"St. Everyone" Chuck Sperry Painting at the SFMOMA Artists Gallery Windows

St. Everyone

Chuck Sperry installed 11 foot by 9 foot acrylic painting, “Saint Everyone,” at the SFMOMA’s Artists Gallery Windows on Minna Street. The painting will be on view from June 2011 through January 2012. There are florescent lights which are timed to go on at dusk until 2 am.

What Chuck says about his painting:

My large scale painting, “Saint Everyone” is figurative, a postmodern pastiche of Pop, Op and Rock Art. Its theme is inspired from the very recent spontaneous popular movements which have swept the world since January 2011. My iconic figure holds a lotus, it’s unfolding petals suggest the expansion of the soul. The growth of its pure beauty springs from the fertile mud of its origin and grows into a benign spiritual promise. The figure is a loose appropriation and is re-imagined by the artist from a rock poster created by The Big Five (Mouse, Wilson, Griffin, Kelley, and Moscoso) for the 20th anniversary of the Summer of Love in 1987. The Summer of Love in 1967 is the San Francisco analog of the change that is sweeping the world in 2011. This image was originally used on a poster I designed and printed for “American Artifact, The Rise of American Rock Art,” directed by Merle Becker. Appliqué disks employ elements of Op Art, inspired as they are from the work of Martin Sharpe, the British psychedelic artist. They are produced via silkscreen and applied – like a poster would on the street – in rhythmic patternization. The disks suggest decentralization or cell structure. I wanted to combine acrylic painting and silkscreen techniques in a seamless composition, and “Saint Everyone” is the result.

This painting was a year in planning and six weeks in execution. Renée de Cossio curated the project which involves me, Chris Shaw and Ron Donovan. Renee has been a constant source of support and inspiration and I thank her and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art for making this show happen.

Make sure to check the websites of my collaborating artist friends Chris Shaw and Ron Donovan to see their paintings and art work.

Here is a video taken showing the process of the painting:



Additonal videos about the painting can be found on Chuck's website.