Some Enlivening Locutions

 

 

Some Enlivening Locutions 

detail - "May I Share A Word With You" by Judi Krew

"May I Share A Word With You" by Judi Krew

(left) "Murders in the Rue Morgue" by William Bogdan
(right) "Our Weapon is Truth" by Sally Lytle

"Lavish Lilies I" by Diane Belfiglio

"Small Reflections" by Christopher Triner

"DeDeKind" by David Kuntzman

"A Place in the Mountains" by Isabel Zaldivar

By Tom Wachunas 

   “The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.” – Aristotle 

   EXHIBIT: 79^th ANNUAL MAY SHOW/ at LITTLE ART GALLERY, located in  The North Canton Public Library, 185 North Main Street, North Canton, Ohio/ Viewing hours: Mon.-Thurs. 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., Fri. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. /  THROUGH JUNE 4, 2022

From Merriam-Webster, definition of locution:

lo·​cu·​tion | \ lō-ˈkyü-shən (noun)

1: a particular form of expression or a peculiarity of phrasing

especially : a word or expression characteristic of a region, group, or cultural level

2: style of discourse : PHRASEOLOGY

     Jurors  Allyssa Hixenbaugh and Elizabeth Taylor have written that they  had “not an easy task” in selecting a scant 28 artworks from more than 130 submissions to this hallowed annual ritual. While I was consequently disappointed by the absence of 3D sculptural works on view (with one notable exception – more on that later), I’m happy and grateful to report that one of my monochrome 2D mixed media collages, Politics and Religion, did make the harvest, so to speak. I wrote about that piece in late 2020, and here’s a link to the post if you care to revisit:

http://artwach.blogspot.com/2020/11/description-and-de-scription.html

   This year’s May Show crop once again heavily favors art of the representational sort, with very little in the way of nonobjective abstraction. In that genre, David Kuntzman’s acrylic painting, DeDeKind, is a stunning mathematical mind-bender. Its complex layers of interlocking angled grids seemingly move forward and recede all at once in a suggestion of infinite spatial depth.

     As a whole, the show feels somewhat safe, as in quietly academic and traditional. This is certainly not to say it lacks technical or conceptual excellence. Several of the most compelling pictures depict the natural world, including landscapes. You might call them diverse narratives, or locutions of locations. Among those, Isabel Zaldivar’s wild, loosely painted acrylic, A Place in the Mountains, exudes a raucous joy with its harmonized planes of electrifying complementary hues. A much tighter method of layered mark-making imbues Christopher J. Triner’s acrylic painting, Small Reflections, with an enchanting sense of sparkling luminosity – a woods enlivened with magical, lambent light. And the remarkable precision of lines, organic shapes, and saturated color all unite to make Diane Belfiglio’s watercolor, Lavish Lilies I, an altogether breathtaking ode to delicate, sunlit textures.

    Elsewhere in the mix, two small portraits mounted side-by-side make for a sobering contrast in considering the darker if not more solemn side of existence in modern times. One is downright morose, the other poignant and  contemplative. In William Bogdan’s raw, bluntly rendered etching, Murders in the Rue Morgue – The Moment Before, a monstrous, wrinkled hand rests on the neck and shoulder of a woman in profile. Her eyes look to the edge of death. The moment before indeed. To the right, the girl in Sally Lytle’s gently fluid oil painting, Our Weapon is Truth, looks directly at us, her dark-eyed gaze at once mournful and expectant. Cutting across her neck and shoulders is an edge, where the blue and yellow fields of the Ukrainian flag meet, and here mix into a wispy swipe of green. Green, the color of growth, of hope? The promise of a life, like this painting, not yet finished?  

   And finally, on another Ukrainian / global note, there’s the exhibit’s sole sculptural – and most arresting - entry: Judi Krew’s interactive, life-sized  robed figure called  May I share a word with you? The piece has a lot to say.  In 73 languages. Here are Krew’s words about her work :

    “One World * One People * One Voice. This coat contains 94 words in 73 different languages. The words are: Peace – Care – Kindness – Hope - Faith – Hello. Viewers are encouraged to gently lift any necktie piece and discover the word rendered and its language of origin. The more we learn, the more we will become a world of understanding and peace. The headpiece is based on the traditional ceremonial dress of the Ukrainian people. It contains three words to be shared: Peace - Freedom - Assistance. Materials for both: black out curtains, necktie skeletons, spray paint, shirt scraps, thread, embroidery floss, buttons, labels and crochet remnants on the headpiece.”

   Krew’s materials and methods are themselves a grand and eloquent locution, literally and symbolically, of the ties that bind our longings for connectivity and unity in times of unspeakable turmoil.