MIKE REA'S SERIOUS PLAY

“Mike Rea: Mature Works”, installation view Bertrand Productions.
 

By EDWARD WAISNIS October 7, 2025

Michael Rea’s entire project may be distilled in his pursuit of the iconic in both his wall-mounted pieces and particularly resonant in his stele obsessed three dimensional works. The exhibition is comprised of a body of work Rea executed in the last three years, expanding his practice, as he relocated his studio from Chicago to DeKalb, Illinois.

Befitting Bertrand Productions focus on highly crafted work, concentrating on a small stable of artists who focus on highly crafted work, pursue complexity, and awe (including principals Stacey Lee Webber and Joeseph Leroux) Rea both typifies and expands upon the program.

With a focus on play, several of the baker’s dozen works mimic construction kit build sets writ monumental. Using Rea’s own words, these gargantuan toys exploit: “The process of making maintains the forensic of craft; the finish allows for vivid and garish cartoons depicting or masquerading as reality.”*

I Will Stand Next to the Worn Patch of Grass and Wait, 2025, riffs on a canine model, as the title suggests. made up of colorful knobby elements at once suggestive of molecular lab vessels or, alternatively, a conglomeration of candy hued bongs to bring a robotic dog into our presence.

The Woods are Lovely Deep and Dank, I Have Miles to go and Bongs to Rip Before I Sleep, 2025, besides acknowledging the influence of the aforementioned weed smoking paraphernalia, resides historically, in its imposing stature, alongside Jonathan Borofsky’s standing men, packaged under a drug-haze elision of Robert Frost’s classic lines. Rea’s primary palette of high-gloss enamel finish falls between a colorful playground jungle gym and the return to the fundamental recitations of Jasper Johns and Sol LeWitt.

Mike Rea, “High Tuffness” (foreground) -and- “The Woods Are Lovely Deep and Dank, I Have Miles To Go and Bongs to Rip Before I Sleep” (background), both 2025, poplar, pine, CDX, acrylic, latex and spray paint, epoxy resin, polyurethane and fabric dye; 16 x 16 x 27 -and-  85 x 40.5 x 10 inches, respectively.

The trio of works that rely on verticality, You Miss One Hundred Percent of the Shots You Do Not Take; You Miss Fifty Percent of The Jokes You Do Not Tell, both 2025 and Before You Kiss Me You Should Know, 2024, tackle a cross-referencing of sport–specifically hockey–and weaponry (amo clips, triggers, and scopes); incorporating a miniature hockey stick made for his dogs Halloween costume allowing he and his companion to dress up as the Hanson brothers from the Paul Neumann movie Slap Shot in concert with more armament accoutrements. ; and, the stagecraft of the singer, respectively. Cobbled from disparate elements they each speak volumes more than their thin statures.

Rea’s predominant use of hockey sticks and tennis rackets (see: further on) is a rare case of sports equipment being used, or referenced, in art-making. Matthew Barney comes to mind as an immediate precursor. However, while Barney’s usage forecasts athletic prowess (his own), Rea comes at it from the forlornness of the found object tradition established by Marcel Duchamp; albeit his ‘objects’ are meticulous replications, marvels of fabrication–once again flavored à la Tom Sachs–rather than off the shelf product recast by act of will.

Mike Rea, “Gaol, Is É Sin An Saol” (at left), 2025, poplar, pine, steel, Baltic birch, CDX, acrylic and spray paint, epoxy resin, polyurethane, fabric dye, burlap and yarn, 24.5 x 24.5 x 84 inches.

Gaol, Is É Sin An Saol, 2025, a freestanding form that comes across as a mash-up of a dressmaker’s mannequin with a Sci-Fi version of samurai armor, relies on the bentwood utilizations of a classic Armoni lounger, all curved shields of plywood admirable to the furniture maker, and the cabinetry worker, as well. Visible through the interstices of the numerous panels one spies the hidden treat of incised legends routers into the surface bringing up the caustic school desks and the interior of public bathroom stalls repurposed as message boards that distinctly echoes the work of Tom Sachs, in addition to the only recently seriously studied obtuse markings, semi-hidden, on the Chinese terra-cotta army figures. Another level of the anthropological can be gleaned from the teasing Celtic title.

Rea accomplishes his feats with heavy reliance on the aspect of his studio that affords his mastery of shop methods. Refined techniques of wood working–warped and bent plywood; band saw, grinding, sanding, harnessing the will of the lathe and Dremel tools; with cast concrete, fiber and upholstery put to service of the artist’s self-admitted obsessive tendencies.† While highly finished they retain enough rawness to encourage entry on a human scale.

Mike Rea, “Everything Needs, Something, Holy Ghost, Oxford Commas (A Simple Heart)” [at right), 2025, poplar, cotton rope, acrylic, latex and spray paint, vinyl, acrylic foam, reinforced concrete, fabric dye, nylon cord, athletic tape, epoxy resin, polyurethane, paste wax, 85 x 40.5 x 10 inches.
 

