Intentions: I really enjoy looking and talking about art. Typically it is a conversation rather than a one-sided rant, though. My intentions aren
't to talk too much in this blog, but to provide another venue for artists.
I will discuss my personal feelings about the work, however. As Tolstoy says, "Art is man's (I'm sure he meant mankind's) transmittal of feelings."
Being an artist myself I know the value of having your work in front of as many people as possible. There is quality work being shown in Jackson, Mississippi that people aren't seeing.
Disclaimer: I am not a professional art critic. I am simply commenting on exhibitions and the impact they had on me personally.
That being said, the first show that I visited since deciding to start this blog was at Fischer Galleries, www.fischergalleries.com, in Fondren. It was a two person show of paintings by Matthew Puckett of Jackson, and ceramic sculptures by Stacey Johnson, www.staceyjohnsonart.com.
Matthew Puckett's work has a real psychological quality to them that is anything but comforting. He employs some traditional compositional no-no's, intentionally I'm sure, to create a disturbing sense of solitude. It's no surprise that he pays tribute to Francis Bacon in a triptych in the show. The uncomfortable compositional elements are things such as having an object sitting right on the edge of the painting, or having a figure facing off the side of the painting that it is closest to creating a lack of balance. In the case of "Interior with Columns" the column comes out of the guys head in a most unpleasant fashion. Matthew is also in the 2009 Mississippi Invitational at the Mississippi Museum of Art, www.msmuseumart.org., which overall is a very strong show. I got in trouble last time I tried to take pictures in the museum so I won't be showing the invitational here. I highly recommend you checking it out, though. Here are a few images from Matthews show at Fischer...
Interior with Columns
Interior VI
Dinner Party
Interior with Chair
Stacey Johnson's ceramic sculptures on the other hand simply make me happy. She has a great attention to detail, and not to mention that they are just interesting. You could spend hours deciphering the little clues she gives to her ceramic stories. I like what she says in her artist's statement on her website... "These sculptural chapters are work created from a true need to manifest externally what is not completely processed internally." I think that is a good descriptor of the need felt by most artists. Here's some of her work...
Guilty of Something - detail
Guilty of Something
Self Portrait, Summer 2009 - detail
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