Max Adrian and Jake Holler
max adrian
Based in Columbus and originally from Kansas City, Max Adrian uses his bold, playful and imaginative style to create mesmerizing inflatable sculptures and out-of-this-world quilts that push the boundaries of textile artistry.
Working with textures and materials such as nylon, shag and pleather, Adrian experiments heavily when crafting. He is driven by inspiration from performance art such as puppetry, theater and drag, as well as his fascination with architecture.
“Playing between soft and hard is something I’m exploring right now,” Adrian says. “That’s kind of the driving theme right now: soft, ludicrous, precarious systems and structures. I like this idea of putting a building or structure in drag.”
Since he relocated to the city with his partner in 2016, Adrian’s art has been displayed at local spaces such as ROY G BIV Gallery, Wild Goose Creative, 934 Gallery and Otherworld.
Most recently, he contributed a work titled “Act II, Scene IV: The Lone Snowman” to the Columbus Museum of Art’s Quilting a Future: Contemporary Quilts and American Tradition exhibition, open through Jan. 28.
Adrian was also selected as the Ohio Arts Council’s artist-in-residence. His work is on view at the council’s Loft Gallery Jan. 19-Feb. 23.
In college, Adrian started as an animation student, but decided to pivot when he saw the work the fiber art students were pursuing.
“Being introduced to all these new things, sewing as a sculptural form of construction, stuck with me,” he says. “I’ve been continuing to push and explore sculpture in some construction-like sense since that point.”
Max Adrian and Jake Holler
max adrian snowman
Adrian developed his interest in inflatable art when he was working on the inflatables team at Costume Specialists, a mascot costume retailer in Columbus. There, he learned sewing techniques and acquired materials to create his own pieces.
“I like the connotations that it has in the portability,” he says, “the idea of having a sculpture that can potentially be really big that can be smushed down (and) just pop up. And surprise! There’s a piece of art, there’s a sculpture there.”
Adrian’s identity as a queer person is shown through the fluidity of his work. People in queer communities often have to pave their own path, he says, building their lives without conforming to normativity that doesn’t fit them.
“I’m always striving to make art that speaks to this idea that anything can be anything,” Adrian says. “That’s a very broad sentiment, but that’s at the core of what I make and what I hope people take away from my work.”
Maisie Fitzmaurice is an assistant editor at CityScene Media Group. Feedback welcome at mfitzmaurice@cityscenemediagroup.com.
