Max Presneill is an artist and curator. His paintings are represented by Garboushian Gallery, Beverly Hills and Durden and Ray Fine Art, Los Angeles. He has exhibited at museums, institutes and galleries in London, New York, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Mexico City, Sydney, Istanbul, Paris, as well as numerous projects throughout the US.
He is currently the Head Curator at the Torrance Art Museum and Director of ARTRA Curatorial and was the Founder and former Director of Raid Projects in Los Angeles (1998-2008) and from 2005-8 he was the Director/Curator for the Mark Moore Gallery.
Artistic Statement
Utilizing source images from the internet, photographs from my own life, art historical references and intuitive decisions when painting, I hope to reflect upon the relationship between fact and fiction in relation to our experience. Within reconstructed histories and mythologized experiences, my own and cultural ones, the forged connections that play between remembering and invention act as considerations of the nature of reality and identity.
The narrative elements allude to situations, both specific and general, factual and imagined, in a form of visual existentialism that places the importance of the act of painting within a set of self-affirmed constructions of reality and value, the choices made being the literal illustration of Being as ‘decision making’.
Isolated, de-contextualized or reconfigured, the source materials float in a sea of uncertainty, like our own reflection in a mirror, somewhat familiar but not quite our ‘self’, what is seen differing from what is felt, hermetic experience and shared cultural expressions constantly oscillating between understanding and illegibility.
In the end they are the remnants and evidence of the cognitive, problem-solving nature of painting and the human experience, or at least mine…
Exhibition Resume
2011
Art Platform LA, art fair, with Garboushian Gallery, LA Mart, CA
Chain Letter, Shoshana Wayne Gallery, Bergamot Station, Santa Monica, CA
CO/LAB at LA Mart, with Durden & Ray, Los Angeles, CA
Film:Shorts, Mark Moore Gallery (with a D&R video project), Culver City, CA
13th Grade, POST, Los Angeles
Role Reversal, Mount St Mary's College, curated by Carl Berg
You First, curated by UFORA, OCCCA, Santa Ana, CA
Social Being, Hudson/Linc, San Pedro, CA
La Caja Galeria, Tijuana, Mexico
319 Scholes, Brooklyn, NY
Polemically Small, curated by Edward Lucie Smith, Garboushian Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA
Future Perfect, Beautiful Decay, Los Angeles (print version)
Los Angeles Art Show art fair, with Garboushian Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA
Eagle Rock 9th Annual Art Auction, Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, CA
Year One, Commonspace, Los Angeles, CA
LACE Annual Auction, LA Mart, Los Angeles, CA
Year One, Raid Projects, Los Angeles, CA
Clare Foundation, Bergamot Station, Santa Monica, CA
2010
Glossolalia and Other Stories, Garboushian Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA (solo)
A Scattered Thought, PØST, Los Angeles, CA
The Bigger Picture, Edgar Varela Projects, Los Angeles, CA
San Diego Art Fair, with Garboushian Gallery and Durden & Ray, San Diego, CA
Economy of Gesture for Performing Public Space Project, L.A.C.E. Los Angeles, CA
Durden & Ray Presents, Phantom Galleries, Long Beach, CA
Nice To Meet You, Sloan Fine Art, New York
L_ove A_lways, Galerie Lara, Tokyo, Japan
2009
Last of the Summer Wine, Durden and Ray Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA (solo)
Here And Now, ARTRA, Los Angeles, CA
Rant, Pacific Design Center, Los Angeles, CA
Manifestation, Carl Berg Projects, Los Angeles, CA
RPLA, Raid Projects, Los Angeles, CA
