K. Wayne Thornley is the kind of visual artist who keeps his patrons on their toes, never knowing what the innovative master-level artist will create next. His latest collection, A Gathering of Chairs, featured this month in the Jasper Project’s Tiny Gallery, is a perfect example. Comprised of nine unique depictions of chairs ranging in style from the beautiful chintz boudoir chairs to the functional and sturdy desk or dining chairs, and several in-between styles, this online exhibition meets the requirements of the Tiny Gallery series (pieces can be any medium but must be under 15” x 15” and under $200) and patrons are grabbing these little beauties fast!
Thornley is a mixed media artist whose work spans several media categories, but he spends most of his creative time as a painter, an assemblage artist, and a wire wrangler. His work has been juried into local, state, and national exhibitions across the U.S.
When not at his real job, Thornley works from his home studio in Columbia, SC. Recently, he has been teaching a series of project-based creativity classes, the ARTMAKERS BOOTCAMP series, with art partner Lucy Bailey.
Thornley says, “My work deals largely with the life-shaping power of memory, memory loss, and memory-imbued objects that ultimately become someone else’s detritus.”
This is my second time to be invited to show work in the Jasper Project Tiny Gallery. For me, it is an opportunity to do work slightly outside my normal themes. I’ve been wanting to do a series of chair paintings, so, using my usual materials and techniques, I’ve created these small works, a limited series I am calling “A Gathering of Chairs.” In the same way found or collected objects carry their history with them, chairs, whether heirlooms or institutional furnishings, reflect their own history through style, usage, ownership, and service. My hope is that one of these chairs sparks the viewer’s memory of a time, a relative, a place, or a feeling from their own collection of life experiences.
Thornley’s A Gathering of Chairs will be available for purchase online at Jasper’s Tiny Gallery site through September 30, 2025.