Not just Christmas lights are being strung up around Phoenix. Exhibitions using light to create artistic works are on display from United Kingdom-based artist Bruce Munro across the Valley.
Lisa Sette Gallery in midtown Phoenix is hosting Munro’s gallery exhibit, one part of his “Desert Radiance” series across Phoenix right now.
Many of his exhibitions from “Desert Radiance” are outdoor works, such as “Sonoran Light” at the Desert Botanical Garden. These outdoor displays are site-specific and become their own environments, while the gallery works find home in a pre-established environment, said Jennifer Lewis, Bruce Munro’s U.S. representative.
Lisa Sette Gallery is presenting five small-scale versions of Munro’s art, including digital light projections and suspended artworks.
“He wanted to meet with different galleries to see kind of where his work could fit in with our space,” said Samantha Strom, Lisa Sette gallery associate. “He came to our space and was inspired by the white, stark space.”
Lewis said the gallery’s modernist space could fit any artist.
“In this case, Bruce used it with the intent of making quiet, livable works that people could own in their homes and that would feed a sense of reflection,” Lewis said. “These are intimate story pieces that are a parallel form of inquiry to the public artworks — both are intended to create an emotional response.”
Munro is a storyteller, and his interest in shared human experience inspires his work, according to the gallery’s artist biography of Munro. Strom said that Munro’s pieces are all about communication — how humans, animals and even insects react to light.
“I’ve kept sketchbook journals for the last 40 years and had recorded moments and memories of feeling connected with the world — and I realized that a lot of that could be expressed by light,” said Munro, who was unavailable to respond for comment, in an artist’s statement. “Our experiences of being connected to the world in its largest sense, of being part of an essential pattern, became my subject matter.”
Of the five pieces at the gallery, three — “Ferryman’s Crossing II,” “Moonwatcher” and “Cloud” — are part of the artist’s “Light and Language” series. Munro was inspired by his responses to music, literature, science and the world around him, which were then transposed into Morse code projections of light, according to the gallery.
Also on display was “Restless Fakir,” a humorous piece referencing a television scene Munro saw as a child that depicted a small man who slept on a bed of nails.
The last on display was “Eden Blooms,” a suspended sculpture exhibition piece intended to be a small-scale iteration of one on display at the Desert Botanical Garden.
The exhibition is open until Jan. 2.
Contact the reporter at nisreen.mandviwala@asu.edu.
