Solo exhibition of paintings on folded paper by X Bonnie Woods

Map Fragments

Sept 1-29, 2019

Opening Reception: Sunday, Sept. 8, 4-7pm
Third Thursday party and artist’s talk: Sept. 19, 6-9pm
Gallery Hours: Fridays and Saturdays, 2-6 pm, or by
appointment. (781-426-5827)

X Bonnie Woods is an artist based in Boston and Berlin, Germany. Her works challenge traditional ideas about artistic materials and boundaries. She has exhibited her paintings and photos widely in the U.S. and Europe. The paintings are often map-like, and sometimes include hidden elements of language.

The newest series includes “Map Fragments,” her glimpse into the piecemeal and fragmentary way that contemporary Americans have come to view the world.

Woods paints on folded printmaking paper with Sumi, a dense black Asian ink. Large-scale works done outdoors often incorporate rain or snow. Relief printing and ink washes dominate. Her playful use of water tension, gravity, and the random effects of weather are important parts of the process.

Once again it’s time for the Atlantic Works Gallery Annual “Friends” Show. This summer we’ll be there for you with work by some old and some new friends, July 18 – August 24.

Please join artists and friends for light refreshments and good conversation on a midsummer’s evening.

Opening Reception: July 18, 6-9pm
Closing Reception: August 15, 6-9pm
Gallery Hours: Fridays and Saturdays, 2-6 pm, or by appointment.

For more information, see contact@atlanticworks.org
Telephone 617-530-0488 or, during gallery hours, 857-302-8363.

Opening reception: June 8, 6-9pm
Third Thursday Celebration and
Artists’ Talk: June 20, 6-9pm

The assigning of celestial bodies a reference to human experience was one of the hallmarks of our evolution. The earliest of us saw their entire worlds captured in the patterns arranged by the stars. There was nothing of chance in these configurations. To the early peoples, they were deliberately placed. It was an affirmation of sentience, the stirrings of the belief in higher powers; gods, beings other than themselves that had the power over wind, rain, darkness, light, life and death.

Both Marjorie Kaye and George Shaw compose configurations, addressing the relationship between energetic fields. Juxtaposition of color describes a certain vibration present in both artists’ works. For Marjorie Kaye this is brought about by cutting apart the shapes in infinity. For George Shaw, the subtlety of a minimal series of shapes touched by textural components lassoes and quiets the sound of the surface.

In Marjorie Kaye’s paintings there are obvious relationships between the points present in each shape. The eye follows miniature color fields, detailed dissection of larger planes. There are vortexes present within each separate shape, layering and spreading over the surface. These points channel energy, color acting as a propellant. The panels are shaped, encouraging repositories of color to interact between one end of the surface to another. Some of these works are done in multiple shaped panels. In “Dragon’s Path”, there are 21 small panels connected by their centers. Lines of continuity are contained and passed along from shape to shape. In another piece, 3 individual shaped panels are connected by biomorphic shapes containing additional forms, broken up into seemingly living entities swimming within the confines of the appointed energy field.

SHOWN: Marjorie Kaye, “Sorceress Picks Up a Conch Shell on the Beach on a Starry Night to Listen to the Ocean. If the Ocean is Right There,
Why Does She Need the Shell?”, Gouache/Acrylic Medium on Shaped Plywood, 33”X36”, 2019

George Shaw’s work is built upon his belief that the heavens and stars are incomprehensible to us. His work is constructed; within the building up of the surface are infinite planes of saturation. He believes that the vast heavens make us feel insignificant. His work strives to find a place, organizing the components of the pieces as the stars, into meaningful things or constellations. He seeks to make the heavens approachable and a way to guide himself through his earthly journeys.

SHOWN: George Shaw, “Becoming”, Mixed Media, 53.25”X13”X6”, 2019

Both Kaye and Shaw work within spatial relationships, assigning individual components as influencers of the whole. Energy fields are inescapable, providing a delicate balance in Shaw’s constructions, and a set of indelicate explosions in Kaye’s paintings. The opposing energies create a unity of tension in the conjunction of works.