Balancing Act

Comment

Comment by Resident Curator on April 7, 2014 at 10:01am

Curator’s Comments:

 

Balancing Act is an amusing petite piece, whimsical and fresh in an apparently alla prima tradition.  I appreciate that the painting appears to capture the essence of studio practice- the play of the materials, and the tenuous balancing act of conflicting resolutions.   The active brushstrokes and the subtle interplay of white on white ground and partially crushed aluminum tubes are pleasurably tactile.  I find it interesting that this piece is an outlier in technique and composition with your other paintings generally offering much more complex arrangements, or combinations of opacity and semi-translucency.   Still Life with Lilacs for instance is particularly dense pictorially, with many objects and broken/impressionistic color planes.  The creamy white vase and cloth hint at the approach of your Balancing piece, but this scene instead gives way to an all-encompassing color palette.  While cast shadows and atmospheric perspective are diligently applied, some of the fruit appears to float slightly above the ground.  The pull away from local color, as in the case of the blue highlighted pears, intimates a visual experience that transcends natural sight.