Weston Fields, Winter Sunset
5 x 7 in.
oil
$325.00
Available through the artist
Using the changing color and light of an impression, the artistry of Mary Bentz Gilkerson’s paintings connects people to the experience of place.
“Almost daily for the last ten years I’ve made a small painting inspired by the landscapes I travel through, mainly near the roads and highways around Columbia, SC, especially Lower Richland, and Savannah, GA” says Gilkerson.
Mary is drawn to the ordinary spaces we move through, especially ones that are within view from the road.
“In a roadside view I find a strange intersection of nature and culture. We move so fast that we don’t take time to observe the world around us in the way that people did before modern transportation and technology came along. In my work, I seek to focus on the shifting patterns of light and color that tell us what time of day and season it is, to note the small and subtle, as well as the large and grand.”
Gilkerson holds an MFA in drawing and painting from the University of South Carolina. A native South Carolinian, she lives and works in her Columbia studio after retiring as a professor of art at Columbia College. She has received grants from the South Carolina Arts Commission and the Cultural Council of Richland and Lexington Counties in addition to having been selected as a Southern Arts Federation Fellowship Finalist. Her work is in the permanent collections of McKissick Museum, Palmetto Health, Morris Communications Company, and Seibels Bruce Group, among others.
The international and contemporary LA Art Show will officially kick off the city’s 2020 art season at the Los Angeles Convention Center on February 5, 2020. As LA’s largest and longest-running art fair, this year marks a milestone for both the LA Art Show and the entire LA art community.
Jeffrey Chong Wang
As the LA Art Show celebrates its 25th anniversary, Los Angeles will be gearing up for the largest lineup of art and cultural programming in the city’s history — rivaling New York, the reigning arts capital of the U.S. This is a turning point that Kim Martindale, who founded LAAS with the Fine Art Dealers Association, has been working toward for decades.
Annie Murphy-Robinson
With over 125 galleries from around the world, Arcadia Contemporary will celebrate its 17th year as a major exhibitor at the fair and will present over 100 works, by all of the artists in their roster, along with the debut of several artists who have never shown in the U.S. before.
The fair takes place February 5–9 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. More information can found at www.laartshow.com.
Dean Mitchell Buffalo Soldier
30 x 20 in.
Acrylic on panel
Available at RJD Gallery “A Time and A Place: Layers of Black History” exhibition
Dean Mitchell is an artist of extraordinary range and talent. His canvases deftly depict soulful figures as easily as they do urban or rural scenes. Dean Mitchell’s world is our world: the people and landscapes seem so familiar — we feel like we know that person or passed by that barn or building on the road to somewhere.
Mitchell grew up in Quincy, Florida raised and inspired by his grandmother to follow his dream of being a fine artist — a path not often taken by African Americans in the 60s and 70s during the volatile Civil Rights period. He persisted despite obstacles of poverty, racism and lack of opportunities in the south and used those limitations as stepping stones in his art to transcend any labels society chose to bestow upon him.
“Buffalo Soldier” speaks to a time and a place in not only Black history but American history as well. Named Buffalo soldiers by American Indians on the western frontier, these men served with distinction beginning in 1866 as the 9th and 10th cavalry as well as the 24th and 25th infantries. Many of these men were among the 180,000 African Americans who were Union soldiers during the Civil War. Not only did they fight in the Indian wars, the Buffalo soldiers also fought in the Spanish-American War, the Philippine-American War, Mexican Border War and World Wars I and II.
Mitchell’s portrait of Buffalo and Union soldiers will be presented in RJD Gallery’s Black History Month exhibition, “A Time and A Place: Layers of Black History.” This show will also showcase Mitchell’s stunning rural landscapes — desolate and filled with a quiet intensity. “A Time and A Place” will also feature the works of Stefanie Jackson, Phillip Thomas and Jules Arthur.
“Black history is American history and it should be honored and shared through art, literature and music. Let us all remember and celebrate those that have paved the way for all of us” says RJD Gallery’s Joi Jackson Perle.
“A Time and A Place: Layers of Black History” opens on Saturday, February 22 and runs through March 16.
Frederick Brosen (b. 1954), “Delancey Street,” 2019, watercolor over graphite on paper, 11 1/2 x 9 1/4 in.
“Frederick Brosen: Recent Watercolor Paintings” will be on view at Hirschl & Adler Galleries (New York) February 6 through March 6, 2020.
