MICHAEL POAST
SCULPTURES
October 28 - December 31, 2022
Reception for the Artist
Friday, October 28th, 5-8pm
Michael Poast
Sculptures
“Space time is multi-dimensional, encompassing all space. Timelessness, an element of sculpture, occupies that place of tension between stillness and motion, in activated form. I cut into steel I-beams, drawing out volumes with my torch, releasing violent emotions that contrast with the smooth hard surfaces. I stack, add, subtract, wedge and compose pieces that have a relationship to musical themes, giving them a timelessness of sound and implied movement. Rust that weathers into color nuances, adds expression and depth to the surfaces. The selected steel, some of which is gleaned from current construction sites in New York City, are transformed into sculptures that reveal beauty, power, and carve out significant form.”
Artist’s Bio
MICHAEL POAST, NYC sculptor, having both classical music and visual art backgrounds, was mentored by the famous sculptor, Mark Di Suvero, during a studio residency at Socrates Sculpture Park, in Long Island City, NYC. Poast demonstrated his use of steel formats in solo sculpture exhibitions entitled Space Time at Pratt Manhattan Gallery, and Hudson Guild Gallery, NYC, and is affiliated with the Denise Bibro Fine Art gallery, Chelsea, NY.
Michael Poast’s steel sculpture Bastille, acquired into the permanent collection of the El Paso Museum of Art, Texas; Venus, painted steel, permanent public artwork commissioned by the City of Yonkers, NY; ZIGon Broad Avenue in Leonia, New Jersey, and three large steel pieces presented at the Mosaic Art Space in LIC, NY, are among his most current collected and sited sculptures.
The New Jersey Stage press hailed Poast’s sculpture as “Exciting New Art” and “Art Thrives” by amNY news, are honors received that include awards and grants from the Gottlieb and Beta Foundations, Artists Space, New York Foundation for the Arts, City Artist Grants, CCNY Art Career Achievement Award, the Lila Acheson Wallace Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, Alliance for Downtown New York, New York State Council on the Arts and Queens Council on the Arts.
Current commissions, exhibitions, and events include a solo exhibition of his small steel pieces at St. John’s University, Dept. of Communication Studies, and upcoming sculpture installations in Woodstock, Mt. Tremper, and Phoenicia, New York.
Michael Poast teaches and lecturers on his art and music, at such venues as Pratt Institute, City University of New York, Parrish Art Museum, Rutgers University, the Julliard School, and is currently on faculty at St. John’s University, in New York City.
Michael Post
Brochure Available
Artist Statement
I sculpt steel and imbue it with feeling. Steel, possessing warmth and strength, allows me to express a full range of emotions.
Space-time is multi-dimensional, encompassing all space. Timelessness, an element of sculpture, occupies that place of tension between stillness and motion in activated form. I cut into steel I-beams, drawing out volumes with my torch, releasing violent emotions that contrast with the smooth hard surfaces. I stack, add, subtract, wedge, and compose pieces that have a relationship to musical themes, giving them a timelessness of sound and implied movement. Rust that weathers into color nuances, adds depth.
Line created with I-beams, rods, rebar, angles of steel, heated and twisted into open negative space, are incorporated energy. The cooling steel from cutting resists being pulled apart, and the process is repeated, heating the steel, pulling with my own strength the opposing masses many times over, to create a dynamic angle, a spatial presence.
The form is either accepted and integrated with the other sections previously made or with the same process, and awaits the next edition of materials. In this manipulating and stacking of steel forms, space, volume, and mass emerge. Expression is achieved in a statement of unified shape, transmitted to the viewer through pure visual language.
All of these steps in the process of building with steel material, culminates in establishing presence. This form has never existed until the moment of completion. Each piece is unique with a set of decisions, bearing relationships to all my works, past, present and future.
I am the medium between intuition and materials at hand. Moments of inspiration are scattered among my work ethic constantly guiding my engagement and sensitivity to materials, mood, space.
Once the sculpture is presented and accepted, the surfacing and refining of color, value, transitions and line, all must come together, each in its own way, but ultimately as a whole.
