Mike Kelley: Mister Memory
2018-06-17 01:30:51 | | 1787
Mike Kelley's Memory Ware series – a diverse group of mixed-media paintings and sculptures made between 2000 and 2010 – exemplifies the thematic engagement with memory that informed the second half of the artist's career...
Kelley borrowed the phrase “memory ware” from a type of North American folk art in which the surfaces of common household objects – bottles, vases, lamps, and so on – are completely covered with small, decorative keepsakes and personal items. The artist first encountered examples of the genre at a Toronto antiques fair in 2000, where he purchased a memory ware bottle. Given his longstanding interest in repurposing materials with prior histories as well as his ongoing engagement with the aesthetics of craft and folk art, one can easily imagine how he came to envision possibilities – apparently, almost immediately – for developing works that would deploy the memory ware aesthetic, but toward very different ends.