Amused Medusa by Matthew Bakkom Curator: Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock
Amused Medusa, by Matthew Bakkom
Curator: Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock
Amused Medusa is a visual explication of the phenomena of the anagram, a word whose constituent letters can be reordered to create an entirely new word historically unrelated to the original. The occurrence of these linguistic gems is fundamentally accidental, the result of coincidence alone, yet their consideration as ordered pairs suggest intriguing new spaces of potential meaning for each audience member to contemplate. Hustling Sunlight (2015) shared an expansive collection of these artifacts in minimal, graphic style. This exhibition returns to that script inspired by Dutch grocery store flower displays to push further through the creation of a much richer and optically saturated context. The linear parameters of each piece are based on a set of children’s stencils stumbled upon in Glendale Queens during the winter of 2025. All work in the exhibition was produced over the course of the last year first in Rotterdam and then subsequently in Minneapolis and New Orleans and made possible through the hospitality of many friends and colleagues along the way to whom I offer my sincere gratitude.
I was originally introduced to the phenomena of the anagram and its compelling implications in the twilight of the 20 th century by a great teacher and close friend, Marie Mueller, to whom I proudly dedicate this show, newly manifest and presented at long last in her beloved New York City.
Matthew Bakkom (b.1968) has worked primarily in Minneapolis and New York since the early 1990’s as both a visual artist and organizer of large scale conceptually driven projects such as the New York City Museum of Complaint (2006-2009). He is the creator of the method of Collective Investigation, a founding member of La Vista the Downtown Cinema Club, The Canal Street Historical Society and All Star Fine and Recorded Arts. He has appeared previously at the Susan Lipani Gallery where he presented The Evil Genius of A King (2015). This 60 piece exhibition featured physical facsimiles of select elements from a 35mm art teaching slide collection that had been discarded by a midwestern university.
For more information or inquiries regarding the work contact mbakkom@gmail.com