[et_pb_section bb_built=”1″][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.17.6″]<\/p>\n
Hamilton Street Gallery Exhibition
\u201cMidnight Mercury\u201d January 26th to March 7th 2019
Steven Epstein
Artist\u2019s Statement<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>I was\u00a0 <\/span>reflecting upon the selection of my paintings for this show and looking for a thread or theme that would lead to a title.\u00a0 <\/span>Many of my images involve night visions of roads and malls.\u00a0 <\/span>The malls that caught my attention were older, decaying with damaged gravel parking lots.\u00a0 <\/span>The displays were of odd merchandise, the neighboring stores lit by mismatched neon lights.\u00a0 <\/span>I became enamored of them on my nightly commutes home driving north on Route 1.\u00a0 <\/span>Having spent the evening working in either the Emergency Department or Operating Room of a hospital I was usually coming off an intense emotional state and as I decompressed, the road, what was on it and around it took on a strange, \u201cnoirish\u201d attribute. In the darkness, with little traffic and closed stores lit by neon I felt like I was between worlds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Mercury is the Roman equivalent of the Greek God Hermes. In mythology he is the god of trade, commerce, roads and travelers as well a being a divine trickster. Boundaries and the transgression of boundaries are in his rule and he is able to move freely between the mortal and divine. As a \u201cpsychopomp\u201d or guide of souls to the next life he was of the few who could cross the boundaries between Olympus, earth, and Hades(the underworld). \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Seemed like I was in Mercury\u2019s realm at midnight, traveling dark roads past aging places of commerce feeling like I was in a different dimension.\u00a0 <\/span>Boundaries were broken as artificial light conspired with color to mystify geometry and mass while the shadows mixed like shades from the underworld.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Styles, fashions and products change making way for the next thing. \u00a0 <\/span>Stores and roads crumble and are torn down to make way for the new.\u00a0 <\/span>The mall of a number of these paintings has now been torn down.\u00a0 <\/span>Gods and civilizations are replaced.\u00a0 <\/span>As long as we are here, though our bodies break down, the human spirit survives.\u00a0 <\/span>Everything that lives eats and as long as there is humanity the spirit of commerce and travel, Mercury\u2019s realm, will continue, past our midnight.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_portfolio _builder_version=”3.17.6″ posts_number=”40″ include_categories=”57″ fullwidth=”off” zoom_icon_color=”#2ea3f2″ hover_overlay_color=”rgba(255,255,255,0.9)” \/][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"