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Max Guy

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FINAL WEEK | Self-effacing as they are ambitious, the works in IT’S ABOUT TIME may appear laidback and slapdash. But by emphasizing the importance of time and space — a “Midwestern” alternative to the demands of artistic production — a shared ethos among Chicago artists speaks to a more “counterproductive” version of conceptualism.

Max Guy (b. 1989) works with sculpture, video, performance, assemblage, and installation, using fast, ergonomic ways to make poetry of the world, filtering it through personal effects. In his work, Matrix #2 (to Every House Has a Door), 2026, Guy transforms his former studio table into an assemblage that stages a working prototype of a Foucault Pendulum, using found and custom-made components to register the earth’s rotation through the pendulum’s movement. Dedicated to the Chicago performance group Every House Has a Door, the work transforms the pendulum’s swing into a series of scans, each rendering a precise yet fragmented “sampling of space-time.” The resulting folio of 15 is titled Pendulum Trial (13:58 to 14:05, 19/5/2026, 50PPI-1200PPI), 2026, after the event, duration, date, and resolution.

An artist whose legacy shaped many of the younger practices featured in this exhibition, Pope.L (1955–2023) was a visual artist and educator whose multidisciplinary practice used binaries, contraries, and preconceived notions embedded within contemporary culture. Building upon a long history of arduous, provocative, and absurdist performances and interventions in public space, Pope.L ‘s work invited broader interrogations of language, systems, gender, race, and community. Pushing the limits of what an artwork allows us to know, the exhibition features Pope.L’s Package Received but Never Opened #167, 2015, and Package Received but Never Opened #75, 2015, two wrapped parcels whose contents are deliberately unknown.

On view at GRAY Chicago through August 22.

#itsabouttime @dieter_roelstraete @abigail_winograd
@leaf_bootleg #popeL taken in Richard Gray Gallery by @leaf_bootleg

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A local story heard in Cagneys bar on his first week on residency in Askeaton inspired Max Guy’s project. The 2 wheels and a pan story took on legendary elements during his month long residency. Max carved a large sculpture from poplar wood and constructed a performance based around the myth of this story for our annual open day on June 27th. Situated beneath the stage in Askeaton Community Hall, and taking on the atmosphere of part tiki bar and part shebeen, Max made a serious of beverages for visitors in character. His costume included yellow sunglasses, a blue hat with a feather astride it and a Hawaiian shirt.

Max was the inaugural artist to Askeaton as part of our new partnership with Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago.

Welcome to the Neighbourhood 2026, our annual international artists residency and arts festival, ran from June 15-27

📸 Max Guy performance and sculpture photographed by @deirdreapower

@leaf_bootleg @hydeparkartcenter @artscouncilireland @csdcu @limerick.ie @supervalu_askeaton @cagney.sbar1 @askeatonballysteencomcouncil @shannonestuaryway @limerickpost @limerickleader @westlimericktoday @wlcr102fm @live95limerick #askeaton #loveaskeaton #artistresidency #maxguy #askeatoncontemporaryarts taken in Askeaton by @leaf_bootleg

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Matrix #2 (to Every House Has a Door), 2026

Enamel paint on medium-density fiberboard, pine, steel sawhorses, Epson Perfection Photo V600, Genuine Mahogany, machined steel bearing ball, braided fishing line (polyethylene), linen book binding thread, self-healing mat, and studio ephemera. (My studio table)
96 L x 48 W x 57 H”

On view at @richardgraygallery as part of ‘It’s About Time: Counterproductive Conceptualisms in Chicago,’ curated by DRAW @dieter_roelstraete @abigail_winograd

Photo: Evan Jenkins, Colectivo Multipolar

I dedicated the work to Every House Has a Door @evryhshsadr , the Chicago-based performance group I’ve had the privilege to work with over the years. Lin Hixson and Matthew Goulish have mentored countless artists in Chicago and abroad. They’ve published newsletters since the outbreak of COVID-19 that generously track the evolution of performance and theater since.

