I Dream Animal — July 29 – August 21, 2010

By Alicia Johnson

Opening Reception: Saturday July 31st 5 – 8PM
Extended hours for last Thursday July 29th 4 – 9PM

Alicia Blue Gallery
1468 NE Alberta St. | Portland, OR 97211

Alicia Blue Gallery is pleased to announce the upcoming exhibition, “I Dream Animal”, featuring Los Angeles artists: Christine Nguyen, Karen Florek and Caryn Baumgartner. These three artists’ works represent a deep reflection into the world of imagination and dream. Their work shares a common sensibility that feels akin to a floating dream state- familiar, as much as fleeting.

Caryn Baumgartner’s oil on canvases are richly painted with colors that, if imagined, were mined from terrestrial mineral and oxide veins- powdered and instinctively processed. Crowning the surface with heavy distress, these paintings become gentle phantoms. Her expertise as a painter is seen in her large works