Show Announcement: Haynes Galleries

News: October, 2010

THOMASTON, Maine - During the month of October, featured artist

Philip Michelson's solo exhibition, Contemporary Realism, brings to

life refreshingly uncomplicated images of slightly worn vintage toys

and discarded objects. In this exhibition, he presents forgotten toys

as painted icons, reminding us of the simpler days of childhood - a

time that existed before the advent of Wii and Xbox.

Michelson graduated from the University of San Francisco in the

early 1970's. His career as a professional artist took off as his

passion for painting photorealism caught the attention of curators,

museums, and collectors. Michelson does not try to explain or

apologize for his art.

"Philip Michelson's work has been called both representational and

Photo-Realist. While his works do represent everyday images and at

first glance could almost be mistaken for photographs, they are really

a composite of both real and imagined surfaces rendered with the

kind of contrast and detail characteristic of photographs. The popular

idea is that photographs depict 'reality.' But artists have always

known that 'reality' is subjective and changes with light, point of view,

and mood. A photograph, being frozen in time, has very little

relationship to reality as we experience it. Neither does a painting."

• Susan Stowens, American Artist Magazine

For more than thirty years, Michelson's art continues to draw new fans and collectors. With works in major museums such as the

Brooklyn Museum of Art in New York, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the Smithsonian Institute for American Art in

Washington D.C., his paintings never cease to wow his viewers.