ABOUT FACE: PEAKE'S PORTRAIT-MOBILES
The Windham Art Gallery is pleased to present About Face, an
exhibit of new work by May's Featured artist, Matthew J. Peake,
in the front gallery. Simultaneous with this show will be a
group exhibit--part of a May/June exhibit featuring the work
of all of WAG's members, new and old, in the back gallery.
May's exhibiting artist-members are: Amy Boemig, Stuart Copans,
Trudy Crites, Ralph DeAnna, Kathie Gatto-Gurney, Jim Giddings,
Judy Hawkins, Lesley Heathcote, Meredith Ingersoll, Steven
Meyer, Petria Mitchell, Carolyn Nelson and Leonard Ragouzeos.
These exhibits run Friday, May 2-Sunday, June 1, with an opening
reception on Friday, May 2, 5:00-8:00 PM during Gallery Walk.
The face, a Proverb states, is "the the index of the mind." In
this exhibit, Peake painted portraits of subjects and then
isolated certain aspects like the hair, eyes, nose and mouth,
before re-rendering each facial element individually, and larger-than-life,
in oil on plexiglass. Then he cut-out these individual parts
and suspended them with fishing line so that they hang as abstract
assemblages, measuring 3 feet by 3 feet and larger, or as giant
portrait-mobiles. "What resulted," Peake says, "was
a tension between order and. . .chaos; between front and back,
surface and underpainting, matte and gloss, opaque and transparent.
Metaphorically, the tensions we all feel in regarding a face." This
multi-media work is a depature for Peake who usually works
with pastel on board. Peake says, "There is nothing more
alluring, more captivating, more puzzling, more deceptive,
and more compelling than the human face."
"Laetitia" by Matthew Peake
32x38, oil on plexiglass
"Terry"
by Matthew Peake
34x38,
oil on plexiglass
