Visual Art Currently Hanging
posted by on July 22 at 13:42 PM
Carlos Vega’s How Quiet (2005), acrylic and collage on canvas, 17 by 16 inches
At James Harris Gallery. (Gallery site here.)
I almost hesitated to post this piece at full size, feeling like a tiny version of it would align more with its internal volume (reflected truly in the title, How Quiet). But I wanted you to be able to see what I saw when I came across it in the gallery the other day: the lined paper with numbers on the top corners, the unfussiness of the thinned paint, the way the artist turns a page ready for a list into a scene of incredible modesty, with the window-washer reaching just as far as she can without making the ladder tip. To me, it’s absolutely beautiful. And it makes absolutely no demands.
It is a compelling piece.
And thank you for your take on it. I think you should comment on Currently Hanging works more often.
Dear Jen,
Thank you for the hang.
Tiny is what tiny does, and I've heard it said that sometimes it's not so much how you lay your canvas down... but often more to do with how we hang are petard out.
Congratulations to Freddy Mercury for playing the Scamp.
I like it. But it's ledger paper, and the numbers aren't sequential, which is confusing. It looks like a bound ledger book, folded over backward (you can see the valley). Is it three-dimensional, or just painted like that? Sometimes computers suck for art.
Fnarf, I think it is folded over, but it lies flat. You're so right about computers and art sometimes.
Jen, thank you for your opinion.
The piece is all the better for its unapologetic reveal of the notebook/ledger/whatever. The conceit works less well in some of Vega's other works on show...you certainly picked one of the best.
There are two reveals: the sketchbook sketch, and the ledger. It serves to make the picture more realistic-appearing than it really is. Or -- and I can't tell from the JPG -- it's the other way around, and the wash is actually a screen of the real picture peeking out from under.
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