The Monster in Adamo Macri’s Art
by Kenneth Radu
One:
I have been thinking about monsters and the art of Adamo Macri. Recently, after re-reading Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, I watched Guillermo del Toro’s cinematic rendition of his version of her book. I had also read coincidentally a critical biography not only of Mary Shelly but also of John Polidori who wrote, Vampyre, arguably the first Vampire novel in English. So, I feel monstrously intrigued by the notion of monsters. Strange and often terrifying creatures walk among us often without our noticing, or inhabit our nightmares and waking dreams, which Fuseli depicts in his famous painting The Nightmare. In this state of mind, I have also been studying Adamo Macri’s jarring images of his Jahrfish and Concrete Facade series.
The Jahrfish series or project is cogently discussed in the essay Bridging the Tangible and the Transcendent, published in ArtMuseExpress:
The Jahrfish project embodies Macri’s ability to layer meaning. The sculptural components evoke the physicality of contamination, while the photographs create a visual narrative that brings his message to life. These works challenge viewers to consider their role in environmental degradation and the urgent need for change.
True, but following the implications of the phrase Macri’s ability to layer meaning, and knowing that Macri’s art is often “layered” with narratives, I see another layer of meaning in the Jahrfish series, as I also do in the Concrete Facade works: the notion of the monster or monstrosity. Macri is clearly intrigued by the concept of the monster in one form or another, the Triffid, for example; but the monster or implications of monstrosity are present in Jahrfish, and elsewhere. A few appearances are overt, others are so subtle that they don’t seem to be monsters at all, at least outwardly. There are pieces that exist within a context of broad social satire or environmental outrage, and some are seemingly innocent on the surface but contain monstrosity beneath. Macri is nothing if he isn’t an artist of implications and the unseen, of what lies within.
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| Concrete Facade |
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| The Jahrfish Project |
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| Triffid II |
First, the word monster itself deserves a brief consideration. It certainly needs qualification when applied to Macri’s art. Who or what is a monster? What constitutes the monstrous or monstrosity? We all have opinions on the subject, and no doubt the photo albums of our mind are stuffed full of monstrous images. Enormous physical size is often a feature of the monster: the cyclops in the Odyssey or Godzilla, to name two, although small creatures like Gremlins can be equally destructive. Is a monster a non-human being like the Creature from the Black Lagoon, or does it share human features like Macri’s Jahrfish, the head of a distinctly subaqueous creature, part human and part fish. The name jahrfish may or may not be an echo of the relatively small and harmless jawfish, which incubates its own eggs in its extended mouth and lives in sandy burrows, a mouth that reminds me of the fish-like mouth in the portrait Utterly Fungible and the Suspension of Disbelief. The suspension of disbelief part of the title, words taken from the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, explains that viewers need to abandon ordinary logic or notions of everyday realism in order to appreciate a parallel or alternative universe of experience and perception, a universe Macri the artist inhabits.
Monstrosity is often applied to major physical deformations, regardless of individual’s character. Who can ever forget John Merrick’s heart-rending cry in the film The Elephant Man, I am not a monster! I am not an animal! I am... a human being! as he is hounded and attacked by a merciless crowd who, horrified by and despising the fact that he doesn’t look like them, act like monsters themselves. We call certain human beings like serial killers and murderous tyrants monsters because their actions, incomprehensible and unforgivable, put themselves outside the realm of humanity. Except, and this is the shock of it, they remain human, identifiably so, and may be indistinguishable from you or me.
The words miasma, spillage, and toxin are attached to the Jahrfish portraits: words indicating monstrous environmental consequences. They are also words metaphorically applicable to aspects of human actions and character, which from one point of view is what the Jahrfish series is about.
