Contemporary exhibit showcases the range of Georgia's artists

Philip Morsberger (American, b. 1933), First Steps, 1999-2005, Oil on canvas, 59 inches by 44 inches. Courtesy of the artist

Corinne Colarusso (American, b. 1952), Swamp Field, Late October, 2008, Acrylic on canvas, 78 inches by 66 inches. Courtesy of the artist

Rocio Rodriguez (American, born Cuba, 1952)The Round City, Baghdad, 2007Oil on canvas72 x 120 inchesCourtesy of the artist

By Allison Hersh

When Atlanta painter Corinne Colarusso was first approached to guest curate an exhibit devoted to contemporary painting in Georgia, she decided to turn to her peers for suggestions.

She asked two fellow artists whose work she admired for suggestions about their favorite painters working in Georgia. Then, she took their lists and asked those artists for recommendations about other talented Peach State painters. Colarusso ultimately narrowed a list of 25 artists to 11.

"I wanted to do a painting show that would identify people who have contributed to the creative vitality of the state," she said. "I thought it would be interesting to see a show which features a dialogue and a conversation about art and to see where that leads us."

The end result is "Painters' Reel: Contemporary Painting in Georgia," a lively, inspired exhibit that recently opened at the Telfair's Jepson Center for the Arts, showcasing talent by top contemporary painters from across the state. Organized by the Museum of Arts and Sciences in Macon , the exhibit includes work by two Savannah artists, Betsy Cain and Marcus Kenney, as well as painters based in Atlanta, Augusta and Athens.

"The work is strong, varied and intensely personal," Colarusso said. "The paintings really communicate with one another."

 

No single theme

Cheryl Goldsleger's dense, abstracted wax and resin compositions, with their canopied spaces and strong sense of order, and Tom Nakashima's "Monument to a Dying Planet," with its dark mood of post-apocalyptic regret, hint at the range of media and subjects explored in "Painters' Reel."

No single theme runs through the work on display. Instead, the paintings offer multi-faceted reflections on the topics, issues, media and modes of representation that fascinate artists working in Georgia today.

"We have a vital and healthy painting scene in Georgia," said Holly Koons McCullough, the Telfair Museum of Art's director of collections and exhibitions. "This exhibit represents the diversity of approaches to painting in our state. We have totally abstract pieces and large-scale figurative narratives."

Wide, muscular brush strokes animate Betsy Cain's large-format abstract paintings, like "Isle of Elongation #1." In this Wilmington Island artist's compositions, restless brush strokes seem to take the viewer on an emotional journey that transcends time and language.

Atlanta artist Don Cooper takes abstraction to an even higher spiritual level in his colorful geometric paintings, which recall the shape of the human iris as concentric circles radiate from a central point. "This Moment As It Is" and "A Connection to the Whole" offer stark, elementary meditations on form and color, stripping painting to its bare essentials and, in so doing, elevating the act of applying oil to canvas to a Rothko-esque spiritual endeavor.

On the opposite end of the representational spectrum, Atlanta artist Stefanie Jackson invokes narrative painting to tell stories about lives literally hanging in the balance in the wake of Hurricane Katrina's devastation. The hopelessness glimpsed in the faces of a sullen family navigating a storm-swollen river in a tiny wooden skiff in "Black Maria" serves as a sobering reminder of how the sting of loss can be soothed by the power of love.

For each of these artists, painting offers a forum to bear witness to, reflect upon and ultimately change the world around us. Through these insightful, often provocative compositions, the viewer understands his or her own power to shape reality, just as a painter might apply an extra brush stroke to an unfinished canvas.

"In painting, the world is a malleable place," said Colarusso. "Countless choices are made and unmade every day in the studio."

IF YOU GO
What: "Painters' Reel: Contemporary Painting in Georgia"
When: Through May 17
Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday; 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Thursday; noon - 5 p.m. Sunday
Admission: Free to Telfair members; $15 for adults; $14 for seniors and AAA members; $5 for students; Free for children under 5
Where: Jepson Center for the Arts, 207 W. York St.
For more information: 790-8800 or www.telfair.org