Preview
PASSAGE SERIES
Les Linfoot and Steven Mack
Runs until February 22
Virginia Christopher Fine Art
(1235 26th Ave. S.E.)
During the winter, Albertans are painfully aware of the contrast between inside and outside, between the comfort of warm enclosures and the challenge of the frigid outdoors. Works by two artists now on view at the Virginia Christopher Fine Art gallery offer viewers a chance to explore related notions about the human body within the environment.
The gallery space itself offers a welcome respite from the chill and bustle of the downtown core. The gallery, which has been in operation for more than 20 years, recently moved into the former administration offices of the Greyhound bus company, a short stroll from Eau Claire market. The classic architecture retains its vintage feel, and works are displayed within a series of intimate rooms.
Les Linfoot graduated from the University of Calgary in 1987. He returns to the city with a new series of works inspired by a set of photographs that languished in a box in his studio for more than a decade.
"They’re bad photos, overexposed and out of focus," he says. "The images intrigued me." The resulting paintings depict figures, mainly women, entering or leaving a public space through a set of glass doors.
In these mid-size paintings, Linfoot defines broad areas in acrylic, adding sparse detail in oil. Indicating the impersonal architectural environment with simple geometric strokes, he creates a framework for the active, moving figures. Sticking to a minimal palette of colours, he pares down the juxtaposed human and constructed forms into bold elements within his compositions.
Unaware of being observed, with faces mainly obscured, Linfoot’s subjects appear unconcerned as they go about their business, yet convey a feeling of intention, of moving purposefully, that people usually demonstrate in a public space. The outside world appears diffused with bright light, the figures dark silhouettes as they navigate the territory between inside and outside. The apparent neutrality of the artist’s observation tempers a first impression of voyeurism or intrusion.
In our normal daily routines, we traverse the seemingly insubstantial barriers of doorways without much conscious thought. But in painting, as in poetry, a single image can convey a wide range of meanings. Linfoot’s concentration on this subject matter suggests he wants to explore all the inherent possibilities of the threshold as a place of transition. Contemporary western society takes for granted that buildings should be square boxes, larger than human scale, and these works also seem to question how comfortable we are with that dictated norm.
Steven Mack, also schooled in Calgary with a 10-year history of art practice, focuses on the nude – a traditional subject for painting that can easily slip into cliché. While Linfoot’s subjects are anonymous, fleeting and mysterious, Mack’s nude figures are aware of, and comfortable with, their involvement in the art-making process.
In his oil-on-canvas works, the figures are set within the intimate confines of a personal space – a warm, secure environment. The women are in comfortable chairs in living rooms, at ease and in repose, but often look directly back at the viewer. Neither erotic objects nor purely decorative bodies, the women depicted project personality and presence, suggesting a collaborative relationship with the painter.
In contrast to the richness of detail in the paintings, Mack’s drawings demonstrate a spareness and fluidity, rendering the human form with a minimum of confident gestures. In his oilstick-on-vellum works, especially, the female form becomes a celebratory and dynamic icon.
While the whole notion of men observing women in art has in recent decades been fraught with much animated debate, these two male artists manage to approach the subject matter with sensitivity and thoughtfulness. Both mature artists accomplished in their craft, they have also found new ways to reflect contemporary values and esthetics. |
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