The steel surfaces may have natural patinas of gold, reds and browns, weathered onto the surfaces by constant exposure to the elements. Particular works are painted with bright industrial colors. Some shined with grinders or wire brushed to a softness, and surfaced with various chemicals, or left to express the developed rusted beauty.
My sculpture occupies a threshold of dimension where space, time and tension, moves the viewer to physical confrontation.
I embrace abstract impact, exploring subconscious associations. The sculpture radiates my anger, frustration, confusion, clarity, and power, all together in a humanized statement that reaches the viewer through palpable connections and logic.
The free canon of experimentation, commitment, and desire, leads to my vision and excitement in the beauty of form.
Public Art
City of Yonkers, NY commission of “Venus”, painted steel public art installation, Nov. 2021
Sculpture for Leonia, ZIG, painted steel, installed on Broad street, Leonia, NJ. 2021
Roosevelt Island, New York, First Plinth Sculpture Project, sponsored by Roosevelt Island Operating Corp.
Fitten Art Center Plaza, sponsors: Pyramid Hill Sculpture Park, Fitten Center, City of Sculpture, Hamilton, Ohio
St. John’s University, Queens Campus, New York
Unison Art Center, New Paltz, NY
City of Yonkers Public Art Program, Yonkers, NY
Town of Huntington, Long Island, New York
William Maxwell Fine Art, Peekskill, NY
The Studio Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Armonk, NY
Queensborough Community College Gallery and Museum, Queens, NY
Pyramid Hill Sculpture Park and Museum, Hamilton, Ohio
Trinity Place, Lower Manhattan, NYC Parks & Recreation, New York, NY
Lehman College (CUNY), Bronx, NY
LaGuardia Community College (CUNY), Long Island City, NY
Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, NY
Collections
El Paso Museum of Art, El Paso, Texas
Pratt Institute Library Collections, Color Music scores, Brooklyn, NYC
Rutgers University Library Archives, lecture video on Color Music, New Brunswick, NJ
Derfner Museum and The Art Collection, Hebrew Home in Riverdale Art Collection, New York
The City College of New York Art Collection (CUNY) extended loan
William Whipple Art Gallery/ Art Museum, Southwest State University, Marshall, Minnesota
Private Collections
Solo Exhibitions
2022 MICHAEL POAST STEEL Sculpture, St. John’s University, Dept. of Communication, NYC
2021 Color Music Timelessness, Gallery Gaia, Brooklyn, NYC
2018 Color Music Philosophy, a public reading event by the author, St. John’s University, NYC
2017 Michael Poast “Constructions”, Pratt Manhattan CCPS Gallery, New York, NY
2017 The Sculpture of Michael Poast, Hudson Guild Gallery, New York, NY
2015 Color Music The Musical Expression of Michael Poast, Karpeles Museum, Newburgh, NY
2015 Space/Time Steel Sculpture by Michael Poast, Pratt Manhattan CCPS Gallery,NYC
2014 Color Music Manuscripts, Pratt Manhattan, CCPS Gallery, New York, NY
2012 Street Sculpture, Outdoor “pop-up” solo sculpture show, Long Island City, NY
2012 Large Steel Sculpture, Courtyard Gallery, Langston Hughes Library & Cultural Center, NYC
2010-2011 Thresholds of Dimension, Outdoor Sculpture, Peekskill, NY, Sponsor: City Spaces
2006, 07-08 Steel Sculpture, St. John’s University, Queens Campus, NY
2005 Queensborough Community College Gallery and Museum, Queens, NY
2002-2003 Monique Goldstrom Gallery, MG Art International, 560 Broadway, New York, NY
Showing by appointment
49-28 31st Place, Long Island City, NY 11101
T: 888.MOSAIC2
About Mosaic Artspace
Mosaic ArtSpace (MAS) is a multi-discipline art venue that aspires to showcase and promote various artistic endeavors with outreach to painters, sculptors, musicians, video, performance, installation artists.
MAS hosts the artwork of local artists and artists from the NY Metropolitan area and other cities.
MAS seeks to create a dialogue with issues of contemporary art practices to encourage, support and expand creativity and self-expression. To create an environment in which the arts flourish and enrich the quality of life.
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