Artist Lecture 1

Morgan McAusian and Jack Dawes

Morgan McAusian, a rather jittery and eccentric artist, began experimenting in art when he was a young boy. He was fascinated with ‘lawn art’ and began making wooden whirligigs. He was also obsessed, and still is, with collecting and dismantling found objects. In college, he studied painting and collage. He was commissioned for a world map mural in a junior high school cafeteria that he created
entirely out of scraps of paper. Throughout his lifetime, McAusian has continued collecting things like
audiotapes, suitcases, thermoses, Tupperware, plastic caps, and tags. He pays special attention to color, texture, and form and is constantly organizing these objects. He creates a particular bond to each item in reference to a memory, a time, and place. His biggest struggle is deciding when to stop, or when to keep working on a piece. One of his projects that is showcased in “Homefill” in the Sheppard
Gallery is an actual replica of windmill created entirely out of paper. He was inspired by the model homes during the 1950’s where cardboard cutouts of turkeys adorned the table to create the illusion
of ‘home’. His windmill creates a dialogue about the difference between what is reality and conspiracy.
McAusian also works in the medium of film/video. He experiments with color next to color and tries to create other worlds. He has a very painterly approach and he edits are based on his emotions. In
“Leslie”, he films a constructed object, a flipbook of a bird. It was filmed all in real time and there was little editing. In “Music Box”, the camera captures the insides of a music box. The amplified sounds,
hard light, and changing perspectives create something eerie and almost uncomfortable to watch.
McAusian is always taking an experimental approach to his art, often forging head-on into projects he has no previous experience with. He claims to relish in his mistakes and enjoys unexpected results.

The second artist to present at the lecture was Jack Dawes, who was equally as quirky as McAusian, but who seemed surer of himself and his work. Dawes’ work is often controversial, if not downright
offensive and I’d like to think he creates most of it for his own amusement. His pieces are simplistic in nature, making their commentary so subtle, it could easily go unnoticed by the casual
onlooker. Examples of these pieces are the White American Flag and the Twin Tower replica he constructed solely from McDonald’s French fries and Heinz ketchup. These two pieces play on American values and patriotism.
Another reoccurring subject in Dawes’ work is illegal drugs. The “Misdemeanor Box”, a 1’ concrete cube that encased an unspecified amount of marijuana, was almost banned from a gallery. Another example was a gumball machine that contained hundreds of dollars worth of prescription pills. These pieces were more light-hearted and I can only assume he, and many others shared a good laugh. Some of his other pieces pointed at racial stereotypes. These pieces were blatantly offensive in nature, but somehow Dawes executes them in such a manner that their ambiguity and playfulness make you want to laugh rather
than gawk-- or maybe that’s just me. Not all of his work is about laughs, though. Two pieces, a statue of
David holding an actual machine gun and a handgun painted to look like a child’s to gun are more sobering and actually terrifying. They speak words about the trivialization of violence and war. In his lecture, Dawes expressed that his artwork was all about intention. Most of his work was created deliberately to evoke a reaction from his audience and begin a dialogue.