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There’s an installation at the Central West End’s Duane Reed Gallery currently that confers a curious sense of calm and evil, awe and confusion, oddness and familiarity. Matthew Paul Isaacson’s self-titled show features his chosen medium—industrial porcelain tiles stacked atop one another in deceptively simple shapes.
By painstakingly stacking the little tiles, Isaacson has created various columnar shapes that together, seem to comprise a tabletop city, titled "A Grandiose Numerical Equation." This silent mini-Manhattan speaks to the anonymity of modern life; it’s an appealing microcosm, but somehow chilling as well—like a dollhouse for after the apocalypse. The “buildings,” erected on custom-made steel bases and pedestals, seem to be in some sort of unknowable dialogue.
It may also remind you of Jenga.
Isaacson, a Michigan native, was recently tapped to direct the St. Louis Community College at Forest Park Gallery.
His chosen art-making material may bring to mind former St. Louisan Christina Shmigel’s chosen medium, plumbing parts.
Matthew Paul Isaacson, through June 23. Duane Reed Gallery, 4729 McPherson, 314-361-4100, duanereedgallery.com.
