Jonathan Ferrara Gallery is proud to announce Body Shop, a multimedia installation of paintings, drawings and painted car parts by New Haven-based artist Maximilian Toth.  This will be Toth's inaugural solo exhibition at the gallery, and will open in conjunction with Art for Art's Sake, the annual opening of the art season in New Orleans, on Saturday, October 6th from 6-9pm.

This October, the Main Gallery will be transformed into a thematic installation, based around the artist's experience with, and materials from, his two year participation in the Broome County Demolition Derby in Upstate New York. 

A demolition derby is a unique spectacle- a motorsport usually associated with state fairs and festivals, these are colorful, cacophonous affairs with a circuslike veneer overlaying a (sometimes violent) competitive drive.  For the past two years, Toth has driven his hand-painted cars in the Broome County derby, and has salvaged the banged-up remains, ironed out and clear-coated, painted in Toth's signature street-inspired style, the trunks, doors and roofs of his cars serve as living relics of this uniquely American sport.

To further bring the derby experience to life in the gallery, Toth will paint the gallery walls with decorations and proclamations taken from other drivers' cars... The effect will be immersive, and will transport visitors into an atmosphere full of hot colors, a heady pop and the satisfaction and chaos of a good crash.

In the artist's words:

Growing up my father would drag me to any state fair within a generous definition of "driving distance." As a human camera bag, I switched out the film as he made his way past tilt-o-whirls and fried dough stands, always ending up at the demolition derby. Engines roared, tires tore up mud, sending it into the back rows of the crowd. Cars fought for traction and aimed for each other. The metal twisted, turned over, caught fire, and crumpled. This continued until only one limping metal object, barely resembling an automobile, was the last able to move. It's a sport of indulgence for grown men, the dangerous equivalent of bumper cars. It's the embodiment of what happens when you allow the strength and experience of adults to engage in a game safer for weaker children, less capable of injuring themselves.

The work from Body Shop is derived from a time when, as an adult, I drove in this gladiatorial competition in Broome County, a small region in upstate NY. I drew my narratives on the car before running it-denting, crumpling, and marking the work with every impact. Afterward at the dim outer edges of the fairground parking lot, I cut the panels from the car's carcass. The pieces are totems of an American history. The car, Henry Ford's legacy, is driven into the ground, the site of sport and carnage its final resting place.

The games we grow up with, we alter, modify, tweak and push until tag becomes a line of automobiles...car by car, metal cages with only the most minimal of modifications to prevent blowing ourselves up, and when the horn sounds the roaring engines let loose and we collide.

Maximilian Toth was born in New Orleans, LA. He received a BFA from Art Center, Pasadena and an MFA from Yale in 2006. He has had solo shows in New York, Minneapolis and Australia as well as numerous group shows including the Wadsworth Athenaeum Museum of Art, Dallas Contemporary and Prospect New Orleans 1.5. He will be included in the upcoming Painters' Paint exhibition at the Saatchi gallery in London.

Immersing themselves in full throttle bacchanalia, Toth's line-based figures reenact contemporary versions of initiation rites long since abandoned. They play at war to test their strengths, galvanize loyalty and challenge faith. They seek danger to establish glory. However, within this search there is an inherent violence that reveals a primal nature. Ultimately, their urge to destroy becomes their vehicle to defy their limitations.

He has exhibited at Franklin Artworks, Minneapolis (solo), Wadsworth Athenaeum, Dallas Contemporary, Daniel Weinberg Gallery, and Jack Tilton Gallery. 

His work has been featured in Artforum, Art in America, The Art Object, Dossier Journal, The Star Tribune, V Magazine, Art & Auction, and The New York Sun.

to view Body Shop as a PDF

to preview works from the exhibition