Windham
Art Gallery is pleased to present Local Color, an exhibition
featuring the work of thirteen gallery artists. The exhibit
will include painting, photography, sculpture and work in other
media; each piece directly reflects, or has been inspired by,
the artist's environment. The exhibition will run from Friday,
June 2 through Sunday, July 2 with opening reception on Friday,
June 2 from 5-8 PM. Participating artists are: Amy Boemig,
Ric Campman, Cia Devan, Jim Giddings, Emily Hague, Lesley Heathcote,
Nan Heminway, Caryn King, Steven Meyer, Petria Mitchell, Scott
Nelson, Lori Schreiner, and Robin Truelove Stronk.
In Jim Giddings’ most recent painting, MacArthur Road, he "honors
mud time," which he says, "is a beautiful time," with thick, wet
mud that gleams dark and silver. The monochromatic oil stick-on-paper painting
pays homage to the rural, rutted road that, connecting West Brattleboro to Marlboro,
is the road Giddings literally takes every day to get home. Nonetheless, with
the road as a dark swath cutting through the equally dark, vertical space of
the paper, it is also the painterly place to which Giddings is compelled to return: “My
main attention," Giddings explains, "is in the paint."
"I live on a dirt road, off a dirt road off a road," Caryn King says
about the location of her house in South Newfane. It is this rural landscape,
and, specifically, the animals that inhabit it, that are the subject of King's
latest work. King, who observes animals in her neighborhood, at the Brattleboro
Retreat, and her husband's uncle's farm, has gained notice for her use of crisp
color and attention to fine detail in her acrylic paintings of cows, pigs, owls,
sheep and roosters. Her paintings often have decorative borders and may include
other, collaged materials, such as lace or bits of memorabilia. For King, a ceramic
sculptor for many years, these layers and depth convey a greater landscape that
includes not only what she directly observes, but what she imagines and is reminded
of about a place and the animals in it.
Nan Heminway will exhibit two oil on paper paintings of landscapes. The abstracted
landscapes with a visible horizon line and vivid streaks of color running
across the paper reveal the disorder Heminway sees in nature, hence the
titles: Nature's Chaos and Nature's Chaos with Red. "Local color," for
Scott Nelson, like Heminway, does not denote a warm and comforting place. Whether
working across various media, such as oil paintings, watercolors, or found objects,
like ties, or creating figurative or abstract images, he is consistently drawn
toward the unusual, and even the catastrophic: for this exhibit, he will show
an aerial view of a giant bull-like creature who has fallen, surprised, smack
into the middle of picturesque town with geometric streets lined with tidy houses
and green trees. "I'm after some intensity," he says, "I want
to startle the viewer."
A horse sprinting across a fluid field of vibrant color is the subject of Robin
Truelove Stronk's painting to be exhibited in this show. "Spring and the
new life it brings," inspired this work, Stronk explains. Departing from
her usual traditional, realistic style of painting, Stronk explored the abstract
aspects of place, and worked in a new way. "I abandoned my brushes," Stronk
says, "and literally engaged the paint and canvas with my fingertips and
palms to experience the excitement of a reawakening countryside." Natures
also inspires Steven Meyer who paints, en plein air, directly from what he sees.
Using mostly pallet knives to lay down paint strokes "in a clean, committed
way that brushes have never allowed," Meyer carefully constructs his paintings,
creating, layer by layer, richly textured landscapes that delicately balance
color and space. In Ochre Barn, a bright mustard-colored field rolls before a
row of buildings: an ochre barn, silo, and small house beyond, the rooftops which,
glinting white, draw the eye toward the serene backdrop of pale green mountains
and fluffy, impasto clouds floating overhead.
Other work to be exhibited in this show are the small, animal sculptures of Amy
Boeming, nature photographs by Emily Hague, bird paintings by Lesley Heathcote
("I am moved not only by their physical form and grace but by their intelligence,
behavior and interactions with each other"), and the paintings of Ric Campan,
Petria Mitchell and Lori Schreiner.
For more information call:
802-257-1881
Caryn
King, "A Good Smell"
Amy
Boemig, "Heifer"
