Tom Devaney has been watching you for quite some time now.
Well, actually his recorded right eye is the one catching a glimpse of you whenever you pass through the intersection of Pleasant and Main streets, but you may have noticed it’s no longer there. And just to be clear, we’re talking about the giant eye ball in Devaney’s downtown studio and not the one he was born with.
But don’t worry, like Devaney told a concerned citizen who sent him a nice email, the eye, which is actually the third one Devaney has done, will return in March after it’s done watching over Hargate Gallery on the campus of St. Paul’s School. Because you see, Devaney moved it there a few weeks back to be part of his latest exhibit, Simultaneous Perspectives, and now its the gallery goers who are subject to the feeling of being constantly watched.
“It seems like the community really enjoys it,” Devaney said.
Devaney spent about a year preparing for this exhibit and it came down to the day of the opening before the final piece made it through the door of the gallery.
“It was a big push to get stuff done,” Devaney said.
It also took about 10 days to get everything set up just right. A few of the items you’ll see on display – that is if you decide to check it out, which we highly recommend – like the large painting entitled Hope, was a piece he had finished before the show came up, but one Devaney felt was important to include.
And this isn’t the kind of show that just has one type of medium, because quite honestly, Devaney isn’t that kind of artist. He is constantly trying new things, some of which work and others not so much. But it’s safe to say that if it’s in Hargate Gallery, it can be considered on the side of the things that worked.
“I’ve always been interested in materials and techniques,” Devaney said. “There’s usually an idea first and then I pick the material. Each material has its own power to it.”
So you can expect to see some of his oil and latex paint work, a print of another painting he did to represent Sept. 11 and the friends he lost that day. There’s a couple statues and sculptures that are painted hydrocal, which we learned is a fancy name for dense plaster.
One of our favorites looks like two people, one made of two Coke bottles, the other two Pepsi bottles, with the arms and legs made out of plastic bottles and bottle caps for the hands. They are standing on a pizza box that – before you open it up looking for a slice – includes no pizza, and are each holding a small wooden bat. It’s named “Coke and Pepsi Battling for a Piece of the Pie,” which is quite clever if you ask us. Devaney even put slits in the back of each person so you can drop a coin in to vote for which soft drink product you enjoy more. As of last week it was close, but Coke looked to have a slight edge.
“I drank the Coke, I drank the Pepsi and I ate the pizza,” Devaney said. “It’s the only way the piece would work.”
Then there’s Linus, you know the little boy from Charlie Brown who carries around a blanket all the time. The sculpture, made using vaporized aluminum over fiberglass resin, represents his famous Christmas speech and is one of the shiniest things we’ve ever seen.
“The shiny material was crucial to the piece,” Devaney said.
But what Devaney is really into these days is 3D video mapping, thanks to programs like Adobe Creative Suite and Movie Maker. It’s what he used to create that giant eyeball you’ve been missing during your nighttime strolls through downtown, and he added a couple of pieces to the mix for this show.
“That’s where the work is going,” Devaney said. “You just mix and match different programs to get them to work together.”
One is made of painted wood with what we like to consider many little stick people trying to climb to the top of a fictitious mountain. The 3D mapping comes into play when one or many of the connected figurines are illuminated. It’s one of those things we could keep trying to explain, but just go and see for yourself already and stop making us do all the hard work.
“I’m manipulating the light to capture time and enhance the experience of the work,” Devaney said. “They literally change over time. It’s a different way to experience it.”
“Past Present and Future” is the other sculpture that uses 3D mapping and is made with that hydrocal stuff, which Devaney likes because it allows for the ability to make sharp edges. The mapping highlights different areas of the sculpture and you guessed it, to represent past, present or future. It ends with a red heart and the sounds of shattering glass – something else Devaney is working to incorporate. Right now the projections are essentially on the front and back of each piece, but he has bigger plans coming soon.
“I’d like to get 360 degrees of mapping and maybe some interactive components,” Devaney said.
But what Devaney’s really doing with all of his pieces is telling a story. He’s not painting birds or a nice river scene that you look at and move on. He wants you to visit them a few times and figure out his complex meanings.
”My work is intended to be seen over a long period of time,” Devaney said. “You put the pieces together as you move around it.”
With that said, you’ve got a little over a month to see what Devaney’s picked for this show. It closes Feb. 28, so there’s no reason why you can’t stop by and check it out a few times. Because that’s really how you’re going to get the true meaning of the work. And just think, you can also vote multiple times for Coke or Pepsi. We’d tell you which one we like, but we don’t want to skew the results.
