Downtown Art Roundup: April 2013

Posted on April 25, 2013, 9:16 am
5 mins

Slide

The gallery shows in Pioneer Square and downtown end soon. We covered some of our favorite gallery shows in Pioneer Square earlier this month. Here are three great shows in the business and market district that you should check out before they close this weekend if you haven’t already.

Fulle-Keeper's Paradise-Oil+Acrylic+EpoxyResin_Panel-12x48x2.5

“Keeper’s Paradise” – Oil, Acrylic and Epoxy Resin – Alan Fulle

Alan Fulle: Liquid Scrolls at William Traver Gallery

Alan Fulle has created bold, vivid blocks composed primarily of epoxy resin filled with paints and mixed media applied in layers. The vitreousness of the medium makes it quite at home in Traver Gallery alongside fine glass works (including a beautifully crafted collection by Preston Singletary also on display for this month). Each of Fulle’s horizontal monoliths presents a sort of crystalline or cellular unity. Indeed, many pieces seem mineral, while other seem animal or vegetable. The depth and dimensions of Fulle’s works alone suggest a narrative, but the addition of vertical ribbons of pigment running from top to bottom creates a pleasing harmony and a sense of concatenation without compartmentalizing any elements.

The best pieces harmonize forms and colors of great variation. There is no literal or linear evolution of these forms, but rather a contained explosion, and viewed through the uneven but highly polished surface of the sculptures, the suspended elements still seem to move and warp. Thus, the narrative contained in these Liquid Scrolls is one of myriad influences and perspectives, something unknowable and ineffable from one view alone. Fulle’s intuitive, aesthetic approach will resonate with viewers who appreciate the beautiful multiplicity of experience.

Alan Fulle’s Liquid Scrolls are on display at William Traver Gallery until April 28

BT_Dilemma-Percieved

“Dilemma, Perceived” – Linocut and pigment – Barbara Earl Thomas

Barbara Earl Thomas: The Reading Room and The Book of Fishing at Paper Hammer

More dreamy narratives can be found just around the corner from William Traver at Paper Hammer. Artist Barbara Earl Thomas only began working with linocuts in 2006, but she has been painting and writing for decades. She took time off from her own artistic practice to direct the Northwest African American Museum in 2008, and has recently stepped down from that role to pursue her own art again. Her dense, skillful compositions colored lightly show her painterly background while the historical and personal content of the prints show her love of narrative. Merging these approaches, the result is lyrical and mesmerizing, even at its most solemn and stark.

The works are clearly informed by Thomas’ southern roots and a deep connection with water—both Atlantic and Pacific—but the works are not literal documents of these things. Men and women flow into and out of water, and it is not clear if they are elementals or drowned spirits. Rooms and furniture heave and twist like breakers. Earth, air and water twist upon each other, while tints of orange seem to add an interior, spiritual fire to the mix. The human quintessence is the last touch—and often seems the most disturbed of all. These are works that will change with each viewing, like the sea itself.

Thomas’ linocut prints will be on display at Paper Hammer through April 30.

sm_LOV.Paire_web

“Paire” – Oil on copper – Kent Lovelace

Kent Lovelace: Occitania at Lisa Harris Gallery

Kent Lovelace’s oil-on-copper landscapes may not be narrative, but they certainly change with each view…even with the time of day. Lovelace is a master of his medium and uses a blend of transparent and opaque oils to create a subtle reflectivity in certain areas of each painting. The surface is thus dynamic under different light conditions. His already luminous landscapes and ponds become a more vital representation of their rich, colorful provenance—a land golden fields and of warmer, less diffused light than that of the Pacific Northwest—as if Lovelace has brought a genuine piece of southern France with him. It’s worth trekking into the Market to get a glimpse before it disappears.

You can read more about Kent Lovelace’s Occitania exhibit in my essay on Seattle Arts News. The exhibit is on display through April 29 at Lisa Harris Gallery.

T.s. Flock is a writer and arts critic based in Seattle and co-founder of Vanguard Seattle.