This newsletter was deeply inspiring to me although I can’t describe all of the reasons why. The guiding principle of creating a stage within a stage to manage the terrain has been eye opening. Not merely as a catastrophe-induced austerity measure, but as an invitation to build a microcosm. Actually, it was that same impulse I’d imagine pushed the Physicist Jean Foucault to construct his Pendulum, despite most of humanity already accepting a heliocentric model of the world at the time.

I met Lin and Matthew as part of Performance Philosophy while in grad school. Most of my time in grad school was spent in my studio with the lights off, hiding from the world and creating still life photographs. I would paint the walls and try different installations in the space. Back then I was reading about Searle’s Chinese Room and Cicero’s Ars Memoria. Here, I used a photo enlarger to clamp down my scanner. I made a table from a large world map I found and some IKEA table legs. I played with this set up for maybe a year.

I’ve previously written that a teacher asked me how this practice would leave my studio. Or another asking “when are you going to do the work you came here to do?” Each felt like an ultimatum of sorts.

Maybe the installations and assemblages and whatever else in the studi by @leaf_bootleg

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Pendulum Trial (13:58 to 14:05, 19/5/2026, 50PPI-1200PPI)
2026

Since 2010, I’ve used Epson Perfection V600 Photo and Epson Perfection 1650 to document sculptures and spacetime. Scanner technologies composite moments in time into recognizable forms, often more than the sum of the individual parts. My work focuses on the capability of these scanners to record entropy, motion, agency, meter and interiority (really depth of field).

Recently, I’ve constructed apparatuses specifically for the scanner to document space, Matrix #2, for example, features a prototype for a Foucault Pendulum, a device made in 1851 that demonstrates the rotation of the Earth.

I documented the pendulum’s swing over the course of ~8 minutes at progressively higher resolutions, resulting in images of spacetime as small as a stamp and as large as a movie poster.

My first adhesive works were scans of clocks and books, after that I stuck with the form. This is the first time that I’ve used digital printing conventions to scale the work. In 2012 I’d tried something similar but I had made up my own scale to print the images.

These ones were printed at @documentartistservices, btw. Thank you, Nick!

Anyway this is essentially what’s happening in each scan, I’m hoping to make a more precise version (this pendulum is suspended from a faulty mechanism, so it drifts a lot and loses momentum quicker than I’d like). The scanner records the light reflecting off of the pendulum in RGB strips, almost like little brush strokes. I hoped maybe at some resolution I’d capture a perfect ellipse.

The work is on view at Gray as part of “It’s About Time: Counterproductive Conceptualisms in Chicago” by @leaf_bootleg

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I didn’t get to speak with many people at the opening of this show! If you were there, thank you for checking out the work!

It was a great few weeks of working with Abby, Dieter and the folks at the gallery, Anastasia, Heidi, Valerie, Anne, Andy and Billy. Big love to all the artists of course. Here are some little bts pics.

The event was packed so if you want to go back and check out the work with me, hmu, would love to talk about it.

Thanks @dieter_roelstraete @abigail_winograd @anastasiaktinari @anneryansharpe @heidi_heim @billyjamesjoyce @valcarb by @leaf_bootleg

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Matrix #2 (to Every House Has a Door), 2026

Pendulum Trial (13:58 to 14:05, 19/5/2026, 50PPI-1200PPI), 2026 by @leaf_bootleg

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Should you find yourself in Chicago in the next month and change, I hope you can check out the group show at Richard Gray, ‘It’s About Time: Counterproductive Conceptualisms in Chicago,’ featuring many artists I admire and respect. I have on display my prototype for a desktop Foucault Pendulum, with record of its motion.

Curated by @abigail_winograd and @dieter_roelstraete at @richardgraygallery by @leaf_bootleg

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SATURDAY 27 JUNE 3PM
ASKEATON COMMUNITY HALL, THE QUAY, V94 EH9Y
WELCOME TO THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OPEN DAY
Our annual OPEN DAY celebrates the work of 2026’s artists-in-residence and our wider community who contribute to cultural life in Askeaton. A reception at Askeaton Community Hall will be followed by a guided tour.

