Show opening at Kehler Liddell on Sunday

Kehler Liddell Gallery
873 Whalley Ave., New Haven, (203) 389-9555
Overtones Undertones: Blinn Jacobs & Marjorie Wolfe
Through Dec. 6, 2009
Artists' Reception: Sun., Nov. 8, 3—6 p.m.
Artists' Talk: Sun., Nov. 15, 2:30 p.m.

Press release

Tone, transparency, texture, color, geometry—these are apparent elements in the paintings of Blinn Jacobs and photographs of Marjorie Wolfe.

Blinn Jacobs' monochromatic surfaces are overtones of color that give way to undertones of barely visible incised lines. Whether a single work or presented in series, the colors and lines reverberate. There is both depth and delicacy to this tension of color and line. This exhibit features a new square painting series that builds off earlier honeycomb cardboard "drawings." In the cardboard works, the surface reveals the properties inherent in the material, while in her paintings the linear structure is wholly created.

Jacob's began this series during a fellowship at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts in the spring of 2009, her 5th residency, and notes she has gone each time with a concept in mind yet is always influenced by the surrounding seasonal landscape.

Marjorie Wolfe presents several groupings of photographs. Prominent are her greenhouses, a subject Wolfe has been working with for over 15 years. The newest compositions in this series include multiple images within a frame, a reconfiguration of many sites. Overtones of mystery and curiosity permeate as the greenhouse materials become an unrecognizable, abstract subject.

Other groupings continue to play off multiples and comprise a variety of objects with an emphasis on similarity of shapes, colors and subjects such as manhole covers, trees, or built structures.

Wolfe's photographs share a formalistic compositional coherence. It is evidence of her studied and deliberate—yet slightly skewed—view of the world. Overtones and undertones happen simultaneously as her photographs move near and far, sharp then out of focus, abstract to the familiar.

The resulting Overtones Undertones exhibition is a quietly intellectual and vividly visual continuum from both artists, expressing their specific and unique interests in repetition, abstraction, and inspiration.

There will be an artists' reception this Sun., Nov. 8, from 3—6 p.m. and an artists' talk the following Sun., Nov. 15, at 2:30 p.m.