July 1 - July 14 2016

Steven Baines | Juan Pablo Echeverri | Judy Mannarino | Christopher Sousa | Forrest Williams | Rick Wrigley

Opening Reception: Friday, July 1, 6-9 pm.

Steven Baines

Laugh at My Jokes and Tell Me I'm Handsome

Steven Baines’ paintings aim to encourage an escape, to draw one in as beautiful and light, like a whimsical daydream. Eventually this light heartedness could get contradicted by deeper thought and complex emotions. The birds in the paintings can be seen as having a hard time expressing emotion, with mouths made of stiff beaks and faces under smooth feathers. This ambiguity of emotion can be relatable to us humans too, never knowing what is really in others heads or how we feel. Bubbles are a classic symbol of our ephemorality and UFOs can be seen as springboards for thought about why we are here and for what purpose like in old timey religious art. However, they are not heavy or morbid. They are optimistic and humorous, like sad, dark lyrics in a catchy lighthearted melody.

Steven Baines lives in New York City and works from his studio in Williamsburg, Brooklyn where his primary focus is on oil painting. He received his BFA in painting from The School of Visual Arts. Baines currently has a show at The Grand Central Library in NYC. He has exhibited his work at Temporary Storage Gallery, Stephen Romano Gallery, New York, White Columns, New York, Brooklyn Fireproof, Brooklyn, The South Street Seaport Museum, New York, Local Projects, Queens, Artists Space, New York, Pat Hearn Gallery, New York, Visual Arts Gallery, New York, AMP Gallery in Provincetown, and several others. He has also shown with Stephen Romano Gallery at art fairs such as The Metro Show, New York, ART Now, New York and Pulse, New York/Miami. He was recently the featured artist on BRIC and onefive4gallery, and was just chosen for Center for Maine Contemporary Art’s (CMCA) Biennial in November of 2016.

Juan Pablo Echeverri

Future Strangers

“This is a recent series having to do with the way we relate to people in social networks nowadays, and where we can construct and present ourselves to the world in a profile picture. I am interested in how we relate to thousands of strangers that we carry in our social networks, and how a new friend request from a stranger is the opportunity to be linked to them. At the same time, people we have related to in real life can disappear by deleting them from a social network, thereby turning them into total strangers.”

Juan Pablo Echeverri was born in 1978 in Bogotá, Colombia, where he lives and works. His work has taken part of several group and solo show in galleries and museums around the world, such as The Photographers´ Gallery in London, The Havana Biennal in Cuba, Itau Cultural in Sao Paulo, Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá among others. He has taken part in Residencies in England, Mexico and Brazil, and his work has been included in Publications such as Younger than Jesus Directory published by the New Museum and Phaidon in 2009. His work is part of the permanent collection of Banco de la República in Colombia and CA2M in Madrid, Spain as well as other private collections.

He was recently a Fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown.

Judy Mannarino

Saints & Sinners

“What does a masked woman, a broken clown’s nose, a bird and solidified paint strokes have in common? Except for the desire to keep myself amused and entertained, my paintings are never about just one thing. I pull from a grab bag full of emotions, psychological complications, formal and abstract constructions and ideas. I begin with a narrative that remains consistent from start to finish, unlike the physical properties of the painting which transform daily.

I continue to work on series of paintings that are engaged in the exploration of altered emotional and psychological states of women; coupled with ideas of beauty, attitude and consequence. Each painting is the product of memory, perception and shifting points of view. I combine humor and dead serious drama in these paintings. The images depict the predicament of women revealing the inner and outer results of “covering up” and “acting out” through ornaments, disguises and facial distortions, exposing vulnerability and conflict.

I am an abstract painter. I am not interested in the accurate physical representation of the figures in my work. The paintings begin with depictions of various women, I combine and juxtapose facial features and move through the construction and deconstruction of that fictitious reality. The shift is abrupt or slight and in some work hard to detect.

The paintings that I make are culled from every step I’ve taken, every sound I have heard and images I have absorbed during both waking and sleeping hours. I lug an invisible emotional tool box around and draw from it when I paint. The props included in my work have strong emotional ties to my identity as a woman. A plastic daisy button I once sewed on a sock puppet when I was a child frightened me so much I had to throw that doll away. That button returns to haunt me in the painting “Wink”.”

