Ryan McLaughlin: Säntis Bindle

The surprisable, semi-recognizable is where we find Ryan McLaughlin’s paintings. His subjects are frequently hazy logos and texts floating in shallow, milky pools. We know that we once knew these places and products. It’s all there on the tips of our tongues, our ensemble hypnotically waiting for new instructions to be hollered out. We the audience and the band are one, we live to lost in the repetition. Ryan's compulsive mark-making emerges from a concrete wall of abstract percussion, awaken anew with the audience filling in the blanks. They derive much of their power via collaboration, the call-and-response, wayward sons coming together to riff on extraordinary lives shared separately. Each painting is personal and universal. Like Junkyard Band’s 40-minute version of Adele’s “Hello” reimagined by Junkyard Band, these paintings lull us in with their elongated melodic sections before cranking up the dial and jamming for hours a zingy bowtie wearing duck or a caveman-like apple. We know it even if we don’t.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website