Douglas Anderson : New Work
September 6 - October 1, 2022
Opening reception September 8, 5-8pm
October 1, 2022 2 - 4 pm - Poetry reading with Loralee Nolletti, Ana Silva, Ben Gantcher, and Rachel Eisler.
Blue Mountain is pleased to announce an exhibition of new paintings by Douglas Anderson. The small works on display express the joy of painting and the silent rhythm of life in visual form. With touchstones in improvisational music and lyrical abstraction of the mid twentieth century, Anderson works in graphite, ink and paint to test the continuing relevance
of painting for the life of the imagination. His practice is one of seeking and discovery - of not knowing, in a sense, what will happen. Many of the works take on the character of landscape as the artist depicts forms growing, turning and evolving against other more stable forms. The language of painting is evident in these works in contrasts of wet and dry, fast and slow, control and loss of control, line and tone, bright colors and dull, and black and white.
Working in theater and movies for many years as a scenic artist, Anderson took away from that experience a love of black paint, which he uses like any other color. Unlike in the gallery or museum, black is the color of negative space in the theater, the color behind all other colors: it is the black box as opposed to the white cube. In his inks as well as his acrylic paintings, black plays a major role as line and tone, and it is in this way that Anderson seeks a marriage of the two - the gallery and the theater. The artist always invites the viewer to participate in the creation of his work by making of it what they will. “In my work, I allow my imagination free rein, and I hope the observer of my work feels, likewise, free to interpret as they please. Ultimately, though, it’s the pleasure of looking that I hope to inspire.”
