Helen's Room, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
90 x 80 x 1 1/2 inches (228.6 x 203.2 x 3.8 cm)
Japanese Garden, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
93 x 93 x 1 1/2 inches (236.2 x 236.2 x 3.8 cm)
Shio's Studio on Blackwelder, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
93 x 100 x 1 1/2 inches (236.2 x 254 x 3.8 cm)
Exterior With Hanging Plants, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
120 x 76 x 1 1/2 inches (304.8 x 193 x 3.8 cm)
Austrian Golf Course, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
84 x 70 x 1 1/2 inches (213.4 x 177.8 x 3.8 cm)
Vegas, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
110 x 132 x 1 1/2 inches (279.4 x 335.3 x 3.8 cm)
Blackwelder Self Portrait, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
120 x 97 x 1 1/2 inches (304.8 x 246.4 x 3.8 cm)
Basement on Pigeon Hill, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
90 x 100 x 1 1/2 inches (228.6 x 254 x 3.8 cm)
Scholl Canyon 2, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
94 x 90 x 1 1/2 inches (238.8 x 228.6 x 3.8 cm)
Eames House Interior, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
100 x 93 x 1 1/2 inches (254 x 236.2 x 3.8 cm)
Snowscape with Barn, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
106 x 120 x 1 1/2 inches (269.2 x 304.8 x 3.8 cm)
Romancing the Stone, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
65 x 65 x 1 1/2 inches (165.1 x 165.1 x 3.8 cm)
Jungle Kitchen, 2017
oil and acrylic on canvas
100 x 93 x 1 1/2 inches (254 x 236.2 x 3.8 cm)
These paintings are metaphorically larger than life and they need to be seen that way in order to fully get what's going on with them. You need to stand before them at various distances and discern the intricacies; a camera will never do. Arguably formulaic in their delivery, it is a patient viewer who may snag the marks of deft paint handling in terms of mark-making (of a digital variety) and color relations (again of a digital variety). Rather than the whole, it is any one of infinite parts that can be enjoyed. Back, at a glance, we're looking at David Hockney 2.0 with respect to California lifestyle, photography and painting sharing common ground, as well as gratuitous energy and color (with respect to copious amounts of natural light), not to leave out odd perspective and a space somewhere between flat, and (again) limitless.
Everything flattens into the picture plane despite any proposal of depth and asks whether we are looking at wallpaper, repeatable image or unique set of conditions. Is this real simulation or simulated simulation? As if landscapes were (and will always be) an inner space. Cf. Matrix-type space, as one way to navigate. In most images, there is at least enough information to determine the name of all subjects. Thus, these paints are just this side of abstract, firmly situated in the concrete world that they represent, sometimes literally as it pertains to basement walls and their textural nuances, for example. Occasionally, there is a mysterious element which can not be named, likely dependent on level of resolution (to be thought about a both a solution to a pictorial problem in terms of representation AND level of digital focus, again resolution). Just consider the repetitive motif of certain size brush marks that create variable rhythms that somehow harmonize as a whole, but are inescapably digital, flatscreen, pictorial elements. Elsewhere in the exhbition, fabric folds like landscape features reminding us of our relationship to bodies, up to and including the artist own self-representation and family-member studio. Pixelated imagery abounds rather than solely the impressionistic color of an analog, later 19th/early 20th century world. These are paintings that are not just light in places but also light aligned on grids in place. Thus, patter, grain, color shift as light would reflect a medium, its history, and present, renewed preoccupation with such things. It's also not difficult to consider Hockney forbears: so, Matisse with respect to interiors and Van Gogh in terms of linear repetition and boldness of color application can be easily thought about. So, while there was once hope for a notion of progress/advancement, we see a reintegration of modern concerns, again with respect to technology and technique, in which case, we might say, funnily enough, that we're not quite out of the woods yet.
No comments:
Post a Comment