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is an artist with an international reputation. With homes in and exhibits around the world. I’ve been lucky to know her for years (in past lives we've golfed together) and I’ve enjoyed many stages of her work. It was my recent good fortune to chat with show at Gallery 10 and to make some notes toward a poem. This time I interacted with gallery visitors—so different from an earlier year when I spent a rainy afternoon alone in a Putterman exhibit at University— where “Blue Ladies and Elephants” led to |
A visit to GALLERY 10 for art by Putterman (featuring NUMINOUS LEGENDS)
I look foolish in Gallery 10 sitting in a director’s chair in the middle of a room. Others walk in front of me as I jot on a pad some words that might work in a poem. These interrupters apologize—I say, No need, your blocking movement gives me space to write a word. — Someone asks, What word? I cannot say—each one I find is a small shadow fragment of the paintings on the wall.
INTERWOVEN DIALOGUES. A woman who says she is a dancer walks before me. I ask her, Tell me what you see. Her eyes go first to crimson curves—yes, I said, the scythe and the seven. And then, of course, the central fish, its nearby bird—each curving to a point, each studded with side-head eye with discrete view. Linking diverse visions is what artists do. The dark whimsy of etchings in the next room whispers images of Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear— the dancer is held by ENCOUNTER(S) AT SEA and I want to take YEAR OF THE COMET home with me— frog dog polliwog . . . girl with hat and hope and telescope . . . NUMINOUS LEGENDS grabs and holds: this painting scintillates sky-wide—sapphire, peacock, cobalt, indigo— much and many blues. My awe gives meaning to numinous: I speechless stare at beach dreamscapes in sprawl as they enfold a shark’s tooth, a rat, a lost boy. I blink and gaze again— beach balls burst into chaos of summer. Such a tangle of exuberance. Joy undone and found again in turbulence. JoAnne Growney July 2006 |
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