Wednesday, September 28, 2005

REALISM PLUS at GALLERY V

"Art's a staple. Like bread or wine or a warm coat in winter. Those who think it is a luxury have only a fragment of a mind."
Irving Stone.

JAMES MOORE
There is only one James Moore and he is showing at Gallery V thru October 15. Moore paints in oils on canvas, or linen. He has reinvented, thru hard work and inspiration, the painting technique possessed by old masters. -- Yet, his offerings are not of fruits and vegetables lusciously arranged on silver trays; neither are they sumptuous depictions of curled shrimp and gleaming grapes among crystal goblets. No. Moore prefers simplicity, austere groupings.
Six Red Tomatoes glow against a red plate and a soft coral cloth, for example.--And are they gorgeous! -- Pause, take a breath:
White Onions & White Bag imparts to onions an earthy luminosity.--Yet, they are just three or four plain white onions; we've seen them in our kitchens. Thru Moore's painting they become special because they re presented without distraction. We focus on them.
Orange Squash is a field-marred pumpkin, dull orange, and
so real you want to thump it. Bright Lemons dance in a brass bowl.-- Ah, those White Peaches made me think of sunrise.
Moore's fruit and vegetable series are around the same size, 22 x 28 inches. Each same-kind grouping is set against the neutral tones of a wall and a linen cloth. You can see the texture and creases of table fabric on these relatively small paintings. You can count your breaths in the presence of the ordinary.
GONG, TINGSHA, AND SINGING BOWL
From across the room it gleams, and it rings, if silently. James Moore's Gong, Tingsha, and Singing Bowl is oil on linen, 36 x 40 inches. Here is a legendary "golden bowl", but it's actually brass, and it's actually a disc, and from across the room it does appear to be actual gold. It shines, yet no actual gold or glitter has been used. Moore, the alchemist, can depict gold without using gold. (I know how, and I'm not going to tell you. I certainly can't do it myself.)
The gong can be rubbed or struck with the tingsha. The singing bowl, which is much smaller than the gong, will sing when it is struck, or rubbed around the rim. Echoes and reverberations await.
The brass gong, its "cymbals" and it's "striker," hang from a carved wood frame that one might find in a meditation center. These meditational objects take up most of the canvas, with dull shadows and textured linen behind them. They balance each other in a proper compositional way. Gong, Tingsha, and Singing Bowl is truly a
remarkable painting.-- Koan: All that glitters is and is not. . .
TAMIE BELDUE
In her artist's statement Tamie Beldue explains why she choose graphite for her lyrical renderings, portraits, actually, of nearly life-sized nude women: "I primarily use graphite to reinforce the concept that pencil can be erased as easily as facial expression, or as the way a bone pressing against the skin can disappear."
True, Beldue's realisticlly depicted women, each one by herself, stands or reclines (to paraphrase Virginia Woolfe) in a "canvas of her own" and exudes an ephemerality, a delicacy, of aspect.
Yet, these are strong women, quietly self confident, happily at ease with themselves and their bodies. They look as though they might be attorneys or tennis stars when they're not posing. Their figures are substantial, neither Renoir-voluptuous nor fashion-model-thin. They're earnest, centered, and like all good models, totally unconcerned with their painter or other viewers.
Each "painting" has been executed in fine soft blacks and grays, of course. Because Beldue's sophisticated yet monotone palette consists of pencil, ink, and sometimes watercolor.
In Traverse, 25 x 48 inches, Beldue's model lies full length on her stomach, yet her head is turned, and she's looking straight at us from an ordinary neutral sofa. In this windowed room everything is as gray as rain. The sofa and the woman take up most of the canvas. Beldue is an expert, a poet, at drawing the human figure. Her renderings of feet and hands, always a challenge, are especially marvelous. Again, Beldue's
women do tend to "fill up" their separate but equal canvases. The backgrounds, although compatible, seem unimportant, yet vital. That is why I sometimes refer to Beldue's nudes as "portraits," and that's a compliment.
Anatomy With Albinus definitely takes place in an art school. The model is seated in a familar "at rest" manner, and a drawing
explicating the musculature of a male -- as in Albinus' seventeenth century On Anatomy -- his back turned, his arms outspread, --stands on a platform. -- One is reminded of the late nineteenth century and all of those photographs in which smocked and bereted students, some of them women in long skirts, worked at their easels, with models, in echoing drop clothed studios that resembled museums. And that's a compliment.
James Moore completed his MFA in Painting at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena California. From 1986 to 1993 Moore was Assistant Professor of Art in Columbus College of Art and Design. He currently teaches at Humboldt State University in Arcata, California.
Tamie Beldue completed her MFA in Drawing and Printmaking at the University of Cincinnati in 2005. She is currently teaching at Columbus College of Art and Design.
Realism Plus will show at Gallery V, 694 N. High St. in the Short North, thru October 15. Call 614-228 -8955.