COOL ART IN HOT WEATHER: PORTLAND IN
JULY
NANCE PARKER: REPOSE AND RENEW
JEFF BADGER: NEW WORK
On view at the Hay Gallery in Portland, Maine
From July 1 to July 27, 2003
FAIRFIELD PORTER: A LIFE IN ART, 1907 –
1975
On view at the Portland Museum of Art in Portland, Maine
From June 19 to September 7, 2003
EDWARD WESTON: LIFE WORK
On view at the Portland Museum of Art in Portland, Maine
From June 28 to October 19, 2003
Reviewed by Laurie Meunier Graves
In Maine, when the weather is hot and steamy and the days are long, thoughts
quite naturally turn to the seaside. Sandy beaches, rocky shores, the sweet
smell of wild roses, and the shimmering of the water in the sun are nearly
irresistible. Yet there are other pleasures to be had in Maine in the
summer, and one of them is to visit the many fine art galleries and museums.
To me, it is soothing to walk into an art museum or gallery on a sweltering
day. They are always cool and usually quiet, a welcome respite from the
frantic pace that short summers inevitably bring.
In Portland, one of the most exciting galleries is the Hay Gallery. Located
on the top floor of a building that is shaped like a wedge of pie dividing
Congress Street and Free Street, the Hay Gallery shows art that is
consistently dynamic and engaging. The space, while airy and attractive, is
not large, but the art is never crowded, and the presentation is museum
quality.
In the first room, which is the largest, is a display of Nance Parker’s big,
vibrant paintings of women reclining, women sitting, women resting. Their
calm faces provide a striking contrast to the bold colors—energy paired with
serenity. Interestingly enough, these women are not skinny little women who
wouldn’t dream of touching a bagel because of “all of the carbs.” These
dark-haired women have substance and presence.
Ms. Parker’s paintings, which feature a single woman in each picture, have
an inward feel. Some of the women are indoors, some are outdoors, but they
are all facing away from the landscape. Many are drinking something—wine,
perhaps—and they look as though they are snatching a few minutes to rest in
between the many jobs that modern women must juggle—home, family, and
outside work. I know how they feel, and as I went around the room, looking
at the paintings, I was tempted to walk on tiptoes so that I wouldn’t
disturb these women.
For a complete change of pace, in another room, there are Jeff Badger’s
paintings, which have a cartoonish, Tim Burton look. The colors are both
bright and dark, and the subjects are various creatures doing different
things. Sometimes the creatures are worms; others look like goofy little
monsters with giant teeth, which figure prominently in many of the
paintings. I think it is these giant, clenched white teeth that give these
antic pictures an air of menace and danger. In Through the Canes at
Midnight, even the candy has oversized teeth. In Cheers, a
vaguely humanoid figure with a square head holds a huge mug. Again, there
are those teeth! Some of the worms have teeth, and even the bowling pins
have teeth (art with a bite?).
In a gallery handout, Mr. Badger writes “The paintings are set up as
allegorical narratives. The subject of the narrative varies, but is always
centered around the human experience: fear, ice cream, parties,
communication, war, and mankind’s uneasy grasp on technology and morality.”
A perfect illustration of this is Love Under Difficulties. Two
heads—with giant teeth, of course—sit on what looks like two piles of
garbage separated by a great divide. The heads, each with a heart hovering
above them, yearn for each other but can’t quite seem to bridge the gap. In
the background, dark buildings loom, and the sky is blood red.
As I left the gallery, I couldn’t help but think that Mr. Badger’s paintings
remind me of uneasy dreams, both waking and asleep, that are never really
forgotten and hover on the edge of consciousness.
Across the street from Hay Gallery, and in the summer, separated by a
corridor of humid air, is the Portland Museum of Art. Right now, there are
two very different exhibits that focus on the artist and his work—one of
Fairfield Porter, a twentieth-century painter, and one of Edward Weston, a
twentieth-century photographer.
Fairfield Porter’s work is on the main floor, and this comprehensive exhibit
includes not only paintings but also biographical details and photographs as
well as excerpts from thoughtful and well-written essays he wrote for
various publications. I learned that Mr. Porter came from a wealthy family,
went to Harvard, married a poet, wrote poetry and art criticism, and lived
in Maine (at least part of the year) on Great Spruce Head Island.
I was particularly impressed by Mr. Porter’s writing, especially by
“Artistic understanding comes from confidence in one’s intuition.” I was so
impressed, in fact, that I would very much like to read more of what he
wrote.
I only wish I could admire Mr. Porter’s paintings as much as I do his
intellect and writing. While his paintings have a tranquil, muted palate and
a pleasing emphasis on domestic life—dogs, houses, family—I found that I
really couldn’t like them. Somehow, they have the soft blur of
impressionism, but they lack the vitality and luminosity that come with the
best of that style of painting. In short, his pictures, while soothing, are
a little dull. For me, art needs an edge, a depth, which I just don’t see in
his work.
On the other hand, Edward Weston’s photographs couldn’t be more different.
They have a snap and an energy and a focus that is completely riveting. His
small, exquisite, black and white pictures find patterns and structure in
the ordinary. There seems to be a preoccupation with shapes, and in many of
the pictures, Mr. Weston photographed his subjects at such a close range
that they are barely recognizable.
This is especially true with his still-life studies of vegetables and
seashells as well as his studies of the female nude. In some of the
pictures, the breasts hardly look like breasts, and the peppers hardly look
like peppers. In fact, some of the peppers look like nudes, and some of the
nudes look like peppers. In others, there’s more distance and what is being
photographed is clearer. However, to me, the extreme closeness is
fascinating; it illustrates how little we see what is near to us.
His landscapes are less close, but they still have a beautiful precision and
focus. This is true whether it’s with the twisted trees in Cypress Grove,
Point Lobos or with the foam of waves of Surf on Black Sand, Point
Lobos. Mr. Weston’s landscapes do not have the symphonic grandeur of
Ansel Adams’s photographs; rather they are more like a string quartet.
There were also some fascinating portraits of famous artists and writers:
the austere D. H. Lawrence, a Falstaffian Diego Rivera, an intense José
Orozco, and a gaunt Robinson Jeffers. Like most of the other photographs in
this exhibition, they are sharp and gleaming.
However, there are a few exceptions. His early work, which was done at the
beginning of the twentieth century, has the lush, fuzzy-edged romantic look
of the times, and it has not aged well. (In general, the early 1900s were not
a happy time for photography.)
Today, this style seems faintly ridiculous. There are two nudes (one is his
three-year-old son), and they are cloying and somehow even irritating in
their softness. These photographs are quite different from his later work,
and I can only be glad that the style changed and that his work moved in a
different direction.
However, move on Mr. Weston did. This exhibition shows the “forty-year
trajectory” of a talented photographer whose work was tight and close, and
Mr. Weston’s pictures remind us that there can be beauty in precision and
smallness.
All in all, a very good way to spend a sultry July afternoon.
