Kevin Cooley
Controlled Burn #2

Controlled Burn #2

© Kevin Cooley

Controlled Burn #2
Controlled Burn #2
ArtistAmerican, born 1975
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Controlled Burn #2
Date2013, printed 2016
MediumInkjet print
DimensionsFrame: 61 × 43 × 2 in. (154.9 × 109.2 × 5.1 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the Museum Collectors
Object number2016.134
Not on view

Explore Further

Department
Photography
Object Type
Description

One
could easily believe that Kevin Cooley’s Controlled
Burn #2
depicts an elaborately sewn and stuffed “soft sculpture,” a
billowing tornado of black crepe rising from a glow of fake flame and ember.
But it is indeed actual smoke and fire. That seeming contradiction—that
something as insubstantial and ephemeral as smoke could appear so weighty and
graspable—is just one of the dualities that Los Angeles–based artist Kevin
Cooley explores in his
Controlled Burn
series. “Fire is a powerful natural force that we harness for greater good, and
it is the only Classical element that we can create on demand,” the artist
notes. “Yet, when out of control, it has the potential for grave destruction.”
Even Cooley’s title suggests the risk and contradiction inherent in an endeavor
as seemingly foolhardy as making a large-scale studio portrait of something as
fleeting, formless, and dangerous as fire and smoke. Yet the artist succeeds,
revealing a beauty we might not suspect could be present in something as
fearful as a cloud of suffocating smoke.




ProvenanceThe artist; [Paul Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles]; purchased by MFAH, 2016.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Printed label on verso backboard: KEVIN COOLEY / CERTIFICATE OF AUTHENTICITY / This is to guarantee the following artwork is authenticated and signed by Kevin Cooley. / (image) / Kevin Cooley / Controlled Burn 2, 2013 / Archival Pigment Print / Edition 1/4 + 2 Artist Proofs / 40x60" /// Signature: (script in ink) / Date: 3/30/2016 (in ink) /// KEVIN COOLEY 917.309.5452 KEVINCOOLEY.NET
Signed in black ink, on Certificate of Authenticity inserted incased into the frame backing board: Kevin Cooley // 3/30/2016

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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