John Patrick McKenzie

John Patrick McKenzie (born 1962, Quezon City, Philippines) is an autistic San Francisco-based artist, known for creating works of visual poetry. His works have been exhibited internationally, including in New York, Europe, Australia, and Japan.

McKenzie’s process is based on a complex and mysterious repetitive sequencing. He methodically adds layers of nuance to each chosen subject, which is most often people and objects from pop culture, current events, and the artist’s immediate surroundings. Swirling, multi-angled, and disorienting, the placement of McKenzie’s language comments on the contradictory, sometimes overwhelming, nature of media attention and celebrity.

McKenzie is tirelessly engaged with sorting through the cyclical likes and dislikes of Hollywood, fashion, marketing, and the geo-political. And, like his artwork, the true nature of our information saturated world can be difficult to decode; but, ultimately, what McKenzie’s work reveals is that we are all people, we are all aging, we all like some things and dislike others, and we all need to communicate.
^[1]

Works

McKenzie's works typically are made up of variations on a theme sentence scrawled in black ink on white paper, though he sometimes uses color or writes on other materials. He writes in a stereotyped font in which all letters are filled in. Pop cultural or political icons figure prominently his works, which always feature a repeating prompt, for example:

George Lucas is full of Luke Skywalker They are full of holy Europe

George Lucas is full of Burger King They are full of holy Asia
George Lucas is full of stars They are full of holy Australia
George Lucas if full of movies

George Lucas is full of Streets of San Francisco and Oceania ...

^[2]

Exhibition Highlights

Solo Exhibitions

2011
John Patrick McKenzie Is Culture Humbug Sexy, Brett McDowell Gallery, Dunedin, New Zealand
They Are Full of Holy Nonsense, Creativity Explored, San Francisco

2009
John Patrick McKenzie's Famous Artworks, Brett McDowell Gallery, Dunedin, New Zealand

2008
Most Culture Humbug Sexy People Like John Patrick McKenzie, Monster Children, Sydney, Australia

Selected Exhibitions

2014
Way Out West, The Art City Project, San Francisco, CA

2012
Create, Cantor Art Gallery, Worchester, Massachusetts
Out of Order, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
ArtPadSF, Phoenix Hotel, San Francisco, California
FAX, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco, California
Parallel Visions, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2011
After Shelley Duvall ’72, Maccarone, New York, New York
Create, Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, California
4 Real 4 Faux Animating the Vernacular, Truman University, Kirksville, Missouri
Black and White and Read All Over, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2010
Where Are We?, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
Paper!Awesome!, Baer Ridgeway, San Francisco, California

2009
Words, Verses and Garabatos, San Francisco City College, San Francisco, California
Repetition, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
TV and Me, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2008
Art Repurposed, Thoreau Center, San Francisco, California
Tasty, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
one of these does not belong, Adobe Books, San Francisco, California
Quarter Century, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
Without Borders: Outsider Art in An Antipodean Context, Monash University, Australia

2007
GROUNDED?, Intersection for the Arts and Southern Exposure, San Francisco, California
Shadowshine, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
Seeing Memory, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2006
The Beat Goes on, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California
CA Calligraphy Summit, SFSU Art Gallery, San Francisco, California
Drawing the Line, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2004
Radiant Spaces: Private Domain, Track 16, Los Angeles, California
Outside Insight, The Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California
Contextual, Creativity Explored, San Francisco, California

2000
Created in California, Lorri Berenberg Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts

1998
Whipper Snapper Nerd, Bronwyn Keenan Gallery, New York, New York
Whipper Snapper Nerd, Mark Moore Gallery, Los Angeles, California

1997
Whipper Snapper Nerd, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, California

Bibliography

2011
Death: A Magazine for the Enthusiast and Non-Enthusiast Alike, Cover, Issue 3, Spring/Summer 2011.
Orma, Stephanie. “’They are Full of Holy Nonsense’: Artist’s Work with Words Intrigues.” San Francisco Chronicle, 5 May 2011.
Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Create. Berkeley: The Regents of the University of California, Berkeley, 2011.
Truman State University Art Department. 4 Real 4 Faux: Animating the Vernacular. Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Fine Arts Publications, 2011.

2009
Benson, Nigel. “Framing Things Differently.” Otago Daily Times, 19 February 2009.

2008
Schwartzkoff, Louise. “Autistic Scribe’s Outpourings Mesmerise.” The Sydney Morning Herald, 19 September 2008.
Monash University. Without Borders: Outsider Art in an Antipodean Context. Melbourne: Monash University Museum of Art, 2008.

2007
Eleven Eleven: A Journal of Literature and Art, Cover. Volume IV, 2007.
Charley #05. Ed. Maurizio Cattelan, Massimiliano Gioni, and Ali Subotnick. Dijon: Les Presses du Réels, 2007.
Torres, Anthony. “Creativity Explored Artists Get ‘Naked’.” San Francisco Examiner, 13 February 2007.
Keeffe, Helena. “Naked at Creativity Explored.” Shotgun Review, 30 January 2007.

2006
“Collecting Case Studies: Lawrence Rinder.” Dwell: At Home in the Modern World, May 2006.

2005
PLoS Medicine, Cover, Volume 2, Issue 4, April 2005.

2004
Greenwood, Georgianna. “Art? Yes!” Alphabet: The Journal of the Friends of Calligraphy, Volume 29, Number 3, Summer 2004.
Track 16 and Irvine Fine Arts Center. Radiant Spaces: Private Domain, California Artists with Developmental Differences. Santa Monica: Smart Art Press, 2004.

2003
Alphabet: The Journal of the Friends of Calligraphy, Volume 29, Number 1, Autumn 2003.

2002
Anderson, Lessley. “Osama Bin Laden Dislikes Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats.” SF Weekly, Cover, Volume 21, Number 43, 2002.

2000
Plazm, Cover, Issue 24, 2000

1998
Whipper Snapper Nerd. San Francisco: Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 1998.

Reception

McKenzie is considered to be a "rising star" in the world of outsider art.^[3] He work has been shown around the world, both in group exhibitions of outsider works (for example in Australia^[3][4]) and is solo shows.^[3]

Collaborators and Collectors

Tracy Chapman
Michael Stripe
UC Berkeley Art Museum

References

External links

• Schwartzkoff, Louise (September 19, 2008). "Autistic scribe's outpourings mesmerise". Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 7 December 2009. 
• Online gallery of McKenzie's works a Brett McDowell Gallery
• "Create" (2011) exhibition at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive