Maysey Craddock

"Sanctuary"  gouache and thread on found paper  38" x 50.5"  2011

"Ninth ward (after Friedrich)"  gouache and thread on found paper  38" x 69.5"  2010

"Held (orchard and rail)"  gouache and thread on found paper  50" x 38"  2011

"Rupture (ashes and light)"  gouache and thread on found paper  38.5" 51.5"  2011

"The Back of Beyond"  gouache and thread on found paper  69.5" x 89"  2009

A friend of mine was recently in New York and saw this work by Memphis artist, Maysey Craddock at Nancy Margolis Gallery (the show will be up until Oct. 15, if you happen to be out that way). Her work depicts the nether world that exists in the wake of human industry, where vines and shrubs establish themselves among discarded and decaying structures and old fences divide empty space form empty space. Her studio is set in such a place, in an old medicine factory, last in a row of empty warehouses at the end of a dead-end street. She works on found paper, mostly old paper grocery bags sewn together with silk thread, giving the work a textural quality that echoes the content. The images are derived from photographic references and painted in simplified graphic forms with gouache. One can imagine these paintings rattling quietly, stuck by a breeze against some old chain link fence. The message of course, is that these forgotten spaces hold their own kind of beauty for those who look, because they are in transition, actively changing from one kind of place into another.
You can see more of her work at www.mayseycraddock.com

(thanks Devon.)