Chapter 3: ACT

ADELSON GALLERIES PRESENTS

SPAZUK

F!RE F!RE F!RE CHAPTER 3 ACT

« My art is based on a sustained exploration of new dimensions and applications of the technique of “fumage”, that is, painting with fire. The focus of my subjects, projects and collections is the relationships between humans and the natural world.

My work explores the current reality of the climate crisis and the Anthropocene through lenses that highlight the ambivalence of humanity. This duality of human nature is reflected in the medium of fire, and carbon as soot, both of which hold the power to nurture or destroy life. » ---- Steven Spazuk

Adelson Galleries presents Spazuk’s FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!: a story telling and virtual experience. Working with fire as his primary creation tool, Spazuk’s Fumage, embodies the polarity of creation and destruction. The artist’s work explores human’s ambivalent relationship with the natural world through the lens of the climate crisis and the Anthropocene. Bridging the illusive gap between human beings and Nature through his choice of elemental media, carbon from soot, Spazuk exemplifies that there is potential to create beauty, contemplation and possibility when working with Nature, rather than against it.

Inspired by the outbreak of global fires due to the climate crisis, FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! is the artist’s perspective and response to the state of urgency that is our present moment. Released in three chapters, the collection narrates Spazuk’s realistic optimism on climate justice and systemic change. The virtual show is divided into chapters: Connect, Understand and Act, proposing a cyclical approach toward converging actions of reparation. In order to arrive at a state of systemic balance, notions of linearity and separateness must be deconstructed. Unlike classical methods of storytelling, (taking the structure of beginning, middle and end), Spazuk aims to create a recurrent unfolding process, where usually defined, finite sections are now interwoven and interdependent. There is no end and no beginning, there is only presence and re-presentation. Such is the language of art; to represent, to engage with, to question what we have been given, and ask where we go from here.

The experience of witnessing Spazuk’s work sparks engagement and an embrace of the discomfort that inevitably comes with change. Spazuk’s practice awakens us to the fact that there is no easy fix, no happy ending that wraps up the tale into a pretty bow. Instead, there is a line of understanding that carries us through the cycles of undoing and rebuilding. Like flames rising from the ashes, built on the rubble of the past; we are reminded that with all destruction there is potential for a powerful creative force to rise up and illuminate the way forward. We are always already, turning the page, humbly bearing witness to the call forward.

Text written by Amanda Deckelbaum and edited by Danielle Delhaes.

Untitled (Fire Extinguisher), 2020 Engraved fire extinguisher.

20 x 5 x 5 inches 50.8 cm x 12.7 cm x 12.7 cm

Chapter 3: ACT

In Spazuk’s third and final chapter of F!RE F!RE F!RE, the viewer is immediately presented with direct instructions via its title: ACT. The chapter consists of the works: Greta Portrait, 10 Multiples of Greta, Fire Extinguisher, Ceci N’est Pas Une Drill, Activistes, Empty Nest, Lifeboat 1, Lion, Tigre, and Koala.

Like in Chapter 2: Understand, ACT has a protagonist. This time, she is not a symbolic, mythological figure like Nemesis. She is a living, powerful and determined woman, Greta Thunberg. Like Nemesis, Thunberg has turned into somewhat of a cultural and social icon in the wake of the recent climate action protests. She became an accidental leader at just 15 years old, putting her formal education aside to speak as the Earth’s voice for her generation and generations to come.

Like Greta’s direct and unswerving rhetoric, Chapter 3: ACT, leaves no room for interpretation. With stern, frank, and startling imagery, Spazuk speaks directly to the viewer about responsibility and action. In Greta Portrait, the viewer is confronted with the eyes of a commanding yet vulnerable young woman who implores our commitment to meaningful action as repayment for her sacrifice.

Earth is our Mother and most of us have become children of greed and entitlement.

The road to recovery is through connection, respect, and immediate action from us all. Like the path that Greta has paved, Spazuk steers the viewer toward the reality that there is no other option, the house is on fire and now is the time to ACT. Hope and recovery lies in our rediscovery: the truth of our own being is Nature.

Like Nature, we can adapt ingeniously, transform with wisdom and regenerate.

Greta, 2019 Soot from fire on gessoed panel 36 in diameter 91.44cm

10 Multiples of Greta Spazuk replicates Greta Thunberg’s portrait ten times. With each iteration, the chaos around the activist varies, but her expression remains focused, stern and steady. Spazuk’s portrayal evokes the varieties of challenges that one person has the grit to resolve, an example for each of us to creatively strive for a better world. With the proceeds collected from these works, a donation will be made to Thunberg’s cause Friday for Future

Greta, 10 multiples, 2020 Soot on paper 20 x 14 inches 50.8 cm x 35.56 cm

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The climate crisis is real.

This is not a drill!

Referencing surrealist René Magritte’s Ceci N’est Pas Une Pipe, Spazuk pulls on the history of art’s imaginative capability to shift perspectives and evoke playful solutions.

Ceci n’est pas une drill, 2019 Soot and acrylic on gessoed panel 11 x 14 inches 28 cm x 35.56 cm

Activistes, 2019 Soot from fire on gessoed panel 18 x 24 inches.

45.72 cm x 60.96cm

Activistes evokes the courage, strength and resilience of life that endures in spite of massive capitalist assault.

Tiger, 2019 Soot from fire on gessoed panel 16 x 20 inches 40.64 cm x 50.8 cm

Spazuk chooses to portray the Lion, the Tiger and the Koala as examples of ongoing conservation and protecting efforts. Each one of these creatures is being ACTively protected. Can we collectively place as much concentration and care onto protecting all of Nature’s creations?

Koala, 2019 Soot on gessoed panel 10 x 8 inches 25.4 cm x 20.32 cm

Lion, 2021 Soot from fire on gessoed panel 12 x9 inches 30.48 cm x 22.86 cm

Lifeboat 1 is a representation of an absurd yet evocative lifeline.

One of innumerable possible creative solutions. We can come together and create a new world; we are intelligent, resourceful and capable beings.

Lifeboat Number 1, 2021 Soot on gessoed panel 72 x 72 inches 182.88 cm x 182.88 cm

Empty Nest, 2019 Soot, acrylic and gold leaf on panel 36 inches diameter 91.44 cm diameter

Empty Nest is an opportunity to return home. There is an option to make this empty nest anew. We must ACT before we can recover.