John L. Moore
About the Prints
These works demonstrate Moore’s mastery as a draughtsman, showcasing his ability to shift space with color, line, and gesture. Moore’s compositions include mirrors, water, and reflections, shifting the gaze from marks to intentions and intimations. Moore is both bold and enigmatic in his approach, pulling his audience through the middle passage into a world that is familiar yet unknown, and in focus but unclear of the direction of action. This multi-color lithograph was drawn with a combination of stones and plates.
Phil’s Team was several months in the making, but proved to be a jumping-off point rather than a conclusion. Moore has utilized 6 layers of silkscreen and 4 layers of lithography to produce a rich and substantive image. The panels, each printed on a separate sheet of paper, are the result of the same plates printed in varying combinations. Moore exploited the possibilities of layering tones and media to produce color which appears to move and change. Similarly, this work is about the changing vantage of what is known, expected, and desired; life is not always clearly rendered in black or white. At times, our interconnected histories have holes in the narrative or in our lineage that cannot be repaired or reclaimed. These gaps stare straight into the hard-edged reality of the present, a reckoning for the living and hope for those to come.
About the Artist
Born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1939, John L. Moore began taking art lessons in junior-high at the Cleveland Museum of Art. After high school, he served in the US Army until 1964. Moore received his BFA and MA from Kent State University in 1972 and 1974 respectively. He left his position as Assistant Curator in the Department of Art History and Education at The Cleveland Museum of Art in 1985 and moved to New York to pursue his studio work full time.
Moore’s work has been exhibited internationally (Tokushima Modern Art Museum, Japan; Seoul Art Center, South, Korea; Galerie Defrost, Paris; P.S1, NYC) and featured in solo exhibitions at venues including the New England School of Art & Design, Boston; Tomoko Liguori Gallery, New York, NY; The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA; Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art, OH; Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, AL among others.