Details

First Name	Michael
Last Name	Miller
Username	mijamiller
Website	michaelmillerpaintings.com
Region	Edinburgh & The Lothians
Disciplines	Painting, Photography
Themes	Abstract, Geometric, Political

Statement

My work is characterized by textural richness, the interplay of transparency and opacity, and a deliberate ambiguity in spatial representation. Consisting of multiple layers and washes of acrylic paint on unprimed canvas, it asks questions about truth and deception, revelation and concealment, and history and memory. It often draws on the visual vocabulary of camouflage, including disruptive “dazzle” patterns applied to shipping in the early years of the last century.

While this work might give an initial impression of legibility and openness, a closer look reveals inconsistencies, revisions and distortions. Forms move and float in ambiguous pictorial space, often obscuring other painting layers in a literal “cover up”. Each work therefore asks the viewer to consider not only what is revealed, but also what has been concealed. This relationship between the seen and unseen is underlined by the interplay of transparency and opacity, and by ambiguity in spatial representation and the definition of volumes, which at times recall architectural forms. In places, lines, marks, pentimenti and other elements that testify to the painting process are are left visible in an apparent gesture of “truthfulness”, but in many cases these elements are spurious additions, introduced to undermine the idea of pictorial integrity.

Biography

Michael Miller, born in Glasgow, Scotland, trained in painting and drawing in Italy, Switzerland and Mozambique. On moving to the USA in 2010, Miller studied abstract painting, drawing and assemblage at the Art Students League of New York. In May 2012, he was awarded the League’s Matisse Estate Merit Scholarship, and in 2014, he was selected as a visiting artist at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. In January 2016, Miller moved to Santiago, Chile, where he lived and worked until July 2017. He currently lives between Edinburgh and Brooklyn, and is represented by Jeeum Gallery in Hong Kong and South Korea.

In addition to his regular art practice, Miller has been involved in a range of community-based public art projects in New York, and has supported a number of arts-based not-for-profits as a volunteer artist (including Sing for Hope and Choose Creativity). From 2012 to 2015, he sat on the board of SONYA – South of the Navy Yards Artists – in Brooklyn. He also sat on the Brooklyn Navy Yard’s exhibit advisory committee.

Michael Miller is trained as a social scientist, and has studied at the Universities of Edinburgh, Leicester and Pennsylvania, as well as the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris. In 2001, he earned a PhD in contemporary history from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. Miller is also a long-standing supporter of human rights, and has published work on a range of issues including violence against children, gender-based violence, and the prevention of torture.