A BETTER WORLD / Opening Reception at The Majestic Nov. 8th

A BETTER WORLD press release by Enrico Gomez

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New York based contemporary artist Deborah Freedman offers works from her newest series A Better World, which foreground the tumultuous drama and abstract order ever-present within the confines of our natural surround. These oil on canvas paintings are recognizable as segments of larger, sweeping landscapes and triumphant vistas.  A sea-green mass swells and falls here, a foamy spray of paint crashes and cuts along the picture edge there, or an enigmatic lagoon shimmers quietly below the horizon. These images are taken from direct observation of the Catskill Mountain Range that rings the artist’s upstate New York home and studio. There is reconciliation here between the often disparate influences of planning and chance. In formal resolutions produced along painterly lines, the works within A Better World evince “the environment” as both subject and context, both the figure and its frame.

Straddling the line between the strategies of representation and abstraction, the works of Deborah Freedman are compelling examples of each. Compositional tension and formal arrangements of shape and color give these works a considered balance, a sense of agreement amongst the variable visual components that is unusual in its completeness. These paintings, as exercises in material and decision, are whole unto themselves with ocular results that are impactful and evocative. The lingering emotional resonance of these works adheres closely to many of the artist’s long-held concerns, which include human intervention and disturbance within the eco-sphere, environmental shifts within the larger planetary system, the ability of the landscape to hold aspects of our collective psyche and the theory of dependent origination between all species of flora and fauna, to name only a few.

Shares Freedman on her new works, “The series A Better World began in response to tragic episodes of gun violence in California and the horrific terrorist episode in Marseilles in July 2016. My impulse was to create images of the world as it could be – optimistic, serene, harmonious, and hopeful. This was painting as protest. Painting as wish fulfillment. Painting as persistence. As the series unfolded the work evolved from a utopian “better” to images of harmony that is difficult to maintain - as if everything we know is slipping away. A year into the series my husband suddenly passed away, adding to my sense of uncertainty. He would want me to continue the task of describing both yearning and chaos.”

While the subject matter of landscape has been a vehicle of expression for artists intermittently throughout the ages, Deborah Freedman brings a unique blend of formal acuity and deftness of arbitration to the creation of these works. Writes Stewart Waltzer of Artnet about the paintings of Deborah Freedman: “If you or I look at a landscape there are the colors and the contours of the land; there is the endless depth of the sky and its reflection on the land before us. We are looking, but you cannot see what you cannot see. Imagine how much harder is it for an artist to organize a landscape, using its color, its shapes, its clarity, its evocative power, i.e. the loneliness of an empty lake or a shore pounded in surf, to transcend the plain topography and make it something that moves us without any apparent reason each time we look at this painting. And it has no verbal correlation. We are captured; it is a feeling without a context. That really is the essence of art. It is valuable without being “precious”; its value is synonymous with its accomplishment. Here, we have someone who has worked long and deeply in the field and whose accomplishment is evident in the pleasure it brings us.”

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Curated by Enrico Gomez, enricogomez.com and thedoradoproject.com 

Image: Deborah Freedman, A Better World #1. 2017, oil on canvas, 30 x 30 inches.

Image courtesy of Deborah Freedman www.deborahfreedman.com

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PARIS ATELIER with John Wellington

So enjoyed Paris Atelier with John Wellington, June 19 - 23rd. Painted at Luxembourg Gardens, Musee Jean-Jacques Henner, Fragonard at the Petit Palais, the Rodin Museum, and the Musee de L'Art Moderne - where there was a fabulous Derain, Balthus and Giacometti exhibit. I drew a Derain bacchanal. 

We also visited Giverny, where it was too hot to draw, and the picture of me in the garden is the home of Delacroix off the Rue Jacob, which I visit every time I go to Paris. 

Pictured with John Wellington, Iveline Lau, Christine Beck, and Shellie Warren

Giverny

NATURE / NURTURE in Roll Magazine

Claire Lambe writes about NATURE/NURTURE: Paintings by Deborah Freedman and Jennifer Hicks in her Roll Magazine write-up, "Spring Awakening," on Hudson Valley art events. 

Deborah Freedman, “A Better World,” 2017, oil on canvas, 12” x 24”

Deborah Freedman, “A Better World,” 2017, oil on canvas, 12” x 24”

Lambe writes: 

Also in Saugerties, Nature/Nurture: Paintings by Deborah Freedman and Jennifer Hicks opened on April 1 at Cross Contemporary Art (81 Partition Street) in advance of CCA’s consolidation into a larger space at 99 Partition Street in May. Freedman and Hicks’ bodies of work explore the rhythm and movement of nature, the natural fluctuations and shifts of the forest at night or distilling cosmic patterns onto canvas. Jennifer Hicks’ career as a performance artist informs her work as a painter, which addresses the mysterious presences that arise in a forest at twilight. Deborah Freedman, whose work can be found in such collections as The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The New York Public Library, and the Library of Congress, captures the larger impressions and the ephemera of the natural world with commanding brushwork and color.

Read the full article SPRING AWAKENING HERE,

And check out the Facebook Event page for NATURE/NURTURE HERE. 

River Woman: March 18 - April 30th at Odetta Gallery

GIVEN MELODY  24, 23, 20,18     20 x 10” ea. Oil on Paper

GIVEN MELODY  24, 23, 20,18     20 x 10” ea. Oil on Paper

River Woman

March 18 - April 30, 2017

Opening Reception: Saturday March 18, 6 - 8PM

Flat File Featured Artists

Deborah Freedman and Caetlynn Booth

http://www.odettagallery.com

DEBORAH FREEDMAN at Cross Contemporary April 1-30

Nature/Nurture: Paintings by Deborah Freedman and Jennifer Hicks opens Sat. April 1, 5-8pm at Cross Contemporary Art 81 Partition Street Saugerties, NY

Deborah Freedman's art is committed to exploring the rhythm of nature and capturing the fluctuations of its constantly changing space. Her paintings, drawings and printmaking find both the large cosmic patterns as well as the ephemeral fleeting moments with commanding brushwork and profound color. Ms. Freedman's landscape work is described by Stewart Waltzer, an analyst of Impressionist auctions for ARTnet, as  "... as an anatomy lesson ...conflated with human form. Landscape which holds the promise of physical pleasure. The abstraction holds the emotional content. If it sounds simplistic, imagine trying to organize a coherent vision of something that does not exist. It mixes the personal with the impersonal, landscape in the guise of familiarity.”. Ms. Freedman's work is in many important collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The New York Public Library, Rutgers University, The Department of State, the Library of Congress, IPCNY,The Hess Collection, CITI, Morgan Guarantee Trust, and Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital.

Jennifer Hicks has a distinctive career as a movement, performance and installation artist as well as being a painter. Her painting is as informed by her work in dance as it is by her direct experience with pigments, paper and canvas. Her paintings reflect the mysterious presences that emerge from the forest as the evening transcends into dusk. Ms. Hicks' versatility in different media is determined by the needs of her artwork and she is comfortable being at once the object, subject and conduit for this expression. A long-time member of Mobius Artist Group, Jennifer Hicks has received her MFA from Naropa University in Contemporary Performance, her BFA from Tufts University and Degree in Fine Arts from The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, in Boston.  Jennifer won the prestigious Traveling Scholars Award from the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, participated as a guest artist at Artisterium VI in Tbilisi, Georgia and is an alumna of Franklin Furnace in NYC. Her latest project is the establishment of 11 Jane, an art studio, workshop, gallery and performance space in Saugerties,NY.