From Jesse Butcher

We’re All in Love with Dying and We’re Doing it in Texas, solo exhibit by Jesse Butcher
August 2-27
MASS Gallery (916 Springdale Road)
Opening reception: Saturday, August 2, 8-10 p.m.
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The Austin artist and Rhode Island School of Design grad combines photographs and cringe-inducing sculptural elements, like tree stumps, hatchets, barbed wire, bone and crumpled paper napkins, to evoke reactions to his themes of masculinity and death. His latest solo exhibit, We're All in Love with Dying and We're Doing it in Texas, opens Saturday at the MASS Gallery.

Butcher's stark and chaotic works examine the repercussions of modern masculinity in the male psyche. “The artifacts and images are tangible reflections of physical, emotional or metaphoric wounds,” wrote Butcher in his artist’s statement about the show, which gets its title from the Butthole Surfers song, "Pepper."

“The iconography acts as a catalyst for the modern males’ ‘walkabout’ to discover a more substantial sense of meaning and purpose.”

Aggression, physical violence, instability, exploitation and fear creep up in Butcher’s work and he seems to enjoy playing with the heads of art viewers.

“I engage the viewer as an accomplice rather than a spectator,” he said.

We're All in Love with Dying and We're Doing it in Texas runs through August 27.