SUSAN KRAUT: New Work
Exhibition: April, 2003
By Alan G. Artner
For more than 25 years, the artist has painted still lifes that have admitted, then excluded, many representations of the outside world. These new oils on panel are interior views that banish even the suggestion of the gardens that Kraut once depicted.
The pieces focus on a few objects--pieces of fruit, sprigs in a clear glass vase, a ceramic pot, a circular table. Added to them is just the autumn or winter light that streams in from a nearby window plus shadowplay of varying complexity.
As in Kraut's work that was featured in a two-person exhibition from 2001, the influence of 17th Century Portuguese still lifes is felt. The whole enterprise is carried by atmosphere and paint handling. There is not even a hint of an underlying conceptual program.
The works' pleasure comes through Kraut's subtle adjustments of form and color; though never self-proclaiming, they are remarkably different from one piece to another. A golden stillness is, however, present in several of the 14 paintings.
Painting like this has been done for centuries, and Kraut seeks less to extend it than find her place along the continuum. It is art that strives to occupy the still point of the turning world and makes the attempt with utmost conviction.
Pictured: "Winter Still Life IV" 14x11, oil on panel At Gwenda Jay / Addington, 704 N Wells St. Hours are 11 to 6 Tuesday through Saturday; 312-664-3406
|
Susan Kraut's new paintings at the Gwenda Jay/Addington Gallery are everything that fashion says paintings should not be--and are the better for it.
click here for images from the show.
