Step inside the Ogunquit Museum of American Art (OMAA), and a luminous transformation unfolds. The salt-spray roar of the Gulf of Maine retreats and a different type of sensory gale rises up. Phosphorescent dreamscapes. Intoxicating light and shadows. Hues so delicious you can almost taste them. Familiar faces you couldn’t possibly know. This is “Spinneret,” the first solo exhibition in the United States by the contemporary figurative painter Anthony Cudahy (b. 1989, Fort Myers, FL).
“Spinneret refers to the interconnectedness and pattern-like repetition that lends meaning to Cudahy’s remarkable body of work,” stated Devon Zimmerman, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at OMAA, in “Anthony Cudahy: Spinneret” (Monacelli Press), the comprehensive monograph published as a companion to the artist’s exhibition. “It draws inspiration from – and is named for – the silk-producing organ that spiders use to weave, or spin, their webs. Cudahy creates his web by interweaving texts and images from sources past and present, forgotten and well-known, canonical and personal, to construct works of incredible complexity and consideration.”
Spanning the last five years of Cudahy’s illustrious career, the “Spinneret” exhibition at OMAA emerges as a monumental ode to the interplay between personal narratives and historical echoes. Through 31 significant paintings, Cudahy intricately weaves a narrative that spans the realms of art history, queer archives, allegory, symbolism and so much more; a meticulously spun world where found photos dance with Renaissance paintings, social media feeds and fragments of memory.