(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.) – “Wax Nostalgic,” a solo exhibition of paintings by Pittsfield artist Michael McKay, is the debut show at Hudson Art, a new contemporary art gallery at 112 Water St. in Williamstown. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, June 14, 2014, from 5 to 7pm, and the exhibit will remain hung through mid-August.

Michael McKay paints images of social commentary using architecture and signage as motifs. “I find inspiration in outdated, Cold War-era American advertising and textbook illustration styles and the hollow fiction of the American dream that they signify,” he says. “I mine the gray area between current events and established history to create images that seduce with nostalgia while simultaneously embodying an underlying sense of dread. All melancholic overtones are fully intentional.”

Born and raised in southeastern Massachusetts, McKay attended Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston where he studied printmaking, painting, sound, film and all aspects of performance art. As an independent producer, McKay went on to organize performance and

multimedia shows at various venues around Boston, including the Boston Institute of Contemporary Art, Harvard Film Archives, Mobius Performance Gallery and for the Eventworks Arts Festival. In 2001 along with his wife, artist Monika Pizzichemi, he co-founded Empty Set Project Space which served as a necessary meeting place for local artists during the early years of Pittsfield’s cultural rebirth. It now serves as a part time gallery and full time art studio.

 

 

HUDSON ART INC.

112 Water St.

Williamstown, MA 01267

413-458-9781

Gallery hours: Thursday-Saturday, 11-4