Roy McMakin

Roy McMakin (born 1956 Lander, Wyoming) is a Seattle-based designer and furniture maker. His furniture bridges the gap between art and design. Some of his pieces are entirely non-functional like "Untitled (Wooden Toilet)", which, as its title suggests, is an unpainted wooden toilet that serves most usefully as a witty conversation piece more so than an actual toilet. Many of his pieces are inspired by visual and verbal puns and other conceptual conceits: a boudoir in which every drawer is painted a different shade of white and every drawer knob is a slightly different size; or a white shag rug with a black square at its center that has had a quarter of its area shaved away showing that in order for the graphic flatness of the square to be realized, black thread must permeate the entire thickness of the rug, drawing our attention to the three-dimensionality of something that we ordinarily perceive as two-dimensional. McMakin’s art forces us to focus on the ontological complexities of furniture that, while it occupies the same space as sculpture, is not culturally recognized as such. Another example would be his "Untitled (Writing Table and Chair)", which, while fully functional, is painted a bright pink, making the table and chair appear more as an "objet d'art" than an actual desk.

Curator Michael Darling has argued that McMakin’s intellectual tack to furniture was informed by his artistic education at the University of California, San Diego, which “was a hotbed of artistic engagement with the everyday. From Allan Kaprow, inventor of the Happening, to domestic conceptualist Eleanor Antin, environmental art pioneers Helen Mayer Harrison and Newton Harrison… the UCSD faculty espoused boundary-breaking, experimental approaches to art-making.” [Michael Darling, "Roy McMakin: A Door as Meant as Adornment", (Los Angeles: Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2003), 4.]

McMakin has been the subject of exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; the Henry Art Gallery in Seattle; and the Portland Art Museum. He is represented by the Matthew Marks Gallery in New York

References

elected Bibliography

*Darling, Michael. "Roy McMakin: A Door Meant as Adornment". Los Angeles: The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2003.
* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9507E5DD133FF932A15753C1A9639C8B63&scp=2&sq=roy%20mcmakin&st=cse Johnson, Ken. “Art in Review; Roy McMakin.” "New York Times", October 21, 2005, sec. E.]
*McMakin, Roy. "Charming Homes for Today: Drawings by Roy McMakin, 1996-2002". New York: Matthew Marks Gallery, 2003.
*McMakin, Roy. "A Month of Drawings in the Cursive Style!" New York: Matthew Marks Gallery, 2003.
*Yapelli, Tina. "Roy McMakin: A Slat-back Chair". San Diego: San Diego State University, 2005.

External Links

[http://www.matthewmarks.com/index.php?n=1&a=145&im=1 Roy McMakin at the Matthew Marks Gallery]