The monumentally totemic Everything Needs Something, Holy Ghost, Oxford Commas (A Simple Heart), 2025, is surmounted by a technicolor parrot, wings spread, built down from a cross between a loom, the interior of some soft sculpture engine–think Claus Oldenberg–supported upon a saw horse, finishing in a foundation of four-square mannequin leg forms, reeking of  Allen Jones homages to his wife Deirdre’s physique transposed to a more tropical outpost. The parenthetical element of the title hints at spiritual grace courtesy of Flaubert’s story from which it is cribbed: “I like literature, perhaps the only overt reference in this show is to ‘A Simple Heart’, by Gustave Flaubert. Felicite Her parrot, which I start to conflate with ‘Felicity’ the TV show and the parrot in —‘Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates’, the Tom Robbins book, not to mention the rooster surmounting Robert Rauchenberg’s Odalisque” Rea mused. ¶

Mike Rea, “Guernica Vol. 11” (on wall), 2024, poplar, pine, baltic birch, burlap, spray paint, cotton rope.

The wall mounted works–essentially paintings–in their built-out aspect cause them to evoke Ashley Bickerton’s wall reliefs from the 80s. They also bask in the quirky peripheral flavor of the Chicago school. Wherein Bickerton, who hailed from Barbados and emigrated to Bali in his final years (dying there in 2022), gave all his attention to a post-Pop critique of consumerism by emblazoning them with brand logos, including favored brands serving as a new fangled sort of self-portraiture, with his late work embracing an island-centric flavor owing testament to his place of birth and chosen resettlement. Conversely, Rea embellishes his surfaces with art historical references writ with facile aerosol dexterity associated with street art, whilst carrying something of the midwestern plains indigenous culture(s). Their wall-centric heft brings to mind another artist who came out of the distinctive stable of the legendary east village gallery International With Monument, Meyer Vaisman, who similarly relied on skills commensurate with cabinetry.

Guernica Vol 11, 2025, faithfully replicates Picasso’s antiwar masterpiece, dressed in Rea’s unique tailoring; the addition of serialization in the title adds respectfully distance to it’s source. And, given the musical equipment references, could be taken as commenting on the sequentiality of album production (discography).

Then there is the aspect of these works resemblance to tarted-up guitar ams, complete with dangling cords that terminate in wall plugs and phone jacks. The fuzz of the burlap in concert with a panoply of soft, primarily organic, materials used brings an organic warmth to the aspiring hardware;  the hippie den winning out over the band equipment van in a subtle relocating of locus.

Mike Rea, “The Woods Are Lovely Deep and Dank, I Have Miles To Go and Bongs to Rip Before I Sleep, 2025, poplar, pink, baltic birch, burlap, spray paint, cotton rope, 48 x 5 x 50 inches. In foreground: “You Miss Fifty Percent of The Jokes You Do Not Tell” -and- “You Miss One Hundred Percent of The Shots You Do Not Take”, both 2025, poplar, pink CDX, acrylic, latex and spray paint, epoxy resin, polyurethane and fabric dye, 7 x 7  22.5 -and- 10.5 x 12 x 70 inches, respectively.

The other two works in this vein, IKB, Sort Of, 2025, and Hang in Their, 2024, offer variants on hypnotizing linear patterns. The former a cryptic run of midnight blue, near-mimicking Yves Klein blue (hence the titling reference to the patented International Klein Blue), that is in fact lifted from the obscure band Sublime’s logo; the latter a noir scrawl alluding to the title referenced–turning the adverb into the possive–cat poster/meme pinned between two hallucinogenic box within box mazes. The musicality of the line work rhymes with the discordance of aural tempo. The arcane album cover art of a particular stripe, namely of the now esoteric 70s Progressive Rock variety: Procol Harum—Cream; King Crimson; Yes; Emerson, Lake & Palmer, et. al. Like the artwork emblazoned on album covers of this genre, Rea’s imagery leans on the historical precedence of Symbolism. Also, I am suggesting, there is a strong whiff of nostalgia in the work.

Mike Rea, “IKB, Sort Of”, 2025, poplar, pink, baltic birch, burlap, spray paint, cotton rope, 87 x 6.5 x 58 inches.
 

Rounding out the affair are three unassuming works that replicate tennis rackets with verisimilitude, Can’t Wait to Meet You on Clay; Double Faults, Bounce; Three Times and Twist Twice, all 2025. In point of fact, they harness Rea’s former competitive playing days through the lens of his retirement propelled by an incident involving an unpleasant doubles partner’s rant in response to having missed a shot in response to which Rea threw the match, never to play professionally again. Rea cites David Foster Wallace’s use of the game as a foil for his writing. Therefore, these works stand in blissful homage to a one time passions; a sort of sedate thumbing of the nose in their verisimilitude. “Tennis the loneliest game in that the player is alone and separated from one’s opponent, a lot like an artist and their audience”, Rea wistfully notes.
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* Quote from the Artist’s Statement that accompanied the show.
† Ibid.
¶  Rea’s comments, used throughout this piece, have been gleaned from his responses to my queries via email, with this initial citing quoting verbatim.

Mike Rea: Mature Works
Bertrand Productions
4500 Worth Street, Philadelphia, PA 19124
September 20–November 7