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Exhibiting At The Wickford Art Association GalleryArt of the Senses Open Juried Show
Awards:
Juror Allison Paschke's StatementFor me the very best art has a rightness that's hard to define. I don't like to apply the same list of criteria to each piece, but rather to come to it fresh and see what there might be to discover. Everything about the piece should get behind what it has to offer: concept, scale, materials, craftsmanship, and presentation. And the best work reveals itself in layers over time; it's not a one-liner and it holds up to a lot of looking. Laura Johnston's Still Life with Bowl is rich with sensorial possibilities and surprises. Ordinary baking objects are rendered in a dough-like material so that one's visual and tactile expectations are overturned even before touching them. Then what looks like dough doesn't feel like dough, and the objects turn out to be surprisingly light. Visually the composition becomes a still life painting of beauty and subtlety, with delicate shades of matt white playing off a rich shiny green base. Julie Rubacha's Please please please please don't touch radiates so much energy for such a tiny piece. The brail symbols beckon touch, even more so when the title forbids it. "What does it say?" one wonders. Even a person who can read the brail without seeing it is not allowed to touch it. The beautiful polished and scratched surface evokes the touch of the maker and again invites touch. The visual, tactile, and verbal elements pull against each other again and again. A sense of play is immediate in Ken Mac Donald's Springs and Things. A strong, colorful visual composition plays against delicate wall shadows; next one feels a child-like curiosity to see what happens when one pulls on the bells. One bell allows the viewer to tinker with the composition (and perhaps pull it apart?), another to make a range of tinkling sounds, and a third to make a hilarious dull thump. Paula Dewell's Impending Storm operates both as illusion and as a powerful, purely visual sensation: light seems to radiate right out of the painting from the glowing bushes and from the luminous sky. Pictorially, one is invited into this energized, luminous, place. James Allen's Silver Oak #2 functions purely in terms of its traditional illusionistic character: rather than strongly experiencing the senses directly from the painting, one is drawn into the still life to imagine tasting the oranges and grapes, hearing the wine pouring into the glass, touching the beautifully and convincingly rendered glass, bottle, and fruit. It was a pleasure for me to experience all this work. Making the decisions was difficult. Thank you for the opportunity, and my best to all the wonderful artists. Allison Paschke |
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