I DROVE THE MOTHER ROAD
HOME TO THE PROMISED LAND
JUSTIN BOYD
NOVEMBER 22 – DECEMBER 20, 2008
Reception – NOVEMBER 22 (8-10 PM)
Please join us Saturday, November 22nd from 8-10 p.m. as Art Palace presents I Drove the Mother Road Home to the Promised Land, a solo exhibition featuring the work of Justin Boyd.
For the past few years, Justin Boyd’s practice has been concerned with tracking notions of what he calls an “American Spirit”, the ideas and artifacts that embody our culture and truly define us as American. He finds evidence of this spirit in folk art and music, literature, monuments and native cultural artifacts across our shared cultural landscape.
Continuing in this vein, I Drove the Mother Road Home to the Promised Land is an investigation of the signs, words and dreams of Route 66, a main artery of movement in the United States since the days of the pioneer. Route 66, the road that connects Chicago to the Pacific Ocean at Santa Monica Pier, is the idea of Manifest Destiny made tangible and concrete. For Boyd, it is also a metaphor for the varied experiences and attitudes, each distinctly American, of those who have traveled its path at different moments in American history: Pioneers began their journeys West seeking the promise of a better life, and still today, people traverse the country in pursuit of a dream. Some have toiled across this bitter road seeking refuge only to find people and places equally unfriendly. For others still, Route 66 signified the liberation of the automobile and Rock n’ Roll. At one point in our history, Route 66 was the road that connected small towns; today it disperses consumer goods across the land, homogenizing culture. Boyd’s ambitious project finds form in a video, digital prints and an installation of signs incorporating text and images. The show also presents a new direction for Boyd, who uses a psychedelic aesthetic unlike anything he’s made prior.
I Drove the Mother Road Home to the Promised Land is on view from November 22nd through December 20th, 2008. Art Palace is located at 2109 E. Cesar Chavez St. (next to Taqueria Chapala) between Chicon and Robert Martinez. The gallery is open Saturdays from noon to 5 pm, Wednesdays, 7 to 9 pm and by appointment. For more information about the exhibition or to request images, please contact the gallery at 512.496.0687 or artpalacedirector@gmail.com.
About the artist:
Justin Boyd attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2001 and received his MFA from the California Institute of the Arts in 2003. Since then, he has exhibited his work and performed at museums and exhibitions spaces throughout the U.S., including The Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), ACME (Los Angeles), Contemporary Arts Museum (Houston), Arthouse at the Jones Center (Austin), the Armory Center for the Arts (Pasadena, CA) and Sala Diaz (San Antonio). Most recently, he was a featured artists in ArtPace’s Two to Watch series (2006) and the McNay Museum’s “Artists Looking at Art” series (2006), a finalist for Arthouse’s 2007 Texas Prize, and received a travel grant from ArtPace (2008).