More from the gallery:
From the Upper West Side to SOHO and out to Coney Island, Frederick Brosen paints the honest and overlooked splendor of New York City’s rainy street corners and gritty façades. Fourteen watercolor paintings, ranging in scale from 10 x 9 inches to 45 x 32 inches, celebrate the city that has served as the artist’s career-long muse and lifelong home. These paintings offer quiet moments of reflection amidst the bustle of NYC, and their skilled-handling demonstrates that Brosen is a true master of watercolor.
Frederick Brosen, “Grand Street and Broadway,” 2019, watercolor over graphite on paper, 45 1/4 x 32 in.
As a native New Yorker, Brosen is not seduced by tourist-trap vistas. His keen eye finds the cracks in the skyline that open to urban expanses unconsidered by most, such as the blues and pinks of passing clouds heightened in their intensity by the heaviness of a high-rise and the solidness of a street corner, as in “West 74th Street.” Brosen carries his ability to balance such pictorial dichotomies into his scenes of Coney Island, but with the added challenge of the park’s spectacle.
Frederick Brosen, “West 74th Street,” 2019, watercolor over graphite on paper, 35 x 23 1/2 in.
“Jones Walk, Coney Island” shows the artist looking past the vendors’ stalls, the ironwork, the signage and neon lights (painted with a vibrancy rarely, if ever, seen in watercolor) to capture the softly dying light of the day, its delicateness belied by the visual noise of street level. Brosen finds that quietness, and the resulting painting lets the viewer in on it as well. Ultimately, Brosen’s watercolors give the viewer that rare moment in New York City when one can stop, look around, and feel as if they alone are enjoying this moment.
Frederick Brosen, “Jones Walk, Coney Island,” 2019, watercolor over graphite on paper, 19 x 12 1/2 in.Frederick Brosen, “Broome Street,” 2019, watercolor over graphite on paper, 19 x 13 in.
“Frederick Brosen: Recent Watercolor Paintings” opens at Hirschl & Adler Modern on Thursday, February 6, and runs through Friday, March 6, 2020. Located on the 9th floor of the Fuller Building, at the corner of 57th Street and Madison Avenue, Hirschl & Adler Modern is open Monday through Friday, from 9:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m.
Robin Damore resides in Vancouver, WA and specializes in personalized custom portraits that capture the real emotion and story of the subject. Throughout her time working as an artist, Robin has gravitated toward events and locations that have invited her to paint with an audience. Being a people person, she gains energy from spectators and finds some of her most inspired work in the process.
Sunday, February 2, at the Hudson River Museum (Yonkers, NY), artist James McElhinney; art historian Katherine Manthorne; and Frances F. Dunwell, Hudson River Estuary Coordinator at the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation will gather to discuss the dynamic and interdependent underpinnings of the Hudson Valley landscape across time, space, and consciousness. The discussion will be moderated by Laura Vookles, Chair of the HRM’s Curatorial Department.
Thomas Cole’s Refrain: The Paintings of Catskill Creek
Thomas Cole’s Refrain: The Paintings of Catskill Creek
Through February 23
“Thomas Cole’s Refrain: The Paintings of Catskill Creek” will illuminate masterpieces from major museums and private collections and explore the deeper meanings of Cole’s Catskill Creek paintings, considered as an integral series, for the first time. The exhibition is based on new scholarship developed by H. Daniel Peck, Exhibition Curator and the John Guy Vassar Jr. Professor Emeritus of English at Vassar College, in his book of the same title, published by Three Hills, an imprint of Cornell University Press.
Created during the 18-year period between 1827 and 1845, which spans Thomas Cole’s mature career, the artist’s paintings of Catskill Creek constitute the most sustained sequence of landscape paintings he ever made.
James McElhinney: Discover the Hudson Anew
Through February 16
“James McElhinney: Discover the Hudson Anew” presents the painter’s sketch books and prints related to the river in a comprehensive showing for the first time. A video program, animating turning pages, will allow visitors to see additional sketchbook paintings.
McElhinney says he wants his art to demonstrate “that constructive dialogue between humanity and nature is alive and well, while underscoring how art provides durable and dynamic modes of engagement.”
Janelle Lynch: Another Way of Looking at Love
Through February 16
View color photographs of Catskills foliage from Janelle Lynch’s series “Another Way of Looking at Love.” Finding subjects on her wooded property during all seasons, Lynch (American, born 1969) focuses closely on dense trees, plants, and flowers to encourage us to look more intently and think more deeply about our natural surroundings.
The title of the series is a quote from contemporary British philosopher Alain de Botton, who believes that love is about making connections and about long-term, pro-active commitment. His ideas resonated with Lynch, who related them to her own work reimagining our relationship to nature, the planet, and each other.
