Liam Everett

Biography

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Untitled (yarrow lens), 2021

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Borin in Rochester, New York, 1973
Lives & Works in Sebastopol, California

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"The literal imprints of the artist’s work animate these pieces, the drips and stains underscoring the phantasmic presence of a body repeatedly working through a singular idea into multiple iterations." —Franklin Melendenz, Artforum
Photo by Spencer Wells.

Liam Everett’s abstract mixed-media painting and sculpture result from a process of steadfast and repetitious application and erasure, employing non-traditional methods to apply—and caustic substances to remove—painstakingly developed layers of paint and composition. Inspired by the dynamic alchemy of the natural environment in California, this method makes plain the interactive properties of the substances on the canvas—how they counteract, preserve, or react to one another. In this way, Everett’s investigative procedure, laser-focused on the subtle behavior of his materials, becomes akin to the scientific assaying of chemical and mineral substances in order to determine purity or the limits of stability.

In the studio, the artist develops this process by imposing physical obstructions, demanding exaggerated levels of adaptation and effort that recall the straight-faced farce and gesturality of absurdist theatre. Everett brings the body into the problem-solving inherent in art-making, destabilizing and actualizing all at once. The studio space, then, is akin to a rehearsal space in which progression and perpetual motion never quite reach a reliable resolution. The toil of this circuitous working method is imbued in the work, revealing itself on the canvas as a complex material and metaphysical depth.
The distillation of the studio’s physical and ephemeral characteristics constitutes an important aspect of the artist’s practice. That which finds expression as work on canvas originates as the inherent dimensions of the structure of the space, the proportion of a window, direction of its light, and the makeshift tools found nearby or inside. Time spent in the studio corralling these native elements, and learning their individual insistences on translation through the work, acts as Everett’s primary vehicle for developing its direction. In this way, what remains is an indexical record of the artist’s labor and practice.

Everett has previously collaborated with choreographers and dancers during major exhibitions to activate the motion inherent in the works. For the artist’s 2017 installation at SFMOMA, Everett invited dance partners for performative actions twice weekly, incorporating a sculptural staging element that further developed his investigations into the influence of emotive environments.

Born in 1973 in Rochester, New York, Liam Everett lives and works in Northern California. His work has been included in exhibitions at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Biennale of Painting, Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens, Deurle, Belgium; U.C. Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive; San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art; CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco. He has had two solo exhibitions at Kasmin: On meeting again (2021) and Cura (2011). Everett is the recipient of the SECA Art Award at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2017), the Richard Diebenkorn Teaching Fellowship at the San Francisco Art Institute (2013) and the San Francisco Artadia Award (2013). Everett’s work is included in significant international public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Dallas Museum of Art; Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes, France; Fondation Carmignac, Paris; Kistefos Museum, Jevnaker, Norway, and U.C. Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archives.
Works

Liam Everett

Untitled (yarrow lens), 2021

ink, oil, sand, acrylic on vinyl
59 1/2 x 37 inches
151.1 x 94 cm

Copyright The Artist

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Exhibitions
- Liam Everett: On meeting again
  October 21 – November 13, 2021 297 Tenth Avenue, New York
  Everett’s experiments in the development of a self-sustaining studio practice see him employing a process of steadfast and repetitious application and erasure, using non-traditional methods to apply—and caustic substances to remove—painstakingly developed layers of paint and composition. A catalogue, featuring a conversation with Everett, will be published in tandem with the exhibition.
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Publications
- Liam Everett: On meeting again
  2021
  Hardcover
  View More
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