I don’t suggest that Macri’s art moves in the direction of monster for the sake of monstrosity, although the grotesque Miasma, part of the Jahrfish project, may indicate otherwise, as does the portrait with the monstrous hand, Intermezzo. The word miasma itself is heavily loaded with implications of death and stench. In the 19th century, it was believed that highly contagious diseases or epidemics were either caused and/or carried by foul air, or miasmas. I am not alone in suggesting that monstrosity may be another term for moral defects or pernicious flaws of character. I recall Lear’s phrase “monster ingratitude,” in reference to his daughters Goneril and Regan. That capacity may well lie within us all like a gene or germ. Hence, evil (another term for monstrosity) is all too human, almost frighteningly ordinary, a notion the philosopher Hannah Arendt explores in her book, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil.
We like to distance ourselves from evil or monstrosity, and choose to believe that a monster, whether human or animal or utterly alien in every respect like the aliens in the movie Alien, are untouched by ordinary human morality or religious precepts, incapable of compassion or moral judgement, with no control of its killer instincts. Moreover, what may appear as a joke, a costume for a party or cartoon, maybe in fact hide horror behind the facade. Lewis Carroll’s nonsensical Jabberwocky, may in fact be the seemingly harmless disguise of a real monster, as real as the one lurking in our dreams or gardens, or any one of Macri’s portraits wherein the figure is heavily disguised as if going to a costume ball like the “creature” in Telltale Manual. The more I think about a monster, the more I believe it’s a slippery designation, especially as monstrosity imbues creations like the Jahrfish and Concrete Facade projects by the brilliantly diverse artist, Adamo Macri, who as an artist is as slippery as slippery can be.
Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, we remember in Shelley’s novel, murders a child and also kills Dr. Frankenstein’s bride on her wedding night. He, or it, is capable, however, of choosing not to do so. It’s true that Shelley imbues the nameless monster with human desires for companionship and love, a father even, but it is also inflamed by a lust for revenge against the creator who made him. A tyrant or dictator who orders the murder of entire populations is certainly a monster, history offering many an example. We have monsters in fairy tales like Bluebeard or Baba Yaga or the giant above Jack’s Beanstalk. We all know the monsters of literature and mythology: Grendel in Beowulf, or Humbaba in the epic Gilgamesh, or the Gorgon or the Cyclops, and of course the Minotaur, who appears now and then Adamo in Macri’s art, the monster residing in the heart of the labyrinth.
Even though the Jahrfish series, according to the ArtMuseExpress article, is designed to challenge viewers to consider their role in environmental degradation, can it not also be a public affirmation of what we contain and/or repress in ourselves? The monstrous amphibian heads become as much a biographical or psychological horror story as a socio-political one.
Of course, there’s often a beauty and a beast in one form or another, from the original folktale to Cocteau’s La Belle et La Bête, to Phantom of the Opera. The idea of monster and monstrosity exists from the very beginning of narrative time; for example, the Windigo in ancient stories of various Indigenous people of Canada, although he/she/it is a supernatural being. Which, of course, raises another issue: the immortality of the monstrous like Lucifer, or the terrifying creatures of Japanese myth. The narrative layering and complexity of Macri’s art demonstrate that there’s no end of one kind of monster or another inhabiting our real and imaginary worlds. Understanding Macri’s larger moral and social vision and seeing his art as witness or warning, we can regard aspects of the monstrous as logical and powerful expressions of human insensitivity to and appalling corruption of the environment.
In Macri’s art, therefore, the monster is a creation of human will, the result of human manipulation and hubris, without regard for consequences. Quite apart from any violations of culturally conditioned notions of beauty and normality, the monster may in fact be ordinary in size and appearance, looking like you and me. He/she/they may embody the worst aspects of the human being, driven by compulsions and derangement to act out his/her/their monstrous behaviours. We may even glorify or honour them, something implicit in the Concrete Facade series. One also has to account for monstrous expectations within a given society, its unspoken or explicit demands made upon, for example, women. The art of Dame Paula Rego depicts latent moral, psychological and socially condoned monstrosity in her visual treatment of the dark side of folklore, fairy tales and nursery rhymes as in Snow White Swallows the Poisoned Apple. And the dark side of existence and opaque identities are sometimes depicted in Macri’s art, as the haunting portrait Nevermore testifies.
