UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS: TWO EXHIBITS AT BATES COLLEGE

WILLIAM MANNING
WORKS ON PAPER 1961-2002
On view at Bates College Museum of Art, Olin Arts Center in Lewiston, Maine
From January 10 to March 21, 2003

GEORGE PLATT LYNES
STUDIO PHOTOGRAPHS OF MARSDEN HARTLEY
On view at Bates College Museum of Art, Olin arts Center in Lewiston, Maine
From January 10 to February 28, 2003

Right now, at Bates College, there are two art exhibits that couldn’t be more different. One is bold and abstract. The other is moody and specific. One is upstairs, and its deep, vivid colors immediately grab the viewer. The other is downstairs, tucked in back in a small space, and it almost seems as though it is hidden. The placement of these two exhibits is appropriate, symbolic, and deceptive.

Upstairs, for all to see, are the works on paper of William Manning. Some of the pictures are acrylics and collage, and these big, abstract pieces, many of which are done in tones of red, black, and gray, have energy and motion. The viewer becomes immersed in the colors and the lines and the patterns.

There are also some abstract pieces done in pencil, watercolor, crayon, and ink, but they seem pallid in comparison with the acrylics and collage. With their muted colors, the energy is missing.

However, there are some charcoal landscapes that are very good. While they don’t have the pizzazz of the collages, they are lovely and delicate and show that the artist has a broad range. He has caught the trees and the hills with a wonderful fluid motion.

Still, in the end, what dominated this exhibit were the vibrant collages. They caught my attention and appealed to my senses in an almost primary way, like a memory or glimpse from childhood before I learned to talk. There were no ideas, no stories, just color and form.

Downstairs it is quite another matter. Way in the back, there is a series of photographs taken by George Platt Lynes of the artist Marsden Hartley. They are gray and somber, and Mr. Lynes has caught Marsden Hartley with nary a smile. They are repeated portraits of an artist as a brooding, old man.

Sometimes Mr. Hartley sits; other times he stands. Sometimes he looks at the camera; other times he’s in profile. Often, his own large shadow looms in the back and almost seems to hover over him. In others, there are one or two dark, out-of-focus men off to one side.

There are close-ups of Mr. Hartley in a director’s chair, and he looks large and big boned and not quite comfortable with himself. In one of them, he is holding a cigarette, and ashes have fallen on the floor. Somehow, this perfectly captures the sad feeling of the pictures.

In the last few photographs, Mr. Hartley is no longer sitting, and he looks stronger, more sure of himself. Standing, he has on his coat, and he is carrying his hat and umbrella. Then, he has put on his hat. In the very last one, he has turned. The artist is leaving.

Taken together, these fine photographs give us a symbolic narrative of an older artist’s life. We can piece together a story, and it hardly matters if we don’t know the exact details. We have the tone and the mood, and that is all we need. Our imaginations will supply the rest.

At first glance, the upstairs exhibit with its vivid colors seems flashier and more compelling than the gray one downstairs. It would appear to be a clear case of the extravert trumping the introvert. And yet what stayed with me was not so much Mr. Manning’s bold, abstract work, but rather Mr. Lynes’s more introspective photographs. Sometimes, just sometimes, the introvert sneaks in and wins after all. 
 

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