“Pieces of the Whole
Ceramic sculptures by Lisa Battle, photographs by 15 Studio Gallery artists and Kay Chernush
NOV 11, 2024
Judy Bonderman, The Quinceanera (Courtesy of Studio Gallery)
BATTLE'S WORK IS ALSO FEATURED in "Something Old, Something New," a photographic group exhibition on Studio's lower level. (Both shows were curated by Martina Sestakova.) The images of water-sculpted rock formations at Zion National Park -- three closeups and one medium shot -- reveal an intimate relationship to her own sinuous ceramics.
The show's titular theme is broad enough to admit almost anything, including work that is barely photographic. Suzanne Goldberg's vibrant abstractions, painted partly atop shards of torn-up pictures, treat the photos as found objects to be obliterated more than integrated. Interestingly, the free brushstrokes yield spiky patterns that somewhat resemble plants, a subject of several other contributors.
The tree and flower pictures are often intimate and evocatively blurred, whether digitally (as by Jo Levine) or simply with narrow depth of field (which appears to be the technique of Steven Marks, the only participant who's not a current member of the gallery). Suliman Abdullah also seems to focus tightly for his study of organic decay, although the picture is actually a photo-collage.
Judy Bonderman softens trees clad in bold red leaves to craft what she calls "haute couture foliage," while Leslie Kiefer's hand-gilds pictures of wintry trees to make them appear both antique and precious. Lynda Andrews-Barry ponders death with photos of fish out of water, which employ saturated color to psychedelic effect.
Some of the photos are more traditionally observational. Bob Burgess, who contributed the only black-and-white pictures, captures rows of stark Arlington Cemetery gravestones, mellowed by snow. Amity Chan's twinned photos of 2019 Hong Kong pair calm with the prospect of tumult. Susan Raines offers a three-photo tour of eccentric Louisiana, which documents a stuffed alligator and a flying-saucer-like structure. There's a comic element as well to Gary Anthes's photo of a underpass tagged with baroque graffiti, where an abandoned office chair seems to gawk at the garish tags.
Graffiti takes a more delicate form in Langley Spurlock's gold-heavy entry, which layers a jewelry-like tag over a background photographed at a different location. Red dominates in Beverly Logan's consumer-product collages, in which red lipsticks levitate before blue skies. Also digitally composited, Iwan Bagus's two self-portraits portray him as a victim of war and displacement, surrounded by a butterflyes and floating keys. Made with the newest photographic technology, Bagus's pictures contemplate age-old struggles.”
Review by Mark Jenkins, DisCerning Eye, November 2024. Thank you!