FEBRUARY 01 - MARCH 31, 2004
Recent Paintings
Robert
GAL-024-OC
The penetrating, psychological portraiture of artist Ann Gale is on exhibit at Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco, CA, February 5 – March 27, 2004. A full-color, illustrated catalogue with essay by Bruce Nixon accompanies the exhibition.
In her most recent work, Gale continues to focus on the psychology and sexuality of the sitter, using light, fragmented brushwork, and color to illuminate or hide these traits. New interests, however, have emerged. This new series reveals Gale’s increased proximity to her subjects and a growing emphasis on the importance of light, both formally and metaphorically.
In Gale’s paintings, the light in the room acts almost as a physical presence, much as in the late paintings of Goya, where light becomes a character itself. The quality of light in her work has evolved; in the latest paintings, the light is a dim, cool tone, a color that may be drawn from memory and not the day-to-day environment of what she sees.
The subjects of Gale’s paintings function like muses. In fact, she does not consider her paintings to be portraits in the traditional sense. Instead the paintings are situational, depicting the ongoing exchange between the sitter and the painter—an exchange that is as much about process as it is about psychology. In the words of essayist Bruce Nixon, "Gale uses the painting process to probe the experiential nature of visuality and its limits."
Gale’s process is complex and rigorous. Sessions with her subjects last for three hours at a stretch, and an entire painting can take up to a year to complete. Over time, the emotional and physical demands of the model yield a fragmentation of the figure that appears to take place before our eyes. A sense of isolation and existential anxiety surrounds the sitters, heightening the tension between model and artist.
Similarly, Gale's use of what could be called non-colors contributes to the tense neutrality rendered in the paintings. While observing her subjects, Gale often associates them with a particular “color environment” that prevents the intrusion of narrative and further fragments the surrounding space, allowing it to simultaneously recede and intrude upon the sitter.
Interest and awareness of Gale’s work continues to rise. She was recently featured on the PBS arts and entertainment show, "The Egg” in a segment on “Inspiration.” Excerpts from that interview can be viewed online at http://www.pbs.org/wnet/egg/307/gale/index.html.
Ann Gale received her BFA from the Rhode Island College, Providence, RI and her MFA from Yale University, New Haven, CT in 1991. In 1996, she was awarded a WESTAF/NEA Fellowship.
She is currently Assistant Professor at the School of Art at University of Washington, Seattle, WA. This is her second solo exhibition with Hackett-Freedman Gallery.