MAX GUY travels to live and work in Askeaton thanks to a new artist residency exchange programme with HYDE PARK ART CENTER in Chicago. In a multitude of artistic ways, he compares the real and the fake, questions everyday behaviour and existential quandaries, and highlights both our shared humour and harsh political realities. With a broad and always curious interest in tourism, anthropology and theatre, his time in Askeaton asks how we relate to the world around us, and where can we find ways of experiencing it anew? KATE O’SHEA is a socially-engaged artist whose DIY ethos spans printmaking, the creation of archiving, large-scale installations, performance, and publishing. Her art is known for a long-term commitment to the power of storytelling and community engagement, creating meeting places for what our shared political imagination and strength of solidary can be.

Meet DAVID BEATTIE, ALLAN HUGHES, ANNE CLEARY and DENNIS CONNOLLY, and we introduce new long-term artist-in-residence RÓNÁN Ó RAGHALLAIGH, whose art considers the role of folklore, land and language across vast expanses of time and place.

📸 Welcome to the Neighbourhood design identity by @daly_lyon

@artscouncilireland @csdcu @supervalu_askeaton @leaf_bootleg @kateosheaartist @davbeattie @ronan.o.raghallaigh @schooloflooking @handmedownes @michelehorrigan_ @roryprout @seanlynch31 @mark_o_gorman @askeatonnaturalheritage @askeatontidytown @limericklibraries @askeatonballysteencomcouncil @hydeparkartcenter @ilovelimerick @limerickpost @limerickleader @live95limerick @westlimericktoday @wlcr102fm @wearewestlimerick @seanlynch31 @cagney.sbar1 @topofthetown1 #askeaton #loveaskeaton #artistsresidency #irishheritage #askeatoncontemporaryarts taken in Askeaton Community Hall by @leaf_bootleg

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Askeaton castle visit with artists, team and friends of Askeaton Contemporary Arts. This is a rarely seen view from the medieval garden side of the complex.

Thanks to OPW foreman onsite Fred Browne and to the OPW for accommodating our visit.

@artscouncilireland @csdcu @supervalu_askeaton @opwireland @heritageirelandopw @leaf_bootleg @kateosheaartist @michelehorrigan_ @mark_o_gorman @davbeattie @askeatonnaturalheritage @askeatontidytown @askeatonballysteencomcouncil @ilovelimerick @limerickpost @limerickleader @live95limerick @westlimericktoday @wlcr102fm @wearewestlimerick #askeaton #loveaskeaton #artistsresidency #askeatoncontemporaryarts taken in Askeaton Castle by @leaf_bootleg

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We did a rainy Sunday out in the Burren, the land of stone, sculpted by cattle, wind, water and man alike! Beautiful.

@askeatoncontemporary by @leaf_bootleg

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Flowers of Askeaton and Tipperary.

At the event on Wednesday night I’d mentioned to someone that there were really only so many photos of flowers I could take. To which she responded that I might be surprised. And it’s true: mind you Co. Limerick has no dearth of daisies, it seems like new colors sprout up every day around here. Blue flowers! by @leaf_bootleg

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Welcome to the Neighbourhood 2026 programme has just dropped 💥🔥💯

This years edition of our annual international artists residency and arts festival runs between June 15th - June 27th. All of our events are free and open to everyone. Follow the link in our bio to read the full programme 📜👌

📸Welcome to the Neighbourhood 2026, Design by @daly_lyon

@artscouncilireland @csdcu @supervalu_askeaton @leaf_bootleg @kateosheaartist @davbeattie @iarlaith_nifheorais @ams.archaeology @ronan.o.raghallaigh @schooloflooking @handmedownes @michelehorrigan_ @askeatonnaturalheritage @askeatontidytown @limericklibraries @askeatonballysteencomcouncil @hydeparkartcenter @ilovelimerick @limerickpost @limerickleader @live95limerick @westlimericktoday @wlcr102fm @wearewestlimerick @seanlynch31 @cagney.sbar1 @topofthetown1 #askeaton #loveaskeaton #artistsresidency #irishheritage #askeatoncontemporaryarts taken in Askeaton by @leaf_bootleg

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