Joe MacGown

From Mississippi Wiki

Joe A. MacGown (born June 21, 1964) is a self-taught artist living in Starkville, Mississippi who produces highly detailed surrealistic drawings and paintings.

1 Personal Life
2 Description of Art
3 Exhibitions
4 Awards
5 International Organizations
6 External Links
7 Examples of Artwork

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Personal Life

Joe MacGown was born in South Paris, Maine where he lived until 1974, when his family moved to Starkville, Mississippi, where he still resides. MacGown is married to Julie MacGown, and they have one son, Joseph. MacGown has three younger brothers, Steve, Robert,and Michael who are now located in Kansas, Minnesota, and Mississippi (respectively). His mother Mary still lives in Starkville, and his father Matthew MacGown is deceased (1940-2007). MacGown has been employed since 1988 at the Mississippi Entomological Museum at Mississippi State University as a research technician/scientific illustrator. Although he does scientific illustration at work, his primary avenue of artistic expression is a form of surrealism. Despite the two semesters he attended college at the Memphis College of Art (1984-1985), he is largely a self-taught artist. Drawing and painting began at a very young age for him, and by the time he was five years old, he had already begun a style of art that was to become a life long pursuit-surreal art.

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Description of Art

Over the course of his lifetime, MacGown has continued to develop his surrealistic drawing style, which he refers to as “Neogothic Surrealism” or “Subconscious Meandering.” In some instances his art is hard to categorize and has been described or included in a variety of genres including surrealism, visionary art, and in some cases fantastic art. His medium of choice is black India ink, which is typically applied using fine-tipped Koh-i-noor Rapidograph pens on various drawing surfaces; however he also does mixed media color works. His drawings are highly detailed and complex, with many layers built up by crosshatching, stippling, and other methods. Some of these drawings take up to 300 hours to finish. The structure of his artwork is based on the drawing of random shapes, after which other shapes are drawn in the negative spaces created by the first shapes, and so forth. Much of his inspiration comes from his love of science fiction and from his studies of nature. His entomological influences are noticeable, and much of his art is intermixed with various insectoid body parts. His observations are mingled with memories and other thoughts and later expressed in random ways in his drawings. Unlike many artists, he does not begin a drawing with a preconceived idea of what he is going to draw, other than at most a minimal idea or a basic shape. Nor does he do underlying pencil sketches, but instead works directly with the pen, which allows for more spontaneity and subconscious flow, which is the basis for all of his surreal art.

In addition to surrealism, MacGown also has done many other types of artwork including watercolor seascapes and landscapes; floral studies; portraits; drawings of historic buildings; impressionistic landscapes; large wood carvings; t-shirt designs; illustrations of insects, plants, fungi, bones, and other subject matter for books, journals, brochures, newsletters, cd-rom publications, posters, and web sites; cd cover and poster designs for bands; and various advertisements and logo designs.

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Exhibitions

Exhibitions include group shows at the Starkville Development Foundation Office Gallery in Starkville, MS; a group show in Champniers, France at the La Mediatheque Gallery; a one man show at Aust Hall, at East Mississippi Community College in Scooba, MS (17 Sept-8 October 2008), a group show at the Creative Warehouse in Starkville (Dec. 2008-Jan. 2009), and a two-man show with Cetin Oguz at the Meridian Museum of Art in Meridian, MS (January 3-31, 2009).

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