Two:
Given the “stillness” of Macri’s art, the monstrosity or the implied monster is not designed to arouse terror or revulsion, although of course it can. It’s impossible to predict any one viewer’s response. In fact, the very presence of the implied monster may well attract admiration, often expressed in terms of praising a certain kind of masculine allure and power. I believe that Macri’s art for the most part is almost neutral in emotion and action, the monster at rest, except when he “breaks out,” so to speak. When the artist exaggerates physical size or malformation or alternative physicality, he creates something eerie, evocative, rather than merely horrific, as in the Jahrfish series. By “stillness” I mean a work that is deeply-layered and quiet, inviting calm reflection and understanding, not dependent upon extreme action, monster or not.
The Jahrfish heads point to profound differences between the human and non-human, the monstrosity arising from the mingling of opposing species, or the alteration of one species because of genetic distortions. Why is Jahrfish so human and nonhuman at the same time? Macri has stated that the Jahrfish heads are designed be a form of public art, displayed on the street as a kind of educational warning: The goal is to create a strong visual presence that draws universal attention to urgent environmental concerns while encouraging public reflection and engagement.
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| Jahrfish spill |
Macri is fascinated by the commingling of identities and species, the blending of the organic with the inanimate, the soft with the solid, the blood with the stone, and the monster with the human. This creative process imbues his fundamental concept of gender shifting and alternative sexualities, the plural deliberate. Moreover, we do the artist a disservice by disconnecting his art from the wider world. As many have noticed and I’ve already stated, Macri is deeply conscious of political, environmental, and moral disasters, which often subtly colour his work like a subterranean hue.
Whether virtuous or vile, his monstrous creations contain something familiar, and even possibly humane, about them. At the risks of twisting in contradictions, I don’t necessarily see the work as oft-putting, although it can send shivers upon and down my spine. It’s quietly resonant, a drama waiting to unfold but momentarily quiescent like Le Stryge, the grotesque sculpture on the Notre Dame Cathedral. Le Stryge is almost human in its pensiveness, just as Jahrfish raid, with its symbolic headpiece of otherness and a title implying victory, is deeply quiet with subdued malevolence.
When I look at Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son, or Dali’s Le Visage de la Guerre, or Moreau’s Hercules and the Lernaean Hydra, or the repulsive monster in Blake’s The Ghost of a Flea, I know what I mean by the power of stillness in Macri’s monsters. Art, after all, is also explanation, or more accurately, revelation. One may meditate upon a work of art, as I so often do with Macri’s, and come away with a sense of having experienced change, of having emerged from a semi-comatose state into exhilarating consciousness. Perhaps transmutation is a word that’s also applicable. Profound change or transmutation lies at the heart of much of Macri’s art. It doesn’t follow, however, that all transmutations have the same effect, as a viewing of his Triffid work will confirm. As stated, Macri’s art now and then depicts monstrous creations who on the surface may not appear to be so. Among those “monstrosities” I would include the Concrete Facade project.
While contemplating the monstrous, I didn’t initially regard Concrete Facade as a study in monstrosity per se, but a presentation of superhuman victory and possibly heroism. To be clear, I don’t necessarily imply that monstrous is always evil, certainly not in Macri’s art, but sometimes there’s an undercurrent, a veiled allusion, an ironic emblem, which, upon further study, raises the hairs on the back of my neck, infinitely more subtle and nuanced than any Jekyll and Hyde dichotomy.
