Photo by Michael Donahue // Buy this photo
Stoughton Outlan
Stoughton Outlan was fascinated with houses when he was 6 years old. “I used to ask my dad for duct tape and refrigerator boxes for my birthday,” he said. “I’d build houses, buildings, out of them that I could actually crawl through. He worked at a distribution center for appliances.”
Later, while working in the heating and air conditioning business, Outlan was fascinated with the “dilapidated architecture” he’d see on sales trip traveling around the South. “Architecture that was falling into ruin. Old barns. You know the drill. Everybody loves them. I always loved the textures of those things and the colors.”
Photo by Michael Donahue
Stoughton Outlan
That gave him the idea for his body of artwork based on architecture. He plays natural oxides, including earth, sodium and rain, off of each other on metal canvases to create abstract minimalist wall sculptures.
Fourteen of his pieces are included in his show, “Alchemy,” which runs through March 13 at On the Street Gallery at 338 South Main.
A Memphis native, Outlan, 46, excelled in art at boarding school at The Baylor School in Chattanooga. Some of his artwork was “still hanging on the walls when I left. One was a line drawing of Lou Reed and I made his eyes look like eagles.”
Outlan graduated from Memphis Academy of Art (now Memphis College of Art), where he had a dual photography and sculpture major.
He worked in a photography lab and studied master’s level marketing at Emerson College in Boston. “It was just something I wanted to learn: how to market a product.”
Outlan then returned to Memphis, where he went to work as marketing director and eventually part owner of an air conditioning distribution firm.
He hadn’t done any art work in years until he got a job designing furniture for Carnivale in Memphis.
Four years ago, Outlan got the idea for his architectural pieces. “I’d apply sodium solutions in order to raise iron oxide. I’d use rain water as well as tap water because they develop a different oxide. I’d scratch surfaces.”
He also uses a fire pit at a friend’s farm in Arkansas. “I’ll lay wood down in this pit and then I’ll lay box springs over the top where I can actually lay metal over the wood.”
Outlan would will then create patinas on the metal “using things like motor oil — anything I can think of to throw on it and burn off and then heat and cool” before cleaning and sealing the surface.
The results are “always a surprise. Each piece of metal seems to have its own hidden qualities.”
In 2006, Outlan landed a show at Clodagh, a New York design gallery run by Clodagh, an Irish interior designer. “She’s very energy oriented — natural surface, stone, steel, wood, fire, water, that kind of thing.”
Outlan called his show “Alchemy” because of “the idea of taking base metals and changing them into gold.”
That lead to Paramount Pictures contacting Outlan to use two of his pieces in the 2007 movie, “Perfect Stranger” starring Halle Berry and Bruce Willis.
Outlan divides his work into several series, including Ambit, which is another name for “circles”; Black Oxide — steel with a black patina caused by heat; Fire Oxide — pieces that may or may not have been thrown in the fire pit; Assemblage — constructed work; and Flat Castings, in which Outlan mixes everything from ground coffee to charcoal to graphite with a glass and sand mixture to make paper-thin castings.
He also makes Living Oxides. “That means iron oxide that’s not sealed. It’s continuing to grow. I make these in big circles or assembled pieces and people hang them on their verandas. It’s actually outdoor art work.”
Sea salt can cause the work to change colors. So, depending on the day, someone in Miami may see their Outlan outdoor piece change from dark brown to reddish to orange. “It’s like a big mood ring. And then eventually one day it’s just gonna turn to powder.”
-- Michael Donahue: 529-2797
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