book art – MATTHEWS GALLERY BLOG

The selection process for our social media-curated show COLLECTOR’S CHOICE is underway, and fans on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr and other networks have placed their votes. It’s time for some tie breakers on WordPress! Check out the match-ups below and vote for your favorites in the comments section. From January 31 to February 5, we’ll unveil your selections in the gallery and online.

JAMIE CHASE

ROUND 1! Jamie Chase is known for his figurative work like image #1, and also his abstracted landscapes like #2. Which one should appear in the show? Take the curatorial reins!

WILLIAM LUMPKINS

Do you prefer William Lumpkins‘ careful watercolor brushstrokes (#1) or experimental wild felt-tip pen marks (#2)? Read more about the influential Santa Fe modernist here before you decide…

KATE RIVERS

Curate this! Should we feature a Kate Rivers book collage in the show, or one of her nests? Read about her mixed media work in this blog post, and vote for #1 or #2 in the comments.

HANNAH HOLLIDAY STEWART

These tall, spindly bronzes might be very different, but they’re both by powerhouse feminist sculptor Hannah Holliday Stewart. Figurative or abstract? Curate that!

PAUL GAUGUIN

Two Tahitian myths inspired these woodblock prints by Paul Gauguin. Which do you prefer? Read about them in this blog post, and vote now!

Thanks for participating in COLLECTOR’S CHOICE! To place your vote on other social networks, connect with us through the links on our About Page.

For our NEW HORIZONS: Focus on Landscapes show, running now through October 27, Tesuque sculptor Frank Morbillo‘s latest body of work engages with our diverse collection of contemporary landscape art. Throughout the exhibition, you’ll find observations by Morbillo and seven other artists, many of whom are inspired by the same severe desert expanses and infinite skies. Below is a selection of works and quotes from the show:

PATTERN

Frank Morbillo finds patterns wherever he looks in the natural world.
Kate Rivers uses manufactured patterns to form fractured reflections of nature.

“What’s a pattern? Something that might be predictable. When I observe things, that’s what I see. As an artist, you take all of these different things and see how they work together.”

-Frank Morbillo

“I’m using this history of text and image as something that is beautiful, and weaving the words together.”

-Kate Rivers

RHYTHM

David Grossmann abstracts his landscapes to lay bare underlying rhythms.
Frank Morbillo traces the formation and disruption of natural rhythms.

“My paintings… are simplified rhythms of color, light, and shape. On the surface they are quiet whispers, but I hope that they convey a depth of emotion to anyone who takes the time to stop and listen.”

-David Grossmann

“Entropy is the introduction of chaos and disorder. That’s a root of what I’ve done over the years. You take something that could be highly organized, and understand that everything, all things, are subject to entropy. As much as we feel like we’ve created something that defies that, there’s no chance. Everything is subject to it.”

-Frank Morbillo

TEXTURE

Terry Craig blends materials to mimic natural textures.
Frank Morbillo places materials with contrasting textures side-by-side.

“It took a long time… to develop the formulas and get the materials to do what I wanted them to do. You can scrape into it and get all sorts of these wonderful organic qualities.”
-Terry Craig

“Glass is a beautiful material that sets up this nice contrast with the metal. If you add texture to it, it takes on a different color. The light behaves differently going through it.”
-Frank Morbillo

COLOR

Jamie Chase uses multiple layers of paint to reveal and obscure different hues.
Frank Morbillo relies on the properties of glass to enhance his palette.

“There are so many narratives underneath the final painting. It starts out as something really dark or really dramatic in contrasting colors, and by the end it’s almost neutral colors, but there’s something moving under the surface.”
-Jamie Chase

“The glass introduced color into the work that really isn’t achievable in metal. The cobalt blues and reds and ambers have a quality that you can’t get with any of the metals.”
-Frank Morbillo

See NEW HORIZONS: Focus on Landscapes now through October 27 at Matthews Gallery. Connect with us on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest to see more material from the show.