PERREAULT’S SEASCAPES AND MENDED STONES
John Perreault's "Seascapes" (2004 - present) are paintings made by splashing petroleum-impregnated beach sand on found seascapes or plywood. "Mended Stones" (2004) is a floorpiece made of beach stones broken in two then glued back together. "Toothpaste Murals" are available by commission.
In 2004 critic Robert Morgan wrote:
"Perreault like [Alfred] Jarry is a kind of quirky genius, an urban cultural renegade, bent on originality…Perreault offers a stroke of genius that brings us back not only to the expressive impulses of the body, but also
to the emotional delight in discovering who we are."
Daniel Rothbart in the N.Y.Arts Magazine analyzed the work:
"Perreault draws the viewer’s attention from illusionistic deep space of the found painting to these linear marks. But the sandy impasto is more than a line or pattern, constituting a sculptural presence in the work with corporeal forms and shadows that emerge from the seascape of the ocean ground.
"The cross-grain patterns [of the Plywood Seascapes] at times resemble circles in pools of water and at others the complex movements of the ocean waves seen from above. Plywood, despite the beauty of its grain, represents a
violate nature. The sand tells a story of ecological imbalance. For Perreault, the use of tainted materials to represent nature effect a certain correction of human transgressions.
"Breaking stones may seem like a primal or even primitive gesture, but the tool Perreault is crafting takes hold of our consciousness like a Zen koan. Perreault’s establishment of a duality within these stones clarifies our understanding of pristine nature. Mended Stones also speaks to a mythic nature with its dualities of masculine or feminine and creation and destruction, which runs like a deep ocean current in the unconscious."
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Plywood Seascape #2, 2003.
Oil impregnated beach sand
on painted plywood.
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