Barry McGee

Barry McGee is the first midcareer survey of the globally influential San Francisco-based artist, and provides a much-anticipated opportunity to experience his work from the late 1980s to the present. The presentation includes rarely seen early etchings, letterpress printing trays and liquor bottles painted with his cast of down-and-out urban characters, constellations of vibrant op-art painted panels, animatronic taggers, and a re-creation of a cacophonous street-corner bodega, along with many new projects.

McGee, who trained professionally in painting and printmaking at the San Francisco Art Institute, began sharing his work in the 1980s, not in a museum or gallery setting but on the streets of San Francisco, where he developed his skills as a graffiti artist, often using the tag name "Twist." McGee's use of this and other monikers—such as Ray and Lydia Fong—as well as his frequent collaborations can make it difficult to precisely situate the artist's unique authorship. Using a visual vocabulary that borrows elements from comics, hobo art, sign painting, and other sources, McGee's work addresses a range of issues, from individual survival and social malaise to alternative forms of community and the harmful effects of capitalism, gentrification, and corporate control of public space. His often-humorous paintings, drawings, and prints—all wrought with extraordinary skill—push the boundaries of art: his work can be shockingly informal in the gallery and surprisingly elegant on the street.

McGee has long viewed the city itself as a living space for art and activism, but his more recent work has brought the urban condition into the space of the gallery. Increasingly, his installation environments express the anarchic vitality of the inner-city street, incorporating overturned cars and trucks, and often spill beyond the frame of the gallery or museum. For McGee, writes Alex Baker in the exhibition catalog, "the creation of chaos is a political act."

Barry McGee
Kuratoren: Lawrence Rinder, Dena Beard