On The Shoulders of Davids, JAUS, Los Angeles, CA
Psychic Hearts, La Verne University Gallery, La Verne, CA
PS 1999 – 2009, Kunstruimte09, Groningen, Netherlands
Tupajumi, Hudson Museum, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Gunshow, Space B, New York City
Doin’ It, Kruglak Gallery, Mira Costa, CA
2008
“um…My, gallery”, The Brewery Arts Complex, Los Angeles, CA
From Similar Origins to Remarkable Visions, Main Art Gallery, CSUF, Fullerton, CA
Plush, Eagle Rock Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, CA
2007
Wish List, Freight & Volume, New York City (solo)
ANFSCD, La Estacion Arte Contemporaneo, Chihuahua, Mexico (solo)
artLA Art Fair, Los Angeles, with Raid FC
2006
Sex Sells, Red House Gallery, Venice Beach, CA (as part of artLA)
2005
Quickening, MOCA, Tuscon, AZ
Just Visiting, Huntington Beach Art Center
artLA. The LA art fair, LA, with Raid Projects
A Warlike People, M Gallery, Phoenix, Arizona, curated by Lara Taubman
Register The Distance, Borusan Gallery, Istanbul, Turkey, curated by Beral Madra (curator of Istanbul Pavilion, Venice Biennale 2005 and 2 previous Istanbul Biennials)
2004
The Armory Show, New York
LA Driveby Part 2, MOP Gallery, Sydney, Australia
LA Driveby Part 1, Kyubidou Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Network, De Parel, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Nexus 1 by nTOPIA, Art and Idea, Mexico City
PLA, Raid Projects, Los Angeles
2003
Turschlusspanik, Kontainer Gallery, LA (solo)
Midas, POST, Los Angeles
Raid In Chicago, Standard Gallery, Chicago
Scope Art Fair, Standard Hotel, Los Angeles
Tinsel Town, Domestic Setting, Los Angeles
Images of Desire 2, Winston Hotel, Amsterdam
Fragment, PS Gallery, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Miniatures, Kyubidou Gallery, Tokyo, Japan (catalog)
The Stray Show Art Fair, Chicago
GAP, SCA Gallery, Pomona, CA (solo)
2002
Curatorial Market, Cuchifritos Gallery, New York (catalog)
Images Of Desire, Fields Gallery, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Cross Currents, Deutsch Bank, London, UK
Dreamcatcher, RA Gallery, Kiev, Ukraine
The Stray Show Art Fair, Chicago
Glamour Trip So Soon To Slip, Sheehan Gallery, WA (catalog)
Animal Instinct, Cerritos College Gallery, CA
GIANT, Three Mills Studio, London, UK
2001
Travails, West Gallery, Fullerton, CA (solo)
100% Rag, POST, LA
Ever Since Icarus, Lord Mori Gallery, Chinatown, LA (catalog)
New Video, Gallery Hana, Austin, TX
For Example, Acuna Hansen Gallery, Chinatown, LA
Rising Tide, O.C. Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Ana, CA (catalog)
Su-Su-Superego, San Bernadino College Gallery, CA
Sound And Vision, Program 12, LA
2000
Logocentricity, Cypress College Gallery, CA (solo)
Phase 3, EGCA Gallery, Santa Ana, CA
Wall Space, Miller Durazo Gallery, LA
10 Degrees Of Abstraction, Biola University Gallery, LA
Strangeland, Andrew Shire Gallery, LA
Intraconnections, Don O’Melveny Gallery, LA
1999
Desire, Eye Five Gallery, LA (catalog)
Strange Bedfellows, Webster Gallery, Santa Ana, CA (solo)
Simon Rondelet International Video Art Show, The Bullet Museum, New York
Land Of Extreme Happiness, SMAC Truck Show, LA (catalog)
1998
10th Annual Juried Show, Irvine Fine Arts Center, CA
IV, EGCA Gallery, Santa Ana, CA
1997
BLOC, Workstation Gallery, Sheffield, UK
Contemporary Diversions, Clocktower Gallery, Sheffield, UK
1996
Spellbound, Octagon Center, Sheffield, UK (solo)
SCAT, The Mappin Gallery, Sheffield, UK
Stockport Open, Stockport City Art Gallery, UK
1995
Derby Open, Derby City Art Gallery, UK
Scattered, Doncaster City Art Gallery, UK
1994
Morbid Symptoms, Leeds Metro University Gallery, UK
Pullit 8, Pullit Gallery, London, UK
Brute Farce, Yorkshire Art Space, Sheffield, UK
Climate, Cool Tan Gallery, London, UK