Asher Brown Durand (American), "Summer Afternoon," 1865, oil on canvas, 22 1/2 x 35 in. (57.2 x 88.9 cm)
Hudson River School Paintings from the David and Laura Grey Collection
Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, Florida International University
On view Saturday, January 25, 2020 – Sunday, May 17, 2020
From the Organizers:
Cultural identity in the United States has been long intertwined with its magnificent landscapes, from the dense forests of New England to the open terrain of the West. These landscapes extol the unique beauty of this country and relate to the first significant art movement in the United States, known as the Hudson River School.
The artists who painted these American landscapes worked during a time of increasing industrialization and growth of technology—not a coincidence of history but a lens on ecocritical thinking of the time. Modern industry changed the culture and economic future of this country, but also gave rise to concerns about the preservation of a natural environment often described as a Garden of Eden.
While much of “Transitional Nature” focuses on U.S. landscapes, depictions of Greenland and Ecuador exemplify the international travel undertaken by 19th-century artists in further pursuit of untrammeled terrain.
Artists working today frequently address the beauty and complexity of landscape, drawing our attention to environment and ecology. “Transitional Nature” features a selection of works by contemporary artists that will connect in powerful ways the past of the Hudson River School to the present art world.
Tara Lewis, “As If,” 2019, oil on canvas, 30 x 24 in. / 76 x 61 cm
Lyons Wier Gallery (NYC) recently announced the exhibition “Hell Yes!” a new series of portrait paintings by Tara Lewis. “Hell Yes!” portrays real-life subjects adorned with incongruous props, artist-made t-shirts, and satin pageant sashes boasting pop culture text idioms.
More from the gallery:
Tara Lewis’s portrait process happens organically as models go through her wardrobe, accessories, and props to discover a “persona.” These “play-dates” serve as a pivotal ingredient for her practice, as they are the underpinning of the subsequent photoshoot that serves as the source material for her paintings. Referencing this initial imagery, Lewis explores celebrated cultural forces such as the Lone Ranger, high school cheering squads, home-court basketball, yearbook superlatives, track shorts, tube socks, and tennis headbands which feature in the work.
Tara Lewis, “Hell Yes,” 2019, oil on canvas, 60 x 46 in. / 152 x 117 cm
Lewis’s collaborative approach documents a consciousness of place, playfulness, and self-awareness framed by irreverence and raw candor that she is known for. Her compositions portray coming-of-age empowerment, authenticity, spontaneity, and informality, expressing an entirely new story, one that is intentionally left open-ended, allowing for a timeless resonance.
Lewis’s cleverness of interweaving modernity and past pop-cultural phenomena renders imagery that comments on society’s evolving perceptions of youth, girl culture, beauty, identity, teen trends, empowerment, social issues, and pop culture.The paintings play with scale, redefine gender stereotypes, and revisit past decades with a dose of satirical zing that results in trophy-toting portraiture and willful nonconformist debutantes gone rebel-rogue.
Tara Lewis, “Lone Ranger,” 2020, oil on canvas, 70 x 40 in. / 178 x 102 cm
Tara Lewis earned her BA in painting and printmaking at the University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH, and her MA in visual studies and art education at Tufts University and the Museum School in Boston, MA. Lewis has spent over a decade as a professor and chair of the Department of Art at Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter, NH. Her artwork has been included in exhibitions and events at the Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO; the Watermill Center, Watermill, NY; Chelsea Art Museum, New York, NY; and New York Fashion Week and is held in private collections in Palm Beach, New York, London, Los Angeles, and Hong Kong. Lewis has been featured in publications such as Whitewall Magazine, New York Magazine, Elle, Vice, Artnet, Art + Auction, and Cultured Magazine, among others, and was recently published in RxArt’s Between the Lines, Volume 7: Contemporary Artist Coloring Book.
Tara Lewis, “HA HA HA,” 2019, oil on canvas, 60 x 48 in. / 152 x 122 cm
Lewis designs and prints her own text idioms onto wearable objects such as satin pageant sashes, t-shirts, trophies, and ping pong paddles, which she considers unique limited-edition print objects. These objects convey messages, re-examine stereotypes, and explore timeless youth culture and serve as a trampoline for her paintings. The interaction of word and image is central to her work. Lewis is a direct descendant of Art Nouveau artist Alphonse Mucha, one of her primary influences, who also infused typefaces and cultural portraiture into his celebrated and pivotal compositions. The artist lives and works in New York City.
“Hell Yes” is on view at Lyons Wier Gallery January 30 through February 22, 2020. For more information, please visit www.lyonswiergallery.com.
