Chuck Webster

StatementCVExhibitions

Chuck Webster is known for his playful quasi-abstract paintings and drawings. His compositions feature a centered graphic floating nonchalantly against a usually monochrome background. His saturated colors and playful biomorphic forms evoke the spuriously naïve abstractions of Paul Klee and late Matisse, as well as outsider artist Forrest Bess. Webster’s paintings are carefully created and reworked over the course of six to eight months.

 

Each of Webster’s paintings is an effective labored distillation of the visual phenomena that draw his attention. While original source material may be hinted at, his finished paintings speak more about process than image. Webster is ultimately interested using painting as a tool to access deeper parts of himself and the viewer. For his latest body of work, the words “messenger” and “passenger” reflect the double activity of his paintings. He is both the carrier of the message and the passenger inside the train.

 

Chuck Webster's received his MFA in Painting from American University in Washington, DC (1996). He has been exhibited in group shows at PS1 Contemporary Art Center, in Long Island City, NY; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego, CA; MOCAD, Detroit, MI; and the Berkshire Museum, Pittsfield, MA. His work is in the permanent collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; and the MFAH, Houston, TX. 

Chuck Webster; Untitled, 2015; homemade ink and watercolor on antique handmade paper; 19 x 15 in.