art crit: Mary C. Lee

Friday, January 19, 2007

Mary C. Lee

Title: "Mountain Spirit"
Medium: Mixed Media on Canvas
Dimensions: 16"x20"
Date: 2006

1 comments:

Dean said...: When I first saw this piece, it had a Francis Bacon feel, but I can't seem to pin it down. I was drawn to the mixed media and use of collage.

When zooming in on the piece, I find the part that reads like an interior intriguing as I see it in space as the rest of the work appears flat in comparison. It's like a ant colony. Also, having recently seen Anslem Kiefer's retrospective, symbolism comes to mind as fire constitutes a hefty portion of his visual vocabulary.

Another thing that comes to mind is some of the issues touched upon in Dorian's post. Here, the idea seems more appropriately thought of as under vs over worked. Some passages have a preliminary feel. As I've mentioned before my education in painting had an emphasis on the mark and being direct with the marks. The mark was thought of as a way of visually abbreviating an observation in a configuration of abstractions.

So bringing that mindset here, I don’t have the impulse to be critical of works because of the limited usage of marks. I like some passages like the stripe of colors that pours down below the man on the mountain. When clicking on the image and zooming in, there are some beautiful subtle variations in color reminiscent of a Clyfford Still painting. Other passages feel preliminary as I said above as if they were initial outlines that haven’t been revisited.

Not sure if this is too helpful, these are my reactions.

Thanks for posting again here Mary, it's always nice to have you contribute to the site.; 9:24 PM

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