BEVERLY SHIPKO
Strawberry Delight (Trifel) - 2003
oil on canvas
11 x 14 inches (27.94 x 35.56 cm)
Beverly Shipko I paint in oil directly from the subject using a wet-on-wet technique, applying the oil paint to the canvas like icing on a cake. The oil medium allows me to capture the luscious, tempting nature of desserts, with their enticing textures, shapes, and colors that seduce me with promises of mouth-watering rewards.
The serial images in this show portray moments of transitory pleasures, especially the ice cream paintings. Since the ice cream melts as soon as I set up the lights and start to paint, I only have a few minutes to fix the image in my mind. Sometimes I see a more exciting image take shape as the ice cream on-a-stick melts and the chocolate shell breaks apart, and I quickly snap a Polaroid to capture the fleeting moment.
Often, the subjects elicit childhood memories, when life was uncomplicated. They evoke a time in my life when an ice cream sandwich or an Oreo cookie was the center of my universe.
I believe that on some level all people are attracted to things they are not supposed to have. I am no exception. My particular challenge is to paint the subject matter on one hand, while not devouring these "forbidden fruits" with the other. It is particularly ironic that I'm obsessed with painting tempting desserts. I have a constant battle with hunger, a history of diabetes while I was pregnant, and a father who is a dentist. And so the name of this body of work, "Great Temptations ", appropriately reflects the tension and conflict that I feel while painting irresistible desserts. Beverly Shipko - July 12, 2001
MARYELLEN
SINCLAIR
Tina 1999
hand stitching, layered silk , net, felt
24 x 18 inches (60.96 x 45.72 cm)
MaryEllen Sinclair For many years I have been fascinated with thread, experimenting with its nature. The thread defines the rules. It does what it will, and will not, do. And I become obsessed learning more and more of how to push and pull, which is how my processes progress. I define fabric as woven threads; a thread simply a three-dimensional spun line of any fiber; silk, hemp, cotton, even dust or dryer lint. However, my work is not about fabric, even though it is made of it.
My emotions are just as interwoven into the pieces as the thread. The objects are personal components of my life experiences; they become visual evidence of human nature and life's ironies.
MaryEllen Sinclair - September, 2001
CORA H. ROTH
Odyssey 2000
oil and acrylic on canvas
20 x 20 inches (50.8 x 50.8 cm)
Cora H. Roth Two lines from Alexander Pope's Essay on Man crystallized the artistic process for me and ignited the germinal idea for this new work: "The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine! Feels at each thread, and lives along the line" New York of the 40's and 50's, its' frenetic, pulsating energy, art deco glamour, and ubiquitous jazz, provided an ongoing underpinning for my aesthetic and artistic development. Years of classical music training have combined with those early visual and auditory influences to continually inform my work, especially the musician's vocabulary - rhythm, harmony, melodic line, balance, and tonality are major elements in my painting. Small brushes are used to methodically develop the textural fields of oil paint that cover the surfaces, stopping short of obliterating their active acrylic underpaintings. Works in this show range in mood from somber to serene to exuberantly playful.
Hopefully, the viewer will be enticed from afar to engage with the painting, and then to embark upon a meditative journey of closer scrutiny between and along the lines.
Cora H. Roth - August 2001
HIROYUKI
HAMADA
Untitled - 1996 98
mixed media
17.5 x 16.5 x 16.5 inches (44.45 x 41.91 x 41.91 cm)
Hiroyuki Hamada Some of my pieces emphasize the making process. The material itself speaks loudly in some pieces. My nature weighs heavily in others. I like to feel that all of these interlock on different levels and create a certain presence. I like this point, where the material becomes more than the material.
Hiroyuki Hamada - September, 2001
DARRYL DELVECCHIO
3 Studies w/Measured Limb 2000
painted wood
70 x 72 x 26 inches (177.8 x 182.9 x 66 cm)
Darryl DelVecchio These sculptures are not really figurative. I can see however if someone mistakes them or interprets them as figurative. To me they speak more about the absence of a presence, or at the very least a filtered or distorted one (like something left behind). They are certainly related to a human presence in some way, just as a stop sign, for instance, is related to a figure even though it does not depict or represent one. It is figurative because of its associations.
The limited color of the sculptures was not planned. They were the only colors that appeared right, so they were used. The only requirements I made regarding this work beforehand were that the forms be open and that they reflect a stillness. Though my forms are still, I wanted there to be a hidden vibrancy in them, just as there can be movement in a stagnant photograph or life in a dead language.
The drawings started out as blueprints or ideas for sculpture, but quickly turned into something separate and altogether different. I knew early on that I would not be making them as sculpture. They are in book form because I wanted them to be seen one at a tine but still together. Also, although they are linked to the sculptures, I did not want them juxtaposed.
Hundreds of drawings were done and these were chosen because of their solidity and directness. My goal with the drawings, and the sculpture, was the same: to isolate and then to probe solid, still forms and present them in a clear, straightforward way while adding to them an ambiguous, figurative, symbol-like quality.
I would consider the collage pieces "open" compositions basically because of their relationship to the sculptures. That relationship is their main function and purpose. They also serve as an extension of the sculptures, so they take on the same open characteristics. They are considerably easier to do because so much more is accepted and allowed (on my part) when doing collage.
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