8th Canyon

Max McConkey

[Recent interview with the artist:

http://www.sonoranartsnetwork.net/max-mcconkey.html ]

"The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery." (Francis Bacon)

My colorful, textural pieces on hardboard panels are created with a mixture of oil & cold wax and often oil sticks, crayon, pastels, acrylics, and, sometimes, a multitude of other materials, including cement, cloth, metal, glue, and wood.

An admirer of and influenced by many artists (e.g., Diebenkorn, Rothko, Franz Kline, Robert McGill, de Kooning, Rauschenberg, and Rebecca Crowell), my principal inspirations are my surroundings: rural (streams, forest floors, southwest deserts, mountain walls of rock, sky) and urban (structures, deteriorated wood, rusted iron, scarred stone, graffiti). I have no interest in attempting to replicate what I see, but I do work to evoke emotions stimulated by the multitude of textures, colors, and line in the enviornment surrounding me.

Critical to my work is music and many of my paintings (and their titles) reflect the feelings ignited by jazz, classical, Americana, and other music genres; my art studio is filled with music.

Art has been a passion since boyhood. In the late 1960s and 1970s, I created a nationally distributed cartoon strip, penned editorial cartoons, and created a series of politically-focused collages. While I have done everything from caricatures to oil portraits throughout these years, my great love has always been abstraction.

I was pleased to be recognized and the images of two my paintings included in the recent book, "Oil and Wax Medium: Techniques, Concepts, and Conversations," by Rebecca Crowell and Jerry McLaughlin, published in spring 2017 by Squeegee Press. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the fascinating oil-cold wax medium.

My wife, Emely, also an artist, and I -- with our three dogs -- make our home in southern Arizona.

Events

September 14 - October 21, 2018

First National Contemporary Biennial

Tubac Center for the Arts, Tubac, Arizona

Jury-selected paintings by Arizona artists celebrating native culture

May 14 - September 3, 2018

Arizona Abstractions

Tucson International Airport

Juried paintings by six Arizona abstract artists

April 27 - August 13, 2017

Arizona Abstract

The Gallery at Tohono Chul, Tucson, Arizona

Show of selected abstract art work reflecting Arizona

April 1, 2014 - November 1, 2015

Paintings Exhibited for Sale

Cohen Abee Gallery, Union Square, San Francisco

Contact

max@abstract-art.me