Scott Lyall combines drawing, painting, sculpture, and found objects into spare yet complex sculptural environments. An intense period of research and digital image-making precedes his multifaceted projects that delve into themes such as the links between graphic processes, sculptural display, and the design legacies of Conceptualism. Lyall makes his sculptures from everyday materials like particle board and Styrofoam, incorporating ephemeral fragments, as well as mathematicallygenerated drawings and paintings, into his installations. The effect is one of improvisation and incompleteness married with calm predetermination.

Recently, Lyall has become interested in the conditions of theatricality and spectacle. a dancer dances (2006) takes its cue from the musical A Chorus Line to investigate forms of performance notation and the idea that “works of art are in progress: the real show is coming.” the little contemporaries (2007) was stimulated by an invitation to collaborate with dancer and choreographer Maria Hassabi. Lyall studied video footage of Hassabi’s rehearsals which he translated into figures and linear diagrams. He also ‘grabbed’ the light refracted from Hassabi’s leotard and displayed it as color gradients on a video monitor. Separated from its theatrical origins, the little contemporaries evoked the different temporalities and conditions of dance and sculpture.

With its condensed wit, elegant formalism, and deliberate opacity, Lyall’s work eschews straightforward interpretation and invites contemplation and exploration.

- Gregory Burke