More Los Angeles Poems

PastExhibition

Nov 16

Keith Rocka Knittel
More Los Angeles Poems

December 10, 2016 - January 7, 2017

SHOW CATALOG (PDF)
PRESS RELEASE (PDF)

Charlie James Gallery is pleased to announce the solo exhibition More Los Angeles Poems by Keith Rocka Knittel, featuring new paintings, drawings, and sculpture by the L.A. based artist. The show will be on view December 10 through December 30, 2016, with an opening reception and performances on Saturday, December 10, from 6-9pm.

Five interconnected series of works fluidly presented form an environment in which material and content signify the inevitability of change. Merging dialects overlap in a syntax of smog and sun-burnt strip-malls, freeways built on fault lines, and translucent run off discoloring the sea. Drawings in dry erase marker on marker board are traced in black urethane resin, resembling treacle, transient thought stabilized. 16” x 22” paintings mounted in box frames constructed from a laminate named “Jungle Eyes,” a recurring motif in Knittel’s work, evoke the hand-painted signage of snacks and car parts on L.A.’s ubiquitous faded stucco store-fronts. Fragile yet hulking 55” x 66” drawings on white seamless paper of a pre-internet meme proclaim discombobulated slogans. Plywood and laminate wall-mounted shelves prop up watercolor still life paintings of the sidewalks and gutters in his studio’s MacArthur Park neighborhood. Underlying all, gestural portraits of Knittel’s studio cat act as intimate sign language spanning the artist’s studio process.

At the opening reception on December 10, the gallery’s basement space will be activated by performances and work by Alli Miller, Kyle Patrick Roberts, Lindsay August Salazar, and Zach Kleyn in a kind-of basement party for disgruntled, anxious, and sincere individuals.

Keith Rocka Knittel holds an MFA from CalArts. His work has been exhibited in contemporary art spaces such as the Hammer Museum, Human Resources LA, and Otras Obras. His curatorial projects include Yard Pedro (Instagram: @yardpedro) and Harborview & Pole. Knittel’s Everything Must Go! radio show on KCHUNG is now in its fourth year on the air. Knittel lives and works in San Pedro, California where he attempts to break down the linear preconceptions of time and space.