Gunnar Tryggmo, “Moving On,” watercolor, 30 x 41 in.
“One Touch of Nature” features watercolor paintings by Swedish artist Gunnar Tryggmo. The show is on view at Turner Fine Art (Jackson Hole, Wyoming) through March 6, 2020.
From the gallery:
Gunnar Tryggmo is a master of his craft. In order to master anything, it is necessary to commit the time and passion to hone the skills. In his native Sweden, Tryggmo is highly revered for his watercolor paintings that follow in the country’s rich tradition of this medium. His imagery reflects his deep love of the natural world; he continually sources the out-of-doors by painting en plein air with his paint box and spotting scope.
“I was born in 1969 in Växjö, Sweden, and raised in Sjöabro, a scenic spot deep in the middle of the forest of Småland, which is a province in southern Sweden,” Tryggmo tells us. “The forest’s diversity of animals and birds caught my interest early on and became a natural source of inspiration. I shared this artistic interest with my uncle, who encouraged me from a young age, and it was he who took me to my first show.
“After high school, I moved to Helsingborg, a city in southern Sweden which faces Denmark, in order to study painting and drawing at Sundsgårdens college.
“I continue to be inspired by nature and in particular by animals and birds in their natural environment, such as the Swedish landscape, which ranges from the coastline to the heavily forested interior.
“The artwork is characterized largely by my natural interest. The values, the mood, and the movement are the most important things in my paintings. The techniques I practice are watercolor, oil, and drawing. I work both in the studio and plein air.”
Gunnar Tryggmo, “Silver Morning,” watercolor, 22 x 30 in.
“I first met Gunnar at the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Museum, where we were both exhibiting in the International Birds in Art Juried Exhibition,” remarks gallery owner, Kathryn Mapes Turner. “One afternoon, the artists were sharing their field journals, and I was so impressed with Gunnar’s. They had the scholarly approach of a naturalist but the astute renderings of a very practiced artist. Traditional watercolor is a very challenging medium because of its unpredictable nature and transparency — it is not possible to undo a misstep. This is why Gunnar’s commitment to painting in this medium is so impressive. The results of his commitment are pieces that are both bold and sensitive, painstakingly rendered with a distinctive lightness of touch and spontaneity.”
“One Touch of Nature” features watercolor paintings by Swedish artist Gunnar Tryggmo. The show is on view at Turner Fine Art (Jackson Hole, Wyoming) through March 6, 2020.
Wood Gaylor, (1883–1957), “Steven’s Point,” 1929, oil on canvas, signed and dated (lower left): Wood Gaylor 1929. Exhibitor: Bernard Goldberg Fine Arts
The Winter Show (thewintershow.org) returns to the Park Avenue Armory from January 24 to February 2, 2020, for its 66th year, bringing together 72 leading experts in the fine and decorative arts. The 2020 edition features a range of exhibitors, including new, returning, and longtime participants, whose offerings span 5,000 years of museum-quality art and antiques from around the globe.
Andrew LaMar Hopkins (b. 1978), “Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau in Her St. Ann Street Cottage,” 2019, oil on canvas board. Exhibitor: Elle Shushan
The Winter Show is an annual benefit for East Side House Settlement (eastsidehouse.org), a community-based organization serving the Bronx and northern Manhattan. Recognizing education as the key to economic and civic opportunity, East Side House works with schools, community centers, and other partners to bring quality education and resources to individuals in need, helping approximately 10,000 residents of the Bronx and Northern Manhattan improve their lives each year.
John Frederick Herring, Sr. (English, 1795–1865), “Black Horse Inn,” oil on canvas, 40 x 49 in., signed: Herring. Exhibitor: Red Fox Fine Art
The upcoming edition of the Winter Show offers collectors and connoisseurs the opportunity to acquire and encounter an extensive range of works from antiquity to the present, including painting, photography, sculpture, tapestry, prints, ceramics, jewelry, arms, antique furniture, and contemporary design.
Auguste Rodin (French, 1840–1917), “L’Éternel Printemps (Eternal Spring),” 3rd Reduction, bronze with rich brown patina, H: 15 ¾ in. (40 cm), signed: Rodin. Inscribed: F. Barbedienne Fondeur. Conceived circa 1884. This example cast between 1908 and 1912. Exhibitor: Bowman Sculpture
The 2020 fair includes a number of specially curated presentations as well as joint exhibitor collaborations, offering thoughtful juxtapositions of rare and exceptional objects that reflect collectors’ varied interests. Each object is vetted for authenticity, date, and condition by a committee of more than 120 experts from the United States and Europe.
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