adam daley wilson artist 2023

The Headlines

Artforum “Must See” for both my first and my second solo shows (2020, 2023).

Self-taught oil painter and conceptual artist. Found by a prominent New York / Los Angeles collector in 2018. Introduced to and representation by ENGAGE Projects Gallery Chicago since 2020.

The Backstory

It just started tumbling out. My psychiatrist had adjusted my bipolar 1 meds for my bipolar 1. This was 2014, I was 42. Before or since, I’ve never had any art education or training.

Shows & Art Fairs — So Far & Upcoming

4 juried art fairs since 2017 (New York, London). 5 group shows since 2020 (Palm Beach, Chicago, Houston, Chicago). Current solo show opening Apr 14 at ENGAGE Projects in Chicago during EXPOChicago — THIS IS TEXT BASED ART —- selected Must See by Artforum and curatorial selected by Mousse.

Why Text-Based Art?

Because its beyond super cool. (I have some deep reasons too — here is a 30 page artist’s studio research paper / monograph I’m researching on the global art histories of text-based art.)

Gallery views below are from recent Palm Beach, Chicago, and Portland group shows. The other images below are of recent pieces mid-2022 to the start of 2023. Photos from the solo show opening Apr 14 2023 will be posted soon or contact the gallery … …

Key Internal Links

(a) CV & Artist’s Statement as of late 2022 — (b) About & Info — (c) Video of recent art talk — Arts & Conversations Gallery, Palm Beach, Feb 2022

Some Cool Things So Far

. . . represented by a respected gallery with 20 global artists . . . two very different pieces selected for a show by Dr. Harry Cooper, PhD, Senior Curator and Head of Modern Art at the Nat’l Gallery of Art (one winning ‘honorable mention’) . . . Artforum listing my first solo as ‘must see’ . . . A positive art critic’s review published about my first solo . . . seeing my first 10-foot text oil hanging near a Richard Prince and a Warhol thanks to a LA / NY art collector who first found and mentored me as a self-taught artist . . . and being free to make art beholden to no one thanks to the support of ENGAGE Project’s gallery director . . . which brings us to —

Some Details About ENGAGE Projects Gallery Chicago

Layers of ‘Notions,’ Connections, and References

Some of my pieces have up to 20, 30, even 50 of these layers, expressed in legible and illegible text

‘Lithium Signature’ Brushstroke

My oil paint letters have a telltale brushstroke — chronic tremors in my hand from 20+ years of lithium to treat bipolar 1 — the bipolar causes the ‘notions’ and connections to just come tumbling out.

The works that arise from the initial “notions” end up having, on average, 10 to 50 layers —

There are substantive lawyers and also layers of material.

meanings and references within the piece itself;

material and physical, overwriting, and resulting erasures comprising the physical work;

— layers of relationships between things;

— layers and blends of art genres and categories of writing;

— layers of dialogue with and rebuttal to past artists, art processes, movements; and theories in other disciplines; and finally

— layers of cumulative meaning — each piece is not just a stand-alone work — each is, and will be over time, an element within a larger 20-year body of work that is cohesive and forms new collective meanings when different groupings of works are assembled, curated, edited, and contemplated together. See below.

— a piece will have 5 to 10 physical layers of overlapping handwriting or text in different media, creating tangible depth and texture. The overwriting layers also result in parts of meaning being erased and lost as I go — some words are lost almost as soon as they had appeared:

— next, substantive layers manifest in the physical layers, referencing art history, human history, religion, world philosophies and cultures, literature, poetry, science, pop culture, theories, jurisprudence — creating and supporting the meanings of the piece. I provide collectors with an essay that brings together all of the references in their piece.

— next, layers of relations, genres, and styles of writing that are normally considered separate and apart. For example, this piece has layers of novel and perhaps difficult comparisons and distinctions; it blends art genres (fine art still life, modern advertising); and it blends literary and writing genres (narrative, argument, documentary, poetic, biblical, and expository writing).

I see my art process and works as building towards larger layers — across works, over time. Sometimes I get a glimpse and this is what I see:

— Yes, each piece is a stand-alone work — but each also comprises a larger conceptual work that will take years. I see cumulative layers of meaning — thousands of total layers resulting in new meanings, offering new interpretations by the curious — as the larger work takes shape, one individual work at a time, as long as I can go, these next 20 years.

— My art process — building layer upon layer, when multiplied by 50 to 100 pieces, will create a compilation of thousands of layers across works — mapping the observations of what is deemed an abnormal mind. A map of this now, as perceived by a disordered mind. A network of interpretations and connections put together by a mind that notices and connects in ways unlike most.

— Individual works coming together one way, then another, in temporary bonds — impermanent in their periodic mixing or curation — I think these will establish not just new layers of meanings but also new interpretations — alive and flexibly relevant in the next decades, and more — because for the curious they will offer connections, across subjects and times, to consider, in new contexts, what happened in this time.

So I see glimpses of a growing work, conceptual and physical, made of individual pieces of dispersed stand-alone artworks, with collectors acting in a kind of stewardship, with each piece bringing dozens of layers of meaning into the closing work. An intertwined, living network that survives even if one piece or many pieces are unavailable or disappear. A mapping of observations and imagination, 20 years long and 100 works wide. Layers of lines, all directions, about contemporary being — now — as perceived by a fundamentally differently-wired mind.

I hope this work that I get glimpses of, with its thousands of layers, may create useful and beautiful meanings. I hope the interpretations may be useful and beautiful too. And I hope they may both be taken as art created by artist, collector-stewards, and interpreters together.