Concrete Facade I is impressive. Any number of viewers and commentators might focus and have focussed on its martial appearance, its look of the mighty and victorious general. The word facade makes one thing also of charade, of pretence, of fake: what we see is not the truth, not real, not enduring, but a projection of our own fallibilities, dreams and ego. From a purely technical perspective, it’s worth exploring the relationship between background and statue, as if the head has emerged from or is part of the architecture. In an essay entitled The Somatic Architecture of Adamo Macri, an art critic specifically examines the relationship between the human body and buildings, often religious structures, not only in the Facade series, but also in many other Macri works, providing another way of seeing his art: Adamo Macri’s architectural style is a manifestation of “somatic structuralism,” where the human form and the built environment are treated as interchangeable membranes. His work evokes diverse architectural narratives, not as static representations, but as living, eroding systems.
We see a blending of stone with flesh in the Facade series, as if the person, if person is applicable here, is also the building behind it or vice versa, as viewers have remarked. One can easily imagine architecture attempting to become human or a human being merging its identity into that of architecture. Macri has touched upon this possibility before in the portrait Flanked by Concrete.
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| Flanked by Concrete |
Based upon my emotional responses to Macri’s art, I am also taken aback by its sepulchral coloration and the appearance of concrete, and the rigidity of its lines, even those that supposedly depict movement. I see a statue guarding a mausoleum entrance, indicating who is entombed: hence, the title Concrete Facade. Yes, the title signals the strong architectural elements of the piece. Macri is especially adept at combining aspects of sculpture, painting, digital photography and architecture, as commonly noted. Although we notice the brutalist aesthetic in the construction of this series, I am inclined to regard it as a dramatization of architecture and sculpture as outward displays of human narcissism and vainglory. In a limited respect, Macri’s facade here shares the same concept as Bernini’s glorified head of Louis XIV le Roi Soleil. The latter is presented as a warrior, with vigorous, curly hair (a wig, of course) similar to Macri’s head, and visible armour on the arm, the body swathed in Roman looking robes.
In Macri’s portrait, though, head and architecture combine to create a sense of memento mori. There’s a rigid stillness to the piece which I find disconcerting. We remember that the pharaohs constructed pyramids as a reminder not only of inevitable physical death, but of their immortality, the body preserved within a monument of stone, which will ultimately break down, a slow, centuries long process of dilapidation. Despite the imposing masculine appearance and the vainglory of martial exploits, real or imagined, in Facade I, I think of Shelley’s famous poem, Ozymandias, itself a warning or moral admonition against human arrogance and vanity:
Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Three:
Behind the facade of Facade I, though, what are we to imagine? I think it’s necessary to take note of various elements to understand the whole, and not simply step back and gasp in wonder over the genius of the artist who could concoct such a work, or list the various techniques employed to create it. Indeed, of Adamo Macri’s technical virtuosity and adroit handling of various media there is no question.
The helmet, for example, is not recognizable as the particular helmet an ordinary warrior would have worn in the past or would wear in the present, although some might think of ancient Rome. It doesn’t sit on the head as protection, but as signification. It’s a gathering of symbols in the shape of a helmet made out of concrete: uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. Here stands a mighty king, it seems to say, a semi-divine hero, a creature of myth, and we remember the undertow of mythology in Macri’s art. The helmet sprouts wings, which suggest swiftness of action and/or the ability to fly, perhaps echoing Mercury/Hermes, messenger of the gods and conductor of souls to the Underworld. The small wheels on the side of the helmet remind me of industry and mechanization, an echo of Futurism perhaps, the artistic movement begun in Italy celebrating speed, the machine, energy, lightning speed, even contemporary militarism, demonstrated by Boccioni’s Unique Forms of Continuity in Space.
Although Macri has indicated that the backdrop of this work is influenced by Art Deco, evident in the symmetry of patterns and flow of lines, and often incorporates mythological elements, I am reminded of the tombstone of Boccioni, the Futurist artist, emblazoned with an eagle. I can’t help but compare the eagle wings in this portrait with the symbolic use of the eagle in the Romanov coat of arms, the eagle on German helmets, and specifically the bald eagle in American iconography: a bird associated with freedom, independence and power, but also associated with carnivorous predation and conquest. There’s a curious bust of a romanticized Napoleon by Bertel Thorvaldsen, a head crowned with laurel leaves, and rising above an eagle with outspread wings. The bust is obviously meant to glorify and memorialize which, after all, is one function of sculpture. But it also presents a phony picture of Napoleon as Roman emperor, a facade whitewashing the hideous truth of egomania, ravenous ambition, wars and slaughters.
