OKLAHOMA CITY – Addison Karl opened a can of chemical, peered into the container, gave it a stir and began working with the cold patina on a copper façade that will soon grace the Chickasaw Nation’s Exhibit C art gallery.
The chemicals were applied to the copper paneling with a brush and then “stippled” with a coarse plastic brush.
It gives it an appearance of aging. The patina was Addison’s proposal, and he was in Oklahoma City giving the treatment to more than 78 panels in an abandoned warehouse on Santa Fe Avenue in a deserted area just north of the Oklahoma Capitol building.
“I came into the mindset of patina and sculpting through the eyes of a painter. What we are doing in Oklahoma City is using a technique I use in sculpting. I am taking the process and making it two dimensional, but it will be three dimensional because the panels will be added to a structure,” Addison said.
Addison ventured to Oklahoma City to embark upon the task he advocated for with Chickasaw Nation officials and performed consulting service and patina application at cost. The global traveler happened to be in the United States to apply chemicals to create the cold patina, and to begin a public art project in Seattle, Washington.
He resides in Italy and has spent most of his adult career in Europe and America, with ongoing international projects. Born in Denver, he grew up in Arizona and devoted much of his early career to commissioned works on buildings, both abroad and many projects in the United States.
He also is promoting his new book “Kulli: A Natural Spring of Artwork, Sculpture, Painting, Drawing, Public Art and Inspiration.” Published in February 2024, Addison has been using it to educate his readers on the importance of imagination, experimenting with artistic techniques, explaining his inspiration and drive to provide talent to public works of art and to attract and interest art gallery and museum curators in taking a look at his impressive portfolio.
At 215 pages and loaded with photographs of his artistic thoughts, finished works and ongoing art, it is a look into the heart of the Chickasaw/Choctaw artist who is blazing a trail internationally and attempting to promote as many other Chickasaw artists to a professional audience and art galleries as he possibly can.
The idea for the book came during an isolation period in Italy where he was tending to his newly born son, Owen Kulli Gava, while his Italian wife, Vera, worked full time as an architect. The family resides in Treviso, approximately 20 miles outside Venice, Italy, one of the most famed cities for critically important ancient and contemporary art in Europe.
“I attempted to write the book colorfully, with lots of photography. I wrote it, edited it, performed the layout design and published it with the idea it could introduce me to art galleries and important public art and museum curators in Europe and the United States,” Addison said.
“It took me about six months to complete from start to finish. I recall I submitted the book to an art gallery in Berlin, Germany. I was told it contained too much writing. I just laughed. The time devoted to it seems like a blur now, as if it happened in just a few moments instead of a few months.”
He is serious about his Chickasaw and Choctaw heritage. His desire to share his art and inspiration exudes from his entire body and being.
“More than mere objects of art, a passionate pursuit to see our stories reflected in the halls of museums and galleries, each a tribute to the historical strides of our convictions,” he writes in “Kulli” to explain his passion to see Chickasaw art and artists succeed and conduct exhibits globally.
He explains his promotional desire by pointing out an April 2024 exhibit by Mississippi Choctaw and Cherokee artist Jeffrey Gibson. Gibson was invited to exhibit works at the Venice Biennale contemporary art show, a premiere Addison attended.
“The most important curators and art patrons in Venice attended. It was an insanely successful exhibition, and he became the first American Indigenous artist to be featured at the show since 1932,” Addison said. “I see that happening with Chickasaw artists in the future. Some have exhibited in Europe and have a growing base of support such as Dustin Mater (painter), Billy Hensley (painter), Brent Greenwood (painter) and Margaret Wheeler (textiles) to name just a few.”
“Kulli” fully embodies all of Addison’s artistic abilities – from spray painting buildings to sculpting and painting. He explains all of his processes and thoughts about creating art honoring Chickasaw heritage, tradition and symbolism.
For a few years now, Addison has entered the Southeastern Art Show and Market (SEASAM) with an elaborate – and expensive – sculpting technique using glass and traditional bronze. The art is quite striking. The technique is called “Lost Wax.”
The resulting hues of turquoise, aquamarine, and slight tinges of green, blue and copper are the result of extreme heat, sand, wax, molten glass and other materials. As he writes in “Kulli,” Addison sees a fluid link between modern art and his ancient Chickasaw heritage.
“Each angle (of the finished product) offers a new interpretation, a dialogue of abstraction, a fresh glyph in the lexicon of glass, inviting a moment to a hushed colloquy with the past,” he writes.
“In the undulating silhouettes, we uncover lineage, a genealogy that threads back to the mound sites of Tennessee, Mississippi and northern Alabama. These mounds … are reliquaries of the Southeastern Woodlands, cradling artifacts that spoke in terminology of shapes and shadows,” he explains in the book. “The (art) is composed of the same earth, air, fire and water that birthed the mounds. It is not merely a sculpture, but a lexicon of history, a murmuring stream that carries the weight of eons.”
“Kulli” is dedicated to his son and Addison bares his soul within the pages and with photography.
Copies of “Kulli” are available at AddisonKarl.com, the First Americans Museum in Oklahoma City at famok.org and Exhibit C in Oklahoma City.