Micheal Combs 

Head of State, 2010

Curated by William Morrow, Director, 21c Museum

Displayed at Proof On Main restaurant, 21c Museum, Louisville, KY, in April 2010. 

Commissioned especially for the Proof On Main installation, Michael Combs' white leather buck Head of State joins his earlier work from the collection, Alpha Male. Comb's is a fifth-generation decoy carver from Long Island. The antlers hand-carved from wood and the leather hand-stitched, Combs' work takes his ancestral craft to new levels in fine art, challenging themes such as masculinity and the way our culture uses animals. William Morrow organized a solo exhibition of Combs' work spanning 15 years that opened at 21c Museum in 2013. 

Man's relationship to nature isn't always pretty. I often dissect the absurdity of what we do, for example, the lengths to which we go for power, security, or sex. I find it extremely similar to what happens in the animal kingdom. I am interested in what makes us tick, the ways in which our contradictions pose a threat to ourselves and our world, and how dangerous we are to our environment. Out of my knowledge and attraction for nature and hunting, I can unearth the issues and create personal visions that explore them in their lurid and sometimes ludicrous complexity. -Michael Combs, 2006