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Michael Eade: Past is Present is Future, New York

Last Updated on 2020/10/31

You are invited to explore the current new show exhibition at FOU GALLERY featuring artwork of Michael Eade introducing viewers to the cycle of life and the moment beyond time.

The apartment gallery presents the show in a renewed and colorful environment that frames and offers a path with a fresh tone: a red thread that highlights the works of “Past is Present is Future”. This is Eade’s second solo exhibition with the gallery, for the occasion will be on display a collection of 19 egg tempera paintings and 12 porcelain sculptures.

Info about the event

When: September 21 – October 11, 2019
Where: Fou Gallery, 410 Jefferson Ave #1, Brooklyn, New York, NY 11221
Hours: Saturday 11 am – 6 pm, or by appointment ([email protected])
Curator: Liang Hai
Poster Design: Jing Lin

Sito ufficiale | Instagram | Fou Gallery

Michael Eade is a contemporary figurative landscape painter from New York. Eade has his unique style that distinguishes his landscape artwork. He studied the egg tempera painting technique, an archival, and stable mediums, that utilize egg yolk. Eade integrates and incorporating in his artworks metal leaves, raised 22k gold leaf, raised copper and aluminum leaf on wood panel. He also explores different mediums, extracts nurse logs, and stumps out of his paintings to create editions varie (EV) in porcelain.

Michael Eade, Tree of Life Reflected, 2018. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised aluminum leaf, oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade, Tree of Life Reflected, 2018. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised aluminum leaf, oil on canvas, 48 x 36 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery

The exhibition touches on some of the most important topics the origins, the roots that linked humans in space and time on Earth, and the awareness of individuals as part of this connection and the universal cycle of life. Inevitably the representation of nature and the landscape, its exploration touch the spirit of nature and the themes of creation, rebirth, renewal, and the cycles of life. 

In Tree of Life Reflected, 2018, Eade’s iconic “Tree of Life” his rendering of this tree is inspired by his study of the ancient fruit forests.

From 2010, Eade began to study and depict an ancient fruit forest in the forests of the western Tian Shan mountains, at the border of Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and China. DNA analysis has pinpointed that the first wild apple trees sprouted on Tian Shan mountain.

From 2010, Eade began to study and depict an ancient fruit forest in the forests of the western Tian Shan mountains, at the border of Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and China.

This area is the genetic origin of over 300 wild fruit and nut species on our planet, literally a “Garden of Eden“.

Central Asian areas played a key role in human history. Fruits were brought to Western Countries by traders traveling the Silk Road from China between 4,000 and 10,000 years ago.

The wild forests on Tian Shan Mountain have evolved species very resistant to drought and are a symbol of abundance, the earth’s bounty, and the origin of life. Central Asia’s fruit tree species are in danger of extinction.

Michael Eade at Opening Reception with gallery owner Echo He - Photo by Nadia PeichaoLin, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade at Opening Reception with gallery owner Echo He – Photo by Nadia PeichaoLin, courtesy Fou Gallery

Around 90% of the fruit and nut forests of Central Asia have been destroyed in the past fifty years.

Is an urgent necessity to save them from destruction since these wild forests are a precious testimony of cultural biodiversity.

Tian Shan mountain wild forest persists today despite thousands of years of deforestation and fires mainly intended to clear land for farming. Learning all of this inspired Eade to visually eulogize this botanical Eden and started his series – “The Wild Fruit Forest – Tree of Life”. He transformed an apple tree into “The Tree of Life”.

Apple represents an important symbol since the beginning of the history of human cultures. Apple fuelled pagan myths, the biblical narrative, fairy tales, and popular legends, and has become part of the collective imagination as a powerful and ambivalent symbol.

The evolution of the symbol of the apple transforms it into the forbidden fruit, of desire, discord, passion, knowledge; the fruit of love, health, gratitude, magic, immortality, redemption; food of the gods, food that quenches and nourishes, a source of power and prosperity, but also of simplicity and mortality.

Michael Eade Opening Reception - Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade Opening Reception – Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery

The place he paints could be one in which all the mythological stories and legends could have been unraveled, a sort of lost paradise and navel of the world, where we could have been once in a lifetime in a dream.

Methuselah (2019) is his interpretation of the “Methuselah Tree”, a real bristlecone pine found in the mountains of eastern California. This tree of over 4,800 years is one of the oldest forms of life.

Bristlecone pines thrive where other plants cannot grow.

The tree is represented in all its majesty in center stage on the canvas and in a perfect moment of idyllic tranquility.

The tree has painstakingly gilding both the sprouting and fully developed leaves.

In a single moment, we can see the balance of all its vital essence, its own natural evolution that led it to a stage of persistence and relevance that for us to be human is calculable as a stage of immortality and eternity.

Michael Eade, Sunset and Gilded Nurse Log, 2017. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised copper and aluminum leaf on wood panel, 11.5 x 48 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade, Sunset and Gilded Nurse Log, 2017. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised copper and aluminum leaf on wood panel, 11.5 x 48 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery

The climate, the years, the time have created the figure that we now see, but we cannot perceive all the changes because we live time differently.

The tree seems to us immutable as if it had never really changed, therefore it is perennial and has a timeless nature.

It has always been there and will be there always.

