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George Terry McDonald keeps up a creative pace that artists half his age would marvel at: painter, art historian and lecturer, singer/songwriter, and front man for The Zealots (classic indie rock and roll).
He painted madly, in between tours, leading up to his successful March 2020 solo show at Revolve Gallery, in Asheville, North Carolina. When the pandemic hit, he refocused on songwriting and pivoting his art lecturing to an online format. Last fall he began a new painting series, based on basketball legends of his younger days.
Born and bred in North Carolina, his painting style was nurtured during his years in Manhattan's Lower East Side where he became steeped in all that the Neo-Expressionist underground had to offer. He continues to address the issues brought to light in that scene - gentrification, gender politics, racism and class - in both his paintings and songs.
In the current work, GTM is a bard for the age, presenting populist legends in surreal and ironic narratives. From Tom Dooley to Michael Bennett, JFK to 45, he chronicles the death, and stubborn life of American mythologies. Blending the content of outsider art with the technique of a master draftsman, expressionist brushwork, and photorealist detail, he extolls the underdog and turns americana inside out.
George received his MFA in Painting from USC, and his BA in English from UNC. In addition to his years of teaching, he has been exhibiting his paintings since the mid 1980's in New York, Los Angeles, DC, and North Carolina. Most recently, he has been featured at DABart in Ventura and the Glenn Dallas Gallery in Santa Barbara. He has been writing and lecturing about the Neo Expressionist underground art scene for the last two years, presenting “Culture Wars – 1980s NYC Art” at SECAC and colleges around the country.