Curator KN Goodrich placed the works of these artists in groups of twos and threes, creating associations through a commingling of diverse styles and media. She arranged them side by side, or in stacks of two or three, or in triangulations with the meatier piece on one side and smaller works stacked beside it.
 "Course Corrections II," encaustic, by Sheary Clough Suiter |
Putting each work near the others builds a fascinating bridge between object, figure and landscape. In one threesome, Suiter’s “Congregation” looks weighty beside the smaller, more delicate imagery in Lambert’s “Glass Float and Bedspring” and Lukyanova’s “Eagle River #2.”
The yellow tones and thick, waxy texture of “Congregation” convey the fleshy consistency of viscera; inside this field, the vague outlines of figures look distinct, but amorphous. In comparison, Lambert’s exquisite still life painting of a float on a bedspring presents a shimmering sphere captured on the cusp of kinetic power. Her work takes on an almost photographic quality through the exacting rendering of lines, edges and shadows.
Next to these two pieces, the photograph “Eagle River” documents a muddy trail in misty light. I use the verb “documents” loosely here, because though a camera lens can capture a moment of real life, the image ends up every bit as static and flat as a painting, sometimes more so.
The notion that photography distinguishes itself from other two-dimensional art forms through technological exactitude and compositional objectivity unravels when viewed in relationship to a still life painting, especially one as masterly and detailed as Lambert’s.
The frames give each form’s traditions away, at least in this show. Lukyanova displays her photos in simple frames while Lambert uses more ornate frames in rich colors like gold. Here, the democratic nature of photography and the heralded status of painting parry without clashing.
Though it seems like Suiter’s encaustic would be out of place in this dialogue, it contributes to the conversation by unveiling a more internal visual universe. Where the other two pieces present what’s on the surface, “Congregation” alludes to the layers below.
The waxy nature of the medium simply lends itself to subcutaneous nuances, just as the texture of oil paint on linen gives Lambert’s still life an unearthly sheen and light on mist imbues Lukyanova’s photo with a singular sense of a moment unfolding.
The gold in Lambert’s frame, the leaves in the photo, and the yellow tones in the encaustic further connect and distinguish each piece.
Interestingly enough, the success of this and other triads make the couplings of only two pieces seem stale and less dynamic. For example, the pairing of Lambert’s “Shoemaker’s Form” with Lukyanova’s “Hatcher Pass #3” plays with the ideas of color and shape. The chunky shoe forms in the painting sit in a field of blue while the rocks in the photo rest in a frothy gray river.
The pairing of images undermines expectations about how objects sit in relation to their surroundings and what water or boulders look like in real life, but the relationship seems somehow incomplete and what’s underneath or within these same objects seems untouched.
The triads in “Shadows and Fog” come across as far more fulfilling. In one of them, Lambert’s “Hand Drill” sits in the center between Suiter’s “Centerpiece” and Lukyanova’s “Light.”
On its own, “Hand Drill” is really quite amazing. The painting depicts an old rusty hand drill on a cloth or sheet full of creases and shadows. The drill looks larger than life and the painting appears surreally photographic and almost overwrought. “Light” counters this imagery by diminishing what the eye sees and questioning what the mind knows. The photo captures a shaft of light emerging from behind a tree, then fanning out over a field of fog, mist or nothingness.
Meanwhile, “Centerpiece” presents ghostly figures caught in a dense layer full of earthy, bile hues. There’s a sense of movement and pliability in this encaustic that doesn’t exist in the other two pieces.
Together, the three works debate the way perspective and materials influence the way we render life into art objects, memories or even documents of thought or life—and then again how these creations exist in and out of time.
In a way, the exhibit re-purposes the bodies of work by individual artists to impart a deeper layer of exotic, yet diminished clarity.
What gets conveyed through paint, wax and the lens of a camera appears deceptively simple at times. But a still life does not just represent a thing, a photograph does not just depict a scene and an abstract painting does not just exist outside or beyond reality.
“Shadows and Fog” simply and astutely reminds us that the brush, lens and idea represent a perspective, viewer, bias, obsession and curiosity.
Shadows and Fog continues at the Out North Gallery until Sunday, December 13.
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