Cynthia Wynn and Michel Delgado Practice “Strange Seduction” at Lucky Street March 30, 2012
Two artists, using two very different mediums, combine to seduce and enchant viewers at Lucky Street Gallery’s latest show, Strange Seduction, opening Wednesday, March 30, with a party to meet the artists from 6 to 9 p.m. at 1130 Duval Street. Michel Delgado is a painter, working with enamel and oil on many surfaces from cardboard to canvas. Cynthia Wynn creates industrial art furniture from scrap metal–which can be made anything from large gears to bits and pieces left over from John Martini sculptures.
Michel Delgado’s paintings are bold, erotic, confident, symbolic and energetic. His people and animals sometimes seem dropped on their surfaces from another, more primitive and colorful world. As he says, “I like things that have been in one form but have become like ashes of what they were…. Everything goes back to something else and recreates something new.” He is currently in an important show in Manhattan.
Born in Dakar, Senegal, Delgado has been in Key West since the late 1980s. His career started off with original designs for fabric merchandise while exploring paintings at night. After taking part in several group shows at local galleries and selling his work at sunset in Mallory Square, he began to display his work at invitation shows and Old Island Days in Key West as well as in venues in Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, Tampa, Provincetown, and Miami Art Museum, picking up awards and prizes along the way. He had several major installations at the now-closed Kent Gallery, which produced a handsome catalog of his work.
Cynthia Wynn first came to Key West in the nineties where her work was featured at Valerie Hoh’s much-missed Pandemonium and ReWorx. After seeing her overscale over-the-top work at ReWorx, Lynn Kaufelt called Wynn “Key West’s own Gaudi.” Splitting her time between Asheville, NC, and Key West, Wynn collects steel from up and down the East Coast. She regularly gets best-in-show awards for sculpture from high-end crafts fairs. Her welding skills are internationally recognized. After completing commissions for chairs for clients around the country, she’ll participate in a prestigious steel trade fair in Dusseldorf, Germany, this summer.
Wynn’s work in steel is continually evolving and increasingly skillful. For this show her tables, chairs and lamps are more graceful: “I’ve been studying the lines of eighteenth-furniture and also been powerfully influenced by Alice in Wonderland.” She creates a playful patchwork from scrap steel, industrial leftovers, and the occasional piece of colorful steel from John Martini’s metal sculptures she stockpiles at her Stock Island studio. This show includes = a large dining table called “Tiddlywink,” a series of chairs called “Winkies,” and a show-stopping hall table.
Strange Seduction continues through April 10. Residents and visitors are invited to meet both artists at the gallery, 1130 Duval Street, during the opening on Wednesday, March 30. For further information, please call (305) 294-3973