Michael Stearns is a contemporary artist whose practice explores fundamental questions of existence, origin, and the forces that animate being. His rich work operates at the intersection of metaphysical exploration and aesthetic investigation, seeking not only to articulate these universal, eternally relevant questions but also to implicate the viewer in their contemplation.
Stearns says that he employes a painterly language that consists of both organic forms and vibrant, saturated color. The artist constructs visual fields that oscillate between abstraction and figuration, amplifying the phenomenological impact of these thematic concerns.
Whether creating entirely abstract, lush and brilliantly colored canvases or more precise maps, roads, grids…or a mix of recognizable, impressionist and abstract landscape, Stearns work is a riveting fairytale, a narrative ripe for the eye to take in and the heart to feel.
In his sculptural works, he often employs the most prosaic of found materials, from cereal boxes to bits of colored cardboard and wire. What he makes from these humble textures does not just elevate the material but transforms it, making it something almost ethereal, an accordian of light and color. His natural and industrial materials are synthesized, generating a dialectic between the primal and the constructed, transforming dissonance into a harmonious duality.
Color shimmers, shape mutates, image mesmerizes. Galvanizing is one way to describe the layered luster of Michael Stearns’ art. Filled with a glowing joy, his work explores questions of profound meaning with dazzling aesthetic forces that fill the viewer with a profond sense of wonder amid its heightened chromatic intensity.
Stearns’ work is reverant in its respect for nature, form, the miracle of life, and the fecundity of nature. Moon shapes, seascapes, rose colored trees, orange mountains, purple coastlines and blue roads dissect, diverse, and blossom. His work is both intelligently precise and voluptuously open, images of land, sea, sky, and the universe itself, all fragrant with color, steeped in memory, imagination, and an inveterate belief in the miraculous.
Whether painting mystical shapes, congruent maps, highly textured landscape, or sculpting with cardboard and newspaper to bring both nature and urban society together, Stearns is a force to be reckoned with.
To view his work is to be immersed in it; the pulse of life and the power of his art run through each image like a current. Stearns’ radiance and accessible yet deeply resonant work is a slice of both California life and magical light. Of course, maybe that is one and the same.
Stearns’ work is currently on exhibit at Diversions Fine Arts Gallery in Manhattan Beach through July 26th., as well as at his own studio and gallery in the Los Angeles Harbor Arts building in San Pedro. DFA Gallery is open 12-4 Thursdays-Sundays, with special open house programming from 12-4 July 25th and an artist’s talk and closing reception on July 26th from 1-3.
- Genie Davis; photos by Genie Davis and as provided by Michael Stearns Studio.