Let’s also not forget that an eagle pecked out Prometheus’s liver, which grew back daily to satisfy either the insatiable bird’s hunger or the Gods’ desire to punish Prometheus for bringing fire to humanity. There’s also a border of leaves around the brim of the helmet in Macri’s portrait, perhaps laurel, indicating achievement and victory, a deliberate association with the ancient Roman symbol. A band of cement stretches from a floral device in the middle of the helmet to the back, a device reminiscent of the jewel we see in Macri’s portrait of Vlad the Impaler, another quasi-mythological monster.
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| Ţepeş |
There are heroic emblems, winged victories like Samothrace, locks of hair da Vinci could not improve upon. A heavy-looking helmet, more decorative than functional, and the appearance of armour give the image a martial, heroic air. Perhaps this is a representation of a certain kind of masculinity, albeit narrow and specific, but it seems so remote from any ordinary human male that it acquires quasi-mythological status and moves upwards towards, if you will, a perverse or monstrous ideal.
Above all, there are no eyes. It’s often the case in Macri’s art that the eyes are hidden, as they are in Telltale Manual, a hybrid portrait incorporating carnival and the Triffid puppet, which would be a perfect illustration for Poe’s story, The Mask of the Red Death. When the eyes are revealed, they add to the complex implications of an individual portrait as they do in the mysterious Salò. Although considerable care and purpose have gone into the selection and arrangement of symbols, we are presented with an imposing, but lifeless creature. Is it monstrous in any ordinary sense of the word? Is Macri ironically presenting a statue that emerges from our tendency to celebrate monstrous behaviour, murderous intent, bloodthirstiness glorified in the personage of heroic warrior? Despite theories of the merging of architecture and the flesh, this piece may also be an ironic comment on monuments erected in honour of so-called great men of the past who have the blood of thousands on their hands.
I repeat: there are no eyes in this extraordinary work. They are covered by a concrete band reminiscent of the robocop shades present in other portraits, a somewhat anachronistic accoutrement if the figure is supposed to be connected with ancient civilisations. But, in Macri’s multi-layered art, the past is always present, the former blending like a silent stream with the latter. The eyelessness, or eye covering, intensifies the austere Übermensch aura of the figure, if I may use a Nietzschean term, as well as its soullessness. l have gone a bit far afield from Jahrfish, except all paths in Macri’s spiral and lead into each other. One work often reflects another, or repeats a motif common to many, or presents a variation upon a consistent theme, so it’s difficult to separate the range of his art into separate, disconnected pieces.
Looking at the collective Jahrfish series, many of us think of amphibians and Macri’s fascination with the emergence of life, interspecies relationships and transmutations, and the role of oceanic origins. Water, or the suggestion of water, appears in his art in one form or another, often symbolically. The Jahrfish series can be frightening, but it can also engender sorrow. Although eerie, intensely suggestive, and may repel some viewers, paradoxically it evinces human feelings of love and sympathy like Toro’s monster, poor boy.
Concrete Facade II may be the same figure as Facade I, or may be an entirely different one, or it may in fact demonstrate Macri’s ongoing interest in the multiplicity of identity. Moreover, and here I am standing on a high ledge about to topple, the figure may not have been conceived as a complete, individual identity, but a composite of elements, an assemblage of symbols and implications. It would therefore be pointless to attempt a psychological analysis of this image as if it were a self-portrait. which it clearly is not meant to be. There is no looking into its mind or soul, no psychological analysis comes easily to mind in either the Jahrfish or Facade series as one may be tempted to do with some of Macri’s portraits.
