Karl A. Meyer/Suzanne BocanegraKarl A. Meyer's canvases infuse the molten fires of the earth's innermost core with the brooding poetry of the young man's romantic passion. This fervent communication between the most physical of processes, the earth's furnace, and the sweeping romantic obsessions, results in highly charged pieces that match uncontainable energy with the artist's sensual refinements. His most recent pieces are huge curved wood blocks for which he uses the stark visual vocabulary emerging from primal intimate sources. He recognizes instincts as the shamans did. He shapes the raw power of his totemic figures and symbols to draw out the forgotten secrets of our primal being and to address the links to spiritual shapers. They're illustrations of tribal forces. Faced with the problem of making art on a recent trip to Europe, Suzanne Bocanegra began making very small pieces that could be easily carried with her. These pieces celebrate the minutest refinements and refocus our attention to the grandiose possibilities of the small scale. These miniatures explore with the concentrated energy inherent in a delicate arrangement of such diverse and embellished materials. Each is a microcosmic examination. With scale so altered, our sensibilities are rearranged. The alteration is pleasurable as the pieces deliver a range of suggestions—from masks for the village initiator to jazzed-up botanical echoes to signs of interstellar navigation. In some works, the soft tones stop you, slightly hypnotic in their tranquility and depth. The forceful, etched-like rendering of other pieces is pleasing in the firm balance of precise and delicate components. (Press Release) |