ARTIST”S STATEMENT AND BIO

Many of the larger paintings shown here have either been developed from collages or are dependent on strategies derived from collage, where disparate images are combined within a single composition to suggest narrative possibilities. The collages themselves explore these same ideas, while at the same time serving as compositional and color studies. By contrast, both the smaller paintings and the drawings shown here are more straightforward in intent - many are essentially vignettes, responding directly to the observation of people, architecture, or other artworks. The mixed media works here are more improvisational, being simple explorations in texture, materials, and composition.

Bruce MacNelly is an architect and artist living on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, where with his wife, Linda Joy Cohen, he has been a principal in MacNelly Cohen Architects P.C. since 1982.

MacNelly’s family background includes many artists, including his father, the portrait artist C.L. MacNelly, and his brother, the acclaimed editorial cartoonist Jeff MacNelly. He received a B.A. from Williams College in 1971, where he was a double major in Art History, studying under Lane Faison, George Heard Hamilton, and others; and Studio Art, where he studied with Lee Hirsche and William Giersbach. He received an M. Arch. from the University of Virginia in 1975, and worked in the office of the architect and painter Michael Graves from 1977 to 1979 before relocating to Martha’s Vineyard in 1981.

MacNelly works in the studio shown here, which he designed to serve as an experiment in an ongoing dialogue between the disciplines of architecture and painting.