From Paris to Paris by Sea

In the 1980s, Chimes moved into the former studio of Tom Palmore. A vast white canvas that Palmore left behind precipitated a creative breakthrough for Chimes, who embarked on a series of “white works” that incorporate mythology, maps, constellations, and geometric forms. From Paris to Paris by Sea refers to the book Exploits and Opinions of Dr. Faustroll, Pataphysician by Alfred Jarry, a symbolist French poet and playwright. The book’s hero, Dr. Faustroll, makes a journey “from Paris to Paris, by sea.” Notably, this adventure takes place on land, by means of a sieve. Jarry conceived of so-called pataphysics as “the science of imaginary solutions,” and Chimes likewise posits an enigmatic alternative universe. 

After a few years spent in New York, the Philadelphia-born Chimes returned to his hometown to remove himself from the quickly centralizing art world. As his career progressed, he became increasingly hermetic, focusing on portraits of cultural figures and their contributions to modern thought, among them Jarry, pioneering conceptual artist Marcel Duchamp, and Irish author James Joyce. Chimes was remarkable for eschewing the notion of a signature style or mode of making art, and he shifted from abstraction, to sculpture, to realist representation. His work is exhibited and collected nationally and internationally, and is championed by Locks Gallery. 

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