Wax Songs, Broken by Melanie Moralez
The Spirit Room
139 State St.
Dec 6, 6:00 pm - 9:00 pm

The exhibited abstract encaustic pieces are from Moralez’s “Shellac Songs” series, as well as many fragmented pieces from larger scale, grided, installations of paintings, from her 2023 exhibition at the Helen E. Copeland exhibition in Bozeman, Montana: “Coda Peripheral”, (2023).

From the artist: “When playing music, my improvisational approach is to weave together theoretical ideas with visual guides as superimposed across my fretboard in maps of note patterns. They are quick, visual, echoes that feel like pops of magic from some unknown source. In my most recent series of abstract paintings, I aim to communicate this relationship between audio and visual perceptions. Further reflecting on my personal connection between image and sound through the abstraction process, in jazz improvisation, one either holds predictably within the key center and melodic interplay, or allows for the lead-line to stray beyond the expected framework. Note by note, each musical decision coalesces into one complete form, the way each touch of pigment builds a painting. In an exploration toward mimicking my experience of jazz improvisations in visual art, I allow every artistic choice to delicately balance between either intent: to reformulate, or passive yielding: to the existing context. The decision to submit or take control influences how each color form connect by their cell-like frames or don’t connect at all.”