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| Concrete Facade II |
Look at how the artist has altered the face in Concrete Facade II, the outward face, with wide open mouth as if howling, the so-called facade, if you will. We see only the facade, the exterior consequence of hidden rage, turmoil, fear, anxiety. One of the few Macri portraits where emotion is vividly expressed in the face, is this architecture humanized or a man slowly turning to stone, as if he had looked upon Medusa and suffered the consequences? Bereft of helmet, the warrior is now robed, his military status either diminished or he’s been defeated. Notice the sculpted soldiers behind on the pillars, as if they represent whatever force has conquered or deprived the soldier in Concrete Facade I.
Stripped of its martial paraphernalia, perhaps Facade II is not the same figure as Facade I. The beards are not the same, the eyes are uncovered, and the monumental background has different elements than those found in Concrete Facade I. The prominent braid leads me to think of a Wagnerian heroine, or a Viking warrior. Curiously, there’s little gender ambiguity in these figures, ordinarily a noticeable feature of Macri’s art, so the images seem to be focussed on masculine roles and identity and mythology. Winged figures have disappeared, and so has the eagle. If such a thing is possible, I dare say that Macri has designed, sculpted, photographed and erected a figure caught in the stunning moment of defeat and/or transformation.
Whether the notions of architecture and sculpture merging into the human or vice versa are at play here, and they probably are, I nonetheless place Caravaggio’s Medusa side by side with Macri’s image and come away both astounded and perplexed.
The hair and open mouth of Facade II may well remind viewers of the anguish expression on Laocoon’s face as he struggles to save his sons and himself from the monstrous serpents. The more I study this extraordinary work, the more I am inclined to view it as humanity struggling to emerge from insensibility, moral petrification, intellectual imprisonment in stone, as the human spirit is struggling against inevitable incarceration in concrete.
Four:
The progression of the Concrete Facade series from the appearance of mighty warrior to agonized civilian to amphibian resident of the sunken Atlantis in Concrete Facade III, is an indication of Macri’s fascination with the merging of forms or melding of identities. As often stated, the figure may in fact be either a part or evolving out of the concrete background. Is this figure yet another mutation of the first Facade, a deeply unsettled identity that cannot know its own meaning or destination because of the pressures of the age, because of the constrictive architecture? Macri’s art is not carved in stone, but stone or concrete can be digitally carved to become what the artist wishes it to become.
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| Concrete Facade III |
But, and the but is large, I also like to think that, bearing in mind the artist’s intentions, this series allows us to witness external manifestations of internal distortions: moral, personal and spiritual. I see a movement from seemingly self-satisfied martial glory to agonized distortion. Although Macri is explicit about his methods in producing these extraordinary works, he does not interpret them. And I agree wholeheartedly with the critic W.K. Wimsatt’s notion that even if artists explicitly explain what their purpose is, which may be helpful, their explanations do not, and indeed should not, necessarily act as the only way to see or read or hear a work of art.
There is indeed something disquieting about the grotesque face of Concrete Facade III, with its resemblance to the Jahrfish series. With the ridged face and protruding mouth, the expression could well express mental disarray, a discombobulation as if the creature has been shocked out of its natural habitat and forced to breathe in a noxious atmosphere. The colouring is more suggestive of water than of earth or cement. Given Macri’s fascinating method of intermingling materials, myths and genders, one may be forgiven for thinking the head of Concrete III has been residing within the head of Facade I all along like an unconscious mockery of martial pretensions and masculine pomposity. Indeed, it’s a kind of looniness residing deep within the stone walls, if you will, or pulsing beneath the surface of human arrogance. The walls in all the portraits are themselves monstrous with the implied heft of their construction. Designed as impressive facades, they also create a sense of keeping people out. Or, is it mere prop designed to look forbidding?
