Patrick Connors at Gross McCleaf Gallery

In the mid 1970's I met Patrick Connors at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, when he was a student and I was a young playwright and poet. His canvas, as I remember, was given to vague imaginary beginnings that had atmosphere and spirit in them, and a sublime feeling. He was, I felt, a romantic in the modern age.

As this exceptional show demonstrates, Patrick has since evolved to indeed become a new American Romantic.

Patrick's gift is devoted to the Philadelphia landscape, as George Inness was at first uniquely motivated by Montclair, NJ.

If you want to revel in the unique feelings of this romantic city that invented Independence and the Constitution, the rights of man and a devotion to learning, the life of economies and the life of the soul, you should check into the vision of this artist.

More is meditated on in this show than you will find at most galleries. There is a series of larger paintings that center on Laurel Hill Cemetery,  one in particular like an Arnold Bocklin, but also showing some debt to Daniel Garber's quarry paintings in its composition. These are not lessons in influence taken for technical reasons, but in the drive to evoke our native mystery of nature and civilization.

And then there are the small paintings that arise like transcendent moments of twilight over the Schuylkill River. These are some of the most affecting views I have seen of this lovely river's spirit. If you look at these paintings, you can feel why it is good to live here, and how much this region offers the sustenance of the soul.

Patrick Connors
Reveries
April 5-28, 2017
At Gross McCleaf Gallery, Philadelphia

Leigh Werrell, Bettina Nelson and Mary Putman at Gross McCleaf Gallery



Beware the Bear, by Leigh Werrell



Leigh Werrell's paintings and Bettina Nelson's collages share the show's title of "A Likely Story," one of those clever word plays that has an ironic as well as earnest reading. Likely stories abound, and the seeking is a large part of the fun. It is why I write these occasional blog reviews.

Leigh Werrell's paintings include gouaches that notice life in the sense of environments peopled with explorers. People are simple, and the world is complex, you might think at first, while looking at these charming works. The paintings seem apropos our time and human experience. The charm is a little like the charm of Sarah McEneaney or Katherine Bradford.
 
One of the overlooked compositional schemes is that of cave paintings. Using a naturally occurring architecture of surprise turns and mysterious peril, those artists long ago made early installations. The caves were ready museums devoted to exploration and surprise discoveries, even the sort one makes in dreams. So it can seem that our era has revived installation, while also inspiring some new idea in the painter's notion of composition.
 
Leigh Werrell's paintings authentically and originally trace the adventure of youth in a new world, something art refreshes in us, but here really lets us notice and feel delight in. Her paintings may arise from that milieu of installations as well as the sense of a world filled with discoveries and discoveries to come.

Bettina Nelson uses the process of discovered things in her beautiful, small collage pieces. They achieve enough imagery that the mood can be assigned to both subject and means as an abstract expression.

The gallery itself is one of the more complex art spaces in the city of Philadelphia. The visitor ascends from street level up a central stairway. The furthest of the galleries repeats the strong classical aspect of that first ascent by the powerful one point perspective paintings of Mary Putman.  The way there meanders in a route of discoveries. Even the racks in another gallery upstairs from this add to the exploratory excitement of a visit. This architecture helps choose the work, and it is an interesting journey of contrasting and complimentary exhibits.
 

For information and the gallery's complete show http://www.grossmccleaf.com/currentexhibition.html

Civilized Discourse

Giovanni Casadei, One Stem, oil on panel, 7 x 9 in.

There is a light to civilization as well as a darkness. We forget in our critique of empires that what they protect and preserve comes from a sense of the good life.

Giovanni Casadei's beautiful still lives at Gross McCleaf Gallery this month benefit from the artist's sense of civilized life. His Mediterranean sense of cultivation came with him to America. Those who know him know his cooking and his craft approach to all phases of life, his tango, his communal and amicable spirit. These all gather people and friends to him, and the same warmth and passion emanate from the warm light of his paintings, like sunlight from a Florence or Sienna of the spirit.

The great change in these recent paintings come from a stronger admission of darks, of those mortal dangers in life against which he must level stronger impastos of light and color. The dynamic result is as poised and graceful as the artist, making order and calm and enjoyment the heart of life.

Douglas Martenson's landscapes in the neighboring gallery present a well chosen opposite to this. Where Martenson's world is outdoors, autumnal, and cold in temperature, Giovanni's still lives are the warmth of the home. They make a good pair of forces to consider and contemplate.

A highly recommended show.

Painting Arcadia, and Everyday Light

Through December 31, 2014

Gross McCleaf Gallery

127 S 16th St, Philadelphia, PA 19102

(215) 665-8138