Odysseus,” all framed in rough wood."

— Endless inquiry - Museum And Gallery - Portland Phoenix