(courtesy Leo Kesting Gallery)

Looking at Ray Sell’s images is like walking into an American vintage pop culture magazine.  It’s my first encounter with Mr. Sell’s work, so I have a fresh eye for what’s up at Leo Kesting (been wanting to visit the gallery for ages). I was not disappointed to see Ray Sell’s mutedly vivid collages raising questions about American boyhood rising into manhood.  Perhaps some of the imagery comes from his own experiences.  Nonetheless, the subjects are stylishly positioned and he seems to work within a nostalgic color palette. Although the images that Mr. Sell uses are only a few decades old, it feels like some strange distant world. Television, pin-up ladies, cowboys, guns and Miller-Coors beer. Just about sums up the American (macho) “high life” before cyberspace came into the picture.

Ray Sell: Stand Yer Ground is on view from May 13 – June 13, 2010