Eli Harris is next up at 666 Gallery. From cafes to park benches, Harris’s work explores the daily nuances of city life and the people who inhabit our streets. Here is a sneak peak at some of his artwork you might see in Banal Obsessions Friday, September 18th, 2009.

Getting lost in the urban landscape is how Harris finds his inspiration; allowing the streets and the people to become his muse, he creates vignettes of the limitless sea of strangers that make up our day-to-day lives.  These transitory moments of social interaction are what drive Harris’s work.  Using antique book pages as his canvas, his pieces change like the flipping of a page, offering the viewer quick glimpses of passersby.  Together his works create a continuous story, a fixation with human interaction and the hustle and bustle of the city.  His work becomes his life, creating memory syntaxes of each moment culminating in Harris’s banal obsession with social interaction and the need to capture the unremitting movement of his characters. 

In the early stages of his work, Harris began filling journals with his eclectic imagery, painting directly on the pages and allowing them to take shape, forming everlasting mementos.  Since then, his canvases have evolved yet still maintain their journalistic quality.  Through the use of acrylic and ink on found pages, Harris continues to carry his work with him, allowing every necessary moment to be captured.   

Graduating with a B.F.A. in Illustration, Harris was awarded best sketchbook two years in a row in the annual Academy of Art Spring Show and was runner-up for best in show in 2008.  In addition to his recent solo show at Café Royale, Harris’s award-winning work has appeared on t-shirts for Gama-Go and in print. 

Banal Obsessions opens Friday, September 18th and runs through October 9th, 2009.