Can viewers even assume, however, that the head of Concrete III is the same as that of the first three portraits? We immediately notice that this creature is bereft of accoutrements and clothing, as naked as the day, presumably, it was born. Or, like Athena, did it spring out of a god’s head fully formed and adult? The backdrop, allowing for variations in appearance, certainly connects all parts of the series, and there is of course a strong similarity among the first three heads. If so, then the word facade becomes especially charged, meaning more than its architectural function: pretence, hidden, superficial, empty, shielded, inherent weakness, the surface of identity, but not the depth, and insanity lies at the core.
One can play many a game with the notion of facade in Macri’s art, given his extraordinary use of masks, and his use of extraordinary masks. There are indeed elements of parody and commedia dell’arte in various works. The artist is not without a sense of humour. The assemblage of motifs, echoes, parts, allusions, symbols, hues, textures, influences and repetitions lead viewers behind the facade, perhaps to the mystery within, perhaps to the complexity, perhaps to the joy and exultation, or perhaps to unacknowledged anxiety and monstrosity.
It’s fitting to end this piece with reference to the last of the Facade series, Facade IV. Here, the eagle, which appears as a symbolic motif in Facade I becomes the helmet itself, inseparable from the head in Facade IV. The image returns us to the rigorous masculinity of the first portrait, suppressing the disturbing and possibly satirical nature of Facade III, and returning to a specifically mythological idea of masculinity, although there are changes. What strikes me is the merging of predatory bird with the human head, and the equally grim expression of both bird and man.
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| Concrete Facade IV |
Has the human merged with the eagle or vice versa? Or, is Macri making a profound statement about the militarization of the masculine and the instinctive, predatory nature of the male? The portrait offers little suggestion of alternative ways of being. The symbolic eagle with victorious, outspread wings is framed multiple times on the wall behind the head, further strengthening the relationship between human and architecture, as well as the inherent predatory nature of the male specifically, or humanity generally. There is also something overly-elaborate about this image, verging on satire, as if Macri is poking fun at the arrogance and pretentions of the mighty warrior. Given the concrete qualities inherent in the portrait, it’s hard to prick the balloon of self-importance, but we know that even stone ultimately crumbles, as Shelley’s poem reminds us.
The architectural elements are present in this portrait as much as they are in the other Facade works. It’s evident that the connection between monumental architecture and human aspiration is paramount in this series. The head, placed on its own plinth, highlights the public sculpture nature of the piece, but seems separate from the wall behind it, as if it has momentarily emerged from it. Again, Macri’s skill in digital technology is evident. Elsewhere he has explained that this collage was finalized and then used as the basis (reference guide) to create a digital rendering, piece by piece, like a puzzle, till it all came together…. Here I am working with a constructed collage of fragmented images to create from it a digital painting.
However enlightening his words, Macri doesn’t tell viewers what the piece means, or what the collective significance is of all the pieces, the statements about public art notwithstanding. Moreover, the impact of the structures on the imagination of the viewer cannot be predicted.
so, yes, puzzle is not only technically accurate, it’s also intellectually apt, and even more broadly speaking, existentially true.
The Facade series demonstrates the great tensions implicit in monumental art and architecture dedicated to human hubris. Adroitly incorporating a plethora of allusions and techniques, the brilliance of Adamo Macri’s art raises many moral and social questions, and points to various answers. What horrific destruction is being memorialized and glorified? What has been permanently ruined and/or lost in its construction? What human values are embodied in concrete to the exclusion of others. Built to endure as an act of memory, a facade of stone conceals inherent contradictions that lead not only to collapse and decay, but also to the emergence of the disturbing Jahrfish creature as monstrous victor. When does the human heart and all it metaphorically represents become petrified, turned to stone? The monster in the art of Adamo Macri may well lie within ourselves.
Kenneth Radu has published books of fiction, nonfiction and poetry. His work has been nominated for a Governor General’s award and twice received the Quebec Writers’ Federation prize for best English-language fiction. He also has written extensively for the online cultural magazine, Salon .II. He has recently completed the manuscript of a new novel, which is now undergoing revisions.
The Monster in Adamo Macri’s Art
Essay by Kenneth Radu - 2026
