The paintings of Laurel Farrin encompass multiple gestures to illustrate the malleable persona of visual language. A perpetual construction and deconstruction of form create visual uncertainties in which the paradox of being and becoming is expressed. An intuitive understanding of “betweenness” lies at the heart of the work and Farrin explores these concepts by juggling the basic precepts of Painting s history: of illusionist representation and the formal emphases of abstraction. Through trompe l oeil, Farrin addresses the basic deception of painting.
She depicts an illusionistic canvas on real canvas, a doubling of the object we call a “painting “. The ground becomes a vertical field, an arena without perspective on which abstracted images improvised primarily from an inventory of modernist painting and popular culture interact. In some paintings, these typologies “press” into the field, impacting its surface and each other. In others, the forms exist on the periphery, appearing to exist in front of, or behind, the ground. The shifting hierarchy between field and figure, illusion and flatness, triggers conversations about the complications of coexistence, both cultural and personal, which extends beyond the discourse of painting to resonate with the pathos and humor of living.
Show runs through MAY 27, 2006
Hallwalls 341 Delaware Avenue
Tu-Fri 11-6
Sa 1-4