Judy Mannarino is the recipient of the Pollack Krasner Foundation ─ Emergency Relief Grant, the Joan Mitchell Foundation ─ Emergency Relief Grant, and a NYFA ─ Emergency Relief Grant. She currently teaches at both the School of Visual Arts, NY (1987 ─ Present) and Mary Mount Manhattan College (2005 ─ Present).

Over the years, Mannarino has exhibited her work throughout the world. Her most recent exhibitions include: 2015 “Faculty”, Mary Mount Manhattan College, NY, “Page/Pagina”, Antica Libreria Cascianelli, Rome, Italy, “The Selfie & Others”, Mary Mount Manhattan College, NY; 2014 “Misrepresentation”, Lesley Heller Workspace, New York, NY; 2014 “Spinning Fiction”, 17 Frost Gallery, Williamsburg, Brooklyn; 2014 “I’ll Be Your Mirror”, AMP, Provincetown, MA; 2012 “Faculty”, Hewitt Gallery of Art, Marymount Manhattan College, NY; 2011 “Threads Of Continuity”, Gallery Bergen, Bergen CC, Paramus, NJ; 2010 “Faculty I, Hewitt Gallery of Art, Marymount Manhattan College, NY; 2009 “Octet”, Pera Museum, Istanbul, Turkey; 2008 “Fresh”, CAM Gallery, Istanbul, Turkey; 2006 “Diversity”, Sulkin/Secant Gallery, Santa Monica, CA; 2005 a solo show at ELL Art Exchange, Los Angeles, CA; 2004 “New Work”, ELL Art Exchange, Los Angeles, CA; 2003 “The Shoe Show”, Project Room 88, NY; 2002 “New York 1998”, Terrain, San Francisco, CA; 2001 “Imaginative Liberties”, The Work Space, NY.

Mannarino's work has appeared in numerous publications, among them: Kuspit, Donald. “42nd Biennial", Artforum, February 1992, p.121; Richard, Paul. “Abstract and Personal”, The Washington Post, September 6, 1991; Gibson, Eric. “42nd Biennial of Contemporary Painting”, The Washington Times, September 6, 1991; Myles, Eileen. “New York Reviews”, Art in America, November, 1990, p. 205; Gerlach, Gunnar. “New Yorker in KX”,Hamburger Morgenpost, June 12, 1990, p. 33; Mahoney, Robert. “New York Reviews”, Arts, May 1990, p. 110; Hess, Elizabeth. “Judy Mannarino”, Village Voice, February 27, 1990, p.84; Ahrens, Klaus. “Durchblick im Labrinth Der Farben”,art, December 1986, p. 109.

Christopher Sousa

A Door Within the Fire

“My painting has always been about the face and/or figure, but most often depicting the male. My inspiration comes from people I see or meet, and a desire to investigate and document the complexities of their distinctiveness.

Recently I've become interested in exploring the male portrait beyond the conventional perceptions of masculinity. Eschewing elements of "manly" coarseness and clichéd machismo, I'm attempting instead to depict a softness and beauty traditionally associated with portraiture of the female.”

Christopher Sousa was born in Fall River, MA and has lived and worked in Provincetown, MA since 2003. His portraits and figures explore themes of isolation, alienation, longing and desire. He counts Lucien Freud, Jenny Saville, Paul Cadmus and Euan Uglow among his influences. Sousa has studied with Larry Collins and Donald Beal. He is represented by AMP in Provincetown and the Woodman/Shimko Gallery in Palm Springs, CA. He has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions at the Provincetown Art Association & Museum, A Gallery, and Larry Collins Fine Art in Provincetown, MA, The Leslie-Lohman Museum in New York, NY, The URI Feinstein Providence Campus Gallery in Providence, RI, and Reynolds Fine Art in New Haven, CT. Sousa’s work has been the subject of articles in The Provincetown Banner, IN Newsweekley, Provincetown Magazine, The Art of Man, Provincetown Arts, OCHO and the online publications Qind, TOH, The Portuguese American Journal, Homodesiribus and Advocate.com.

