My Pet Ram is pleased to present Note To Self, a solo exhibition by New York City-based artist Aaron Wrinkle.

“I’ve been using the written word as a platform to make art and specifically abstract paintings for many years now. It starts with the line and continues with the line. This is the abstraction and it’s never ending. That’s not to say a painting isn’t resolved though. That is the task really, laying down the groundwork and pulling it all together or picking up where I left. There has to be some form of relief or success in art and life. As well as failure.

Note To Self is comprised of a selection of abstract compositions pertaining to a large series of raw oil paintings created from scrawled text onto primed canvas and antique fabrics. The texts vary in subject, but are written generally by the bedside, throughout the day or in the studio. Once making their way onto the canvas, lines are exaggerated, mimicked, extended and sometimes painted out. The shapes of the letters guide the paintings and gestures. Sometimes there are recognizable traces and sometimes the words are completely obliterated by the composition the painting ultimately needs to be. Occasionally I’ll forget the text unless written on the back of a painting or traced back to paper or my phone. There are also times the text changes or is a variation on the original text. This isn’t that different from everyday conversations  and language. I don’t judge if its good or not. The painting space is already damaged. Although I do have helpful  mantras and do place affirmations into some paintings,  there’s a certain absurdity to it all. To make a painting from a dream about a “good orange” and in turn making a painting entitled “eating an orange” really exemplifies this. The paintings are not jokes though. They are very sincere.

I made it a point early on to lose control of any predetermined system or variables within the compositions aside from the text and my general understanding of formal elements and color. Although mixing colors and using out of the tube color in the compositions, it was also important to use previously non used colors for me, even colors generally deemed unruly for a painting’s posture or presentation. These consist primarily of earth tones or muddied colors interacting with primaries and brighter colors. The surface is unforgivable and raw. At times compositions seemed unlikely manageable so I knew I had found what I needed for new paintings. That being paintings that were uncomfortable.

To further extend my vocabulary of color I in turn limited color by  producing grayscale and black and white paintings in tandem. There is a signifier element to these in that they pertain to the slumber aspect of some of the text such as “ Dry Mouth Toilet Bed”. Also relative are my interests in surrealism and the black and white photographs, “rayograms” and painting compositions of Man Ray. My paintings  aren’t typical value scale or necessarily contemporarily popular  artworks. Man Ray stated “ I paint what cannot be photographed, that which comes from the imagination or from dreams, or from an unconscious drive.” I find this statement very useful to my own paintings being lost in the avalanche of hyper realism and neo-abstraction to date. I am conjoined to the latter but find the addition of a conceptual apparatus helpful in making paintings. I generally have no choice but to relate my paintings  to what they are and not to what they are not. Abstraction is inherent to all gestures, so I see no need in attempting to replicate a reality that is already questionable. My paintings aren’t always photogenic. I’m very well aware of the problematic history of painting and that’s why I continue to paint. Michael Asher once observed “I never understood how painting could be conceptual”. Although probably deemed a serious outlook, I saw this as permission and a task to approach literal painting in such terms with a brush.

My paintings are recordings of what is not necessarily definable in reality, psychology, within and sometimes not even in the paintings themselves. The stimuli, the undulations, the things you can’t quite pin down are all projected and navigated in the arena of painting. The paintings use the same formal elements as seen throughout the history of painting, specifically push-pull modernism, but their origins are quite present. They have their own identities. They are immediate in their production and presentation. The oil is raw. There is fatigue and meditation. There are mistakes. If lucky there is an object that earns its place. Sometimes it’s quick, but usually it’s a slow dance.

Overall, I only aim to be present and to give a certain peace and kindness to life through art. I’m grateful for the opportunity to present my art to anyone."

Note To Self will be on view Wednesday, October 5, 2022 through Monday, October 17, 2022. A reception will be held on Friday, October 7th from 6-9pm. The gallery is located at 48 Hester Street in the Lower East Side. Gallery hours are Wed-Sun from 12-7pm and by appointment. For inquiries and more information about this exhibition, please email info@mypetram.com.

Aaron Wrinkle (b. 1978, Missouri) is an independent artist, writer and performer based in New York, New York and Southwest Missouri. He received his BFA in painting from the Kansas City Art Institute (2004) and an MFA from CalArts (2008). He has collaborated with Michael Decker as Wrinkle/Decker, L.E. Kim in DG ( Drums Guitar), Raymond Pettibon, Dan Graham, Chris Johanson and acted in William Leavitt's films. Wrinkle often cites older generations of artists, genres and movements over peer or contemporary influence. His work was published in the New Museum’s ‘Younger than Jesus Artist Directory’ by Phaidon Press in 2009 and his works and projects have been featured and reviewed in Artforum, ArtJournal, Artnet, ArtScene, Autre Magazine, Interview Magazine, LA WEEKLY, Modern Painters, Notes on Looking and The New York Times. He has written extensive essays on Paul and Damon McCarthy and Dan Graham. His work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Kansas City, Los Angeles, New York, Japan and Europe with works housed in private and public collections including the Nerman Museum of Art in Johnson County, Kansas. He has an annex studio, his archive and part time residence in Aurora, Missouri situated in a retired and remodeled pig barn neighboring his father’s auto body shop. In 2020 Wrinkle moved to New York from Los Angeles.