Scott McEwan
When two circles are eccentric, they don’t share the same center although they do share the same space. Scott McEwan’s work is within the circle of art – accomplished, current, informed and ardent; and yet it is slightly off center. It is this skew that catches, engages and provokes interest. The personal circle, Scott’s circle, that is inhabiting the greater art circle, is centered. In fact it is holistic and the art work contains signifiers of a well rounded experience. The work is about wrestling, queer culture, pop iconography and graphic imagery. It tells us a story. Scott is one of the main characters.
The paintings on paper and canvas tell it all. He’s an art teacher, a wrestler and he’s gay. He has asthma. He hangs out with a colorful, cross-dressing crowd. He has brilliant taste and a fine hand. He is committed to his art practice and currently has a habit of drawing black ink portraits, varying in size. The smallest are drawn on the cards given out in gay bars to pass on telephone numbers with the hope of future assignations. There are also larger than life size formats, often committed to paper from memory, of all of the men that he meets. His world is lined with men, grappling and cavorting in masculine demonstrations of fitness and strength. The wrestlers, dressed like super-heroes exist in an atmosphere of clouds, flames and bubbles where every element is outlined in black – a cartoon and candy-colored depiction of a hairy, sweating, sensuous sport.
There are pansies throughout – that antiquated derogatory term once used for homosexual men. Yet like the resilience of the gay culture, Scott too has reclaimed, with punchy pride, the slur and worn it on his heart sleeve. ‘Queer’ at one time described a mentally unbalanced, deranged or qualmish individual and then extended into a slang derivation for ‘homosexual’. The homosexual community adopted the term and, with fey bravado, ran with it. This is where Scott McEwan shines. He shies away from nothing. He allows the combination of brash colors, whimsical lyricism and an enchanted oeuvre free-range in the world of wrestling. Starting with a random word from the lingo of the ring; he builds on it visually, inserting his characters into a turbulent, active world where excretions spurt high and explosions, just like in the comics, are a matter of course with no more significance in the echelon of masculine attributes than the veined petals of a pansy.
His skew is clearly stated, his circle is intact and he’s spinning but not out of control. Like a dervish, he twirls and as the sequins catch flashes of ambient light, he sparkles.
Copyright © 2007, Julie Oakes
TWEENER
By Scott McEwan
The body of work presented in this exhibition is spawned from pro wrestling culture, sexual orientation, identity, social connections made through the internet, and lived experience.
Pro wrestling is an athletic, performative, and ritualistic act. It is a key component of my life orientation because of the unique social spaces, culture and a community it offers. One of the most intriguing aspects of this lifestyle is the language it possesses. Pro Wrestling Speak is derived from English carnival culture of the 1800’s. Casual words in English have been appropriated and given new meaning. It is not unlike codes of secret security or secret societies. The only difference is that pro wrestling’s secrets are very much in the public domain. It is in this language that I find inspiration for my Neo Psychedelic paintings. The tension between words in Wrestle Speak and English are the catalyst for every work.
Within pro wrestling there are four major types of characters. The Jobber (the perpetual loser), the Heel (the rule breaking villain), the Face (the super hero), and the Tweener (the wrestler of ambiguity). In today’s pro wrestling its mostly a juxtaposition of Heel vs Face. Good versus evil. I miss the days when Jobbers and Tweeners were more prominent. The duality of Face and Heel seems, to me, another easy fit in this world of the bipolar schism. Where individuals are relegated by choice and social manipulations into extreme dualities such as Coke or Pepsi, left or right, top or bottom, happy or sad, and Mac or PC. These dualities are imposed by a rigid global power structure and finds its way into many aspects of our lives. Even pro wrestling is not immune. It is for this reason that I based the exhibit around the concept of the Tweener (the ambiguous wrestler). It is in this character that I find an acknowledgment of the real world. The one where living and non-living things are connected through infinite set of relationships. A world of possibility as opposed to terminal options disguised as complex choices.
Conceptually this interconnectedness is found in the images appropriated from wrestling magazines and those sent to me randomly by friends on social networking sites. In these paintings you will find images of wrestlers, masks, and gear juxtaposed with cartoon characters, flowers, nuclear reactors, and other random images. These images are woven together in a visual webbing of definitive contours and oozing ink outlines This morphing lacework of imagery is the result of an 8 step structured process. The complexity of the aesthetic is created through my own rigidity and obsessive behaviour. Two opposite words from Wrestle Speak act as book ends or brackets between the connected imagery. The outcome is a fine line between representation and abstraction. Here in the connected and fluid imagery is where I hope the viewer can find the Tweener in my work.