Change of Season, no. 2”, (2016) is a large artwork where inter-woven branches bearing colorful changing leaves of fall depicting a mature ornamental cherry tree, a view that artists used to see by every day.

Michael Eade Opening Reception - Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade Opening Reception – Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery

Eade brought leaves back to his studio to create works joining his personal life with a larger universal idea of a metaphor for the cycle of life.

The creation showcase Eade’s mastery of naturalistic detail, where intertwining leaves and branches shine in radiant greens, golds, reds and brown hues. 

This creation showcase Eade’s mastery of naturalistic detail, where intertwining leaves and branches shine in radiant greens, golds, reds, and brown hues. 

Inspired by nature and the cycles of life “Sunset and Gilded Nurse Log” (2017) explore and expand on artist fascination with fallen trees which, as they decay, provide an ecological harbor facilitating healthy growth and sustainability of many different plant species seedlings.

The nurse log symbolizes renewal and rebirth in the world’s ecological cycle system.

He usually gilded in silver or gold the log, highlighting its metaphorical importance as a self-circulating eco-system.

The circle of life is Nature’s way to take and give back to the earth.

The circle of life is Nature’s way to take and give back to the earth.

Plants, on every little piece of land, experience an endless circle of germination, growth, blossom, reproduction, death, and renewal: rebirth happens every day and we can hear the buzz of life.

Michael Eade, Pine Tree Sapling (Small), 2019. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised copper and aluminum leaf on wood panel, 17.1 x 13.8 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade, Pine Tree Sapling (Small), 2019. Egg tempera, raised 22k gold leaf, raised copper and aluminum leaf on wood panel, 17.1 x 13.8 inches ©Michael Eade, courtesy Fou Gallery

The number of details is impressive and incredible, almost as if the artist wanted to invite us to use a magnifying glass to appreciate the macros of the micro details he created.

The scene inside leads to synaesthesia, where you can feel the fragile and vulnerable infinite universe of life.

Pine Tree Sapling (Small) (2019) is from a new series Eade started this year depicting the renewing power of fire.

In the painted scene, green saplings sprout from and around a burnt and destroyed trunk. Plants and leaves are painted and realize in such a way as to give a three-dimensionality texture.

The fire has the power to utterly destroy as seen in the recent mega-fires in California and Brazil’s devastating broad clearing of the rainforest.

However, naturally burning forest fires clear the forest floor and provide nutrients for surviving plants and newly sprouting life, thus maintaining undamaged the world cycle of life.

Eade describes a challenging concept: environmental balance has its own energetic ecological system. The natural world around us has its own rules to self-renew, reborn, and regenerate.

Michael Eade’s egg tempera paintings with their intense color and luminosity bring to mind medieval miniatures or Illuminated manuscript thanks to super-clarity realism given by the details but also by the lights and shadows in the various shades of colors and the use of metal leaves.

Michael Eade Opening Reception - Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade Opening Reception – Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery

He takes care of every single detail with precision just like the smaller decorative ornaments of manuscripts and into the ancient books of the Middle Ages. Eade’s paintings have a great sense of depth that arouses a sense of three-dimensionality given by precision like the fine embroideries on silk.

Furthermore, the precision and delicacy of his lines evoke the signs of ancient calligraphy art.

Viewers are brought into lush, dreamy otherworldly landscapes, between fantasy, reality, and memory, into a vision of nature is close up and highly detailed.

Michael Eade Exhibition - Florist Ye Zi designing Ikebana based on the ceramics by Michael Preperation, Photo by Yilan Wang, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade Exhibition – Florist Ye Zi designing Ikebana based on the ceramics by Michael Preperation, Photo by Yilan Wang, courtesy Fou Gallery

His worlds have natural elements that are all suspended in a state where time-lapses and an instant becomes eternal.

He opens a temporal doorway to embark on a journey to the origins to meditate in the before, here and now, and after. In just one moment simultaneous coexist past, present, and future.

Planet Earth, from what we know so far, is the only one in our galaxy with a soo huge variety of flora and fauna and therefore our task should be to protect it. In all of Michael Eade’s artworks, we can have a sign of what we could lose as we continue to threaten our environment. 

Michael Eade Opening Reception Group Photo - Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery
Michael Eade Opening Reception Group Photo – Photo by Nadia Peichao Lin, courtesy Fou Gallery

The exhibition curated by Liang Hai is on view through November 10, 2019. You are welcome to stop by!

The gallery will hold, during the exhibition a series of events that closely connected to the theme, including the flower and tea ceremonies hosted by Yezi and Lanzhi Dai on October 5th, Zuoliang Liu’s flute solo concert on October 19th, and the Di Zhao’s opera solo concert on November 2nd.

Taking a visual tour to Michael Eade’s show exhibition, thanks to his utopian vision, it’s possible to immerse in an unknown world but with a familiar aspect of cultural and emotional consciousness of nature.

His paintings can connect viewers with the inner world and therefore with an inseparable part of spiritual life.

The journey into nature, the inspiration in the mysterious beauty of nature is a journey not only to the origins of plants, planet Earth and our roots but also within our soul.

Everything is intertwined.

The visual journey in nature can turn into an occasion and moment of reflection and meditation, a return to our origins and our inner world.

Photos courtesy of Fou Gallery
Art: © Michael Eade
Photographer: Nadia Peichao Lin and Yilan Wang

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