OKAY 2008
David Ellis arrived at the Mattress Factory with a personal archive of collected papers and images and a Quonset-hut-like structure in which to paint and be photographed.
Description
David Ellis arrived at the Mattress Factory with a personal archive of collected papers and images and a Quonset-hut-like structure in which to paint and be photographed. Essentially transporting the studio inside the Mattress Factory for his residency period, Ellis painted from morning to night inside the curved structure for 15 days in the museum’s lobby. Working in a tunnel of white light with a still camera pointed down from the ceiling, and producing a high-speed camera shoot over one weekend, the cameras captured the artist’s painting from a bird’s eye view perspective every few seconds. The only record of the continuous layering of paintings that he produced is this volume of digital images, now edited into an animated motion painting entitled OKAY.
David Ellis received his BFA from Cooper Union. David Ellis’ work interprets music and sound. His paintings are often recorded in a form of digital time-lapse animation Ellis calls motion painting. Like jazz, these works provide Ellis with an opportunity to combine ideas with collaborators or work solo within a form that promotes improvisation and spontaneity. For a recent commission the artist painted a truck from sunup to sundown over five consecutive days. Ellis often stages events when exhibiting his motion paintings, inviting musicians, performers, and sound artists to interpret the work live. His motion painting, Paint on Trucks in a World in Need of Love was recently exhibited at MoMA. Ellis’ paintings are frequently improvised. He works directly on the walls of spaces that remain open to the public during installation and shares the making of the work with viewers. The experience is much like a band playing in front of a passing audience. Ellis further explores sound with kinetic installations that produce analogue sequences in rhythm