Painting show opens at Kehler Liddell Thursday, artist talk on Sunday

Kehler Liddell Gallery
873 Whalley Ave., New Haven, (203) 389-9555
Affinities: Joseph Adolphe & Amy Browning
Oct. 1—Nov. 1, 2009
Artists' Talk: Sun., Oct. 4, 2:30 p.m.
Artists' Reception: Sun., Oct. 11, 3—6 p.m.

Press release

Affinities is a title born out of the artists' discussion of the work they love and a shared affinity for subject, material, and the endless motivations to paint.

Joseph Adolphe's paintings and drawings are primarily narrative. His subjects are his people, places, and icons. In the exquisite draughtsmanship, color, and hand, the viewer shares Adolphe's sense of spiritual presence within the physical realities of an image. Central to this exhibit is a series of black and white drawings. They are an expression of his desire for a "hands-on" immediacy through the favored medium of charcoal. Adolphe describes his artwork as existing each image for itself, and also as "pieces of a psychological self-portrait midway in its development."

Amy Browning's paintings are often identified as impressionist or abstract. The rich textural surfaces and explorations of color and shape are clearly landscape or subject informed, with a gently compelling uncertainty of the specific object or place. Perhaps that is due to her affinity for asking questions. "What if" peppers her process visually and intellectually. "What if I could Google from Hubble, an extreme distance, to the beautiful islands I contemplate everyday?" or "What if the typical 16th century view of a landscape from a small window in the context of a large indoor space were given a collapsed perspective?" Browning's search for the unseen and unexpected landscape is a private labyrinth that drives her to paint.

One of the easiest affinities to spot at this is exhibit: it is a painter's show with mutual respect, unique thought-filled processes, and evidence from both of the articulate and accomplished painters' hand.

The Kehler Liddell Gallery will be open this weekend as part City-Wide Open Studios. There will be an artists' talk on Sun., Oct. 4, at 2:30 p.m. The artists' reception for this show will be held the following Sunday, Oct. 11, from 3—6 p.m.