Introduce Artist

Lee Musgrave

@leemusgrave_art

Lee Musgrave studied with artists Hans Burkhardt and Fritz Faiss. Hans was studio partner of Arshile Gorky. Fritz studied at the Bauhaus with Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky. Musgrave earned a Master of Art degree from California State University, Los Angeles and his artwork has been exhibited in 21 solo and over 100 group exhibitions internationally. He is the recipient of an American National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship (Painting). His abstract still-life digital photography art was most recently exhibited in International Biennial Digital Art, Nicolaus Opernicus University, Torun, Poland; Hello Brooklyn, Kingsborough Art Museum, NY; Abstraction, Omnimbus Gallery, Dresden, Germany; Techspressionism: Digital & Beyond, Southampton Arts Center, Southampton, NY; the 2018 Barcelona Foto Biennale; at L.A. Artcore Gallery, Los Angeles; in the 2016 Berlin Foto Biennale; at Blue Sky Gallery, Portland, OR, and in a special 2024 curated online exhibit for The Photo Review Magazine and other magazines. His studio is in White Salmon, Washington, USA where he has resided for the past 30 years.

All artists are absorbed in their own inner worlds—infused with a voyeuristic, psychological complexity echoing the overwhelming isolation of contemporary life. Even with the availability of instant human contact via the world-wide-web the computer-based studio establishes a general sense of alienation. This is not necessarily loneliness, but a kind-of ambiguity of subconscious psychic tension. My work addresses the solitude of this dream-like suspended time while acknowledging the life-like energy of computer technology. It provides instant access to the basic elements of art (line, color, shape, etc.) in an aura of denatured nostalgia or fondness for the creation of abstract expressionistic images. I address this drive by staging found ephemera (trash) on my studio work table, light and photograph it; then load the images into my computer and adjust them using a variety of programs (no A.I.). This process gives me the ability to immortalize the momentary coalescence of these objects into what many artists have come to call Techpressionism. For me, each image is more than a document of repurposed trash for each provides opportunities to discover elements of enchantment that connect with the viewer in deeply profound ways. This effect arises from our collective consciousness and can feel deeply personal, maybe a little disquieting plus suggestive of other times, other places, other worlds or simply a dream roused, but not woken. They even radiate a life force of their own that suggest something beyond them, that leaves a lasting imprint on the viewers cerebral cortex. Enjoy.

Artwork

Blue Rose 5 / Broken Dream 1 / Reciprocal 3 / Skittle Daddle 1 / Revel Moon 1