Forrest Williams

Lowlands

“I’m setting out to express strong emotion through restrained movement, context, and structure—to find that place of tension between the containment and the expression of feeling.

The apparent passivity of the figures has something to do with longing—both physical and spiritual. For me the paintings are often as much about what isn’t there as what is. About the unseen, the hidden—just beyond reach or just beyond sight. I am hoping to get at a portrayal of consciousness, or perhaps more specifically of self-consciousness.

In this latest work, much of it inspired by my experiences in Provincetown, I wanted to convey a sense of air and atmosphere as opposed to the confined, hermetic spaces of past work—and a sense of atmospheric light as opposed to artificial light. There are often multiple figures, sometimes naked. My interest shifted towards organic forms as opposed to previous pattern and geometry, with an accompanying palette shift from strong color to more muted grays and blues.

There is certainly a narrative ambiguity in the situations set up in each painting, sometimes amplified by the addition of small buildings as other “characters.” These were very much inspired by looking at the work of the painter George Stubbs. In fact, most of the drama comes from the surroundings rather than the figures themselves, who remain quiet presences. Again a certain separateness here. An element of melancholy. Of thoughtfulness. Naked and yet somehow private.”

Forrest Williams has shown his work in numerous solo and group exhibitions in the US and Canada. Current solo exhibitions include: 2014 “Arrival” AMP, Provincetown, MA; 2010 “Crossways” Marx & Zavattero, San Francisco, CA; 2007 “Porches” Heather Marx Gallery, San Francisco, CA; 2005 “Passage” Heather Marx Gallery, San Francisco, CA. Recent group exhibitions include: 2013-14 “Hello, Goodbye” Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco, CA; 2012 “Two Loves – Sex, Art, and the Love That Dare Not Speak Its Name” Kymara Gallery, Biddeford, ME; 2012 “Seen” Visual Aid Gallery, San Francisco, CA; 2012 “New York Academy of Art Sixth Annual Summer Exhibition” Flowers, New York, NY; 2011 “Sea Change” Marx & Zavattero, San Francisco, CA; 2011 “The Elegance of Refusal” Gensler, San Francisco, CA; 2009 “Seldom Seen” Leslie/Lohman Foundation; New York, NY; 2009 “Figuratively Speaking” Lyons Wier Gallery, New York, NY; 2008 “Color Key” The Painting Center, New York, NY.

Rick Wrigley

Untitled #1

“Until this point in my life, my creative process has involved working within the tight constraints established by the ‘purpose’ of the thing that I was designing. For instance, a successful design of a chair, a table, or especially a house, must meet a very particular set of functional criteria.

For many years I enjoyed the challenge of solving aesthetic problems within these constraints. The work required a type of discipline that I felt comfortable with. But now I feel motivated to set new challenges for myself; to explore new creative territory where limitations are no longer present.

I bring my concern for craftsmanship as a furniture maker to my new work as a sculptor. My formal training as a designer also informs the work. I now intend to break a few of the rules that I was taught. My hope is to loosen things up a bit. To have some fun working a bit more freely and intuitively.”

Rick Wrigley is embarking on a new career in sculpture after 25 years as an art-furniture designer and maker, and over 10 years designing and building houses.

For his furniture work, Rick was a recipient of the Mass Cultural Council/New England Foundation for the Arts Regional Fellowship in the Visual Arts. He has shown at The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; The Smithsonian Museum of American Art, DC; The American Craft Museum, NY; The Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Montréal; The Milwaukee Art Museum; The Oakland Museum; The Flagler Museum, Palm Beach, FL; The Fuller Museum of Art, MA; and The Cape Cod Museum of Art. His work is included in the collections of the Smithsonian Museum of American Art’s Renwick Gallery, Smith College Museum of Art, and The Boston Public Library. He has executed commissions for The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; Springfield Museum of Fine Arts, The Legislative Office Building, Hartford, CT; Babson College Interfaith Chapel, and the U.S. Embassy in Amman, Jordan.

Having completed six house design projects in Provincetown, Rick is excited to be back at the workbench in his studio — now making sculpture.