The Jackson artist Roy Adkins has a new series of work, Fracture, which he premiered last night at Light + Glass, the downtown gallery he shares with glass artist Jerri Sherer.
A far cry from the calm and intricate black and white landscapes of recent years, or the neon vibrancy of Coalesce, Fracture hearkens back to Adkin’s elaborate set pieces of earlier years, especially Transference and some of the figure studies he created from 1995-1999.
Like those works, the latest series is firmly grounded in explorations of the human body, especially the body as it twists, turns, and reacts to unseen pressures. Unlike those works, by girding his ghost figures with the sketches which inspired the poses, Adkins has overtly tied the Fracture series to classical art. In this, he echoes what I call his Recreation series, which was regrettably short-lived (composed solely of The Death of Marat and The Lamentation Over the Dead Christ). Recreation demonstrated Adkins’ unabashed love for the pillars of modern art, focusing on the elaborately-posed set pieces of classical and neoclassical works.
The image below, (Untitled) [Fracture 5], immediately evokes Renaissance-era figure studies.
Compare [Fracture 5] with this page from the circa 1543 anatomy textbook of Andreas Vesalius, De humani corporis fabrica libri septem.
Or this circa 1509-10 pen and ink study by Leonardo da Vinci:
The similarities are readily apparent. The extreme emphasis on torsion and tendon, the interplay between muscle and bone: Adkins’ figures reduce these detailed drawings to vibrant life.
Fracture also recalls the work of one of the most diligent disciples of anatomy in the 20th century, the illustration legend Burne Hogarth. His Dynamic Anatomy could provide the sketchsuits for Adkins’ ghost figures:
In this scene from one of Hogarth’s most famous works, a long-form graphic adaption of Tarzan of the Apes, first published in 1972, Tarzan grieves over the death of his adopted mother:
Turn to Adkins’ (Untitled) [Fracture 4]:
This isn’t conscious homage on behalf of Adkins’; rather, it is simply two students of anatomy twisting human forms in order to express a particular emotion. The prostration of the kneeling figures is visual shorthand for grief or, perhaps, supplication or prayer. Without the benefit of words, one perceives the emotion. The fully-formed, fully-colored figures of Tarzan clearly express the dawning sorrow that comes with loss. Like Adkins’ figures, the physical manifestation of the emotion is portrayed out of time: both the awareness and the resulting collapse happen simultaneously.
The key difference between da Vinci, Hogarth, and Adkins, is that the previous masters worked with graphite, charcoal, and ink. Adkins uses the instruments’ modern descendants, photography and computer-editing software, to incorporate classical ideas into a thoroughly modern image. While the bodies that we examine have not changed over the past five centuries, the way in which we represent them has. By melding together centuries-old methods with modern-day technique, Adkins creates something entirely new.
Very interesting work and I surely appreciate the comparative juxtapositions you provided, (even Tarzan!) Fracture 5 is particularly interesting as the forms seem to merge with or emerge from that basement wall. But I love the evokation of emotion in Fracture 4. The stretch and collapse is so true to grief.