BILL MILLER: “BIG DEEP AND MYTHIC REFLECTIONS”

Bill Miller returns Sunday, September 21 to the James Cox Gallery at Woodstock with a collection of work titled “Big Deep and Mythic Reflections.” The exhibit will showcase familiar scenes around the Hudson Valley.

Since his 2006 exhibit at the James Cox Gallery, Miller has made a second home of the area, becoming a part of the local culture. As well, Miller has earned a greater audience nationally, recognized for his innovative use of vintage linoleum in creating his paintings. The effect lies somewhere between collage and stained glass, rendering narrative moods and an uncanny sense of common memory. Contemporary, Folk and Outsider Art collectors are drawn to the originality.

Miller uses the linoleum as a palette of colors, dipping into the piles of recycled flooring for detail and inspiration, incorporating the wear and tear into familiar landscapes, family snapshots, historical portraits, and still lifes. For this exhibit, Miller drew upon the areas history and personalities. James Cox states, “I am amazed by Bill Miller’s ability to absorb and interpret our region’s most evocative people and places. Perhaps his fresh eye is an advantage and we are proud to show his newest work, which includes depictions of some of Woodstock’s most sacred places, such as Opus 40 and Big Deep.”

A graphic artist by trade, “I was always painting,” says Miller who originally worked with oils and acrylics. Then in the early Nineties while scavenging an abandoned steel mill Miller came across some vintage linoleum. “It was beautiful and it was blue. I saw the sky; I saw water,” he recalls. This moment inspired what has become an exclusive use of predominantly pre-World War II linoleum. Originally Miller used the linoleum to mat paintings, and now, after twelve years of collecting and working with retro-linoleum, his vocabulary of the many varied patterns and types has vastly expanded his palette. Consequently Miller’s paintings have become more detailed and sophisticated.

An example of this would be Miller’s portrait of Woodstock Outsider Artist Clarence Schmidt, included in the “Big Deep and Mythic Reflections” exhibit. Cox comments that “Miller’s depiction of this long departed master is inspired.” Schmidt is depicted standing in front of his cathedral-like residence built from recycled materials holding two paint brushes along with a small picture of the house. Miller uses red linoleum for Schmidt’s soft and well worn flannel shirt, transforming what was once part of a dining room floor.

Transform and transcend is what Bill Miller does naturally. His work goes beyond the conventional definitions of categories. Neither contemporary nor folk art can singularly claim Miller as part of the genre. This dichotomy is a result of Miller’s personal history as well as that of his medium. His long family roots are buried in West Virginia coal country, from which his parents moved to Cleveland for the industrial opportunities of the auto factories. Miller’s father was a son of a coal miner, born and raised in the farm house that his grandfather had built. Miller’s mother was the daughter of a door-to-door minister, and considered the “city girl” because she had indoor plumbing. After Miller was born, his grandfather was fatally crushed in a coal mine, and in a twist of tragic industrial irony, his father later met a similar fate in the car factory where he worked. Mrs. Miller never remarried, raising Miller and his sister on her own. Industry took a great personal toll on Miller’s world, both in terms of his family and later on the surrounding Rust Belt communities, helping to infuse and shape his work on many levels. Miller’s sister has continued a West Virginian tradition of quilting, creating designs from sections of flat pattern, a technique Miller also reflects, and which aligns his work with that of artists such as Matisse and Klimt.

Miller has exhibited throughout the United States, and has been profiled on television by the National Geographic Channel and WQED TV, as well as had work featured in Home magazine, The New York Times, LA Times, Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News, Pittsburgh Magazine and more.

“Big Deep and Mythic Reflections” will be exhibited at the James Cox Gallery at Woodstock, September 21 through October 17. An opening reception will be held Sunday, September 21 at the gallery from 4 to 7 p.m.

For more information, telephone (845) 679-7608 or visit the James Cox Gallery at Woodstock, 4666 Route 212, Willow, NY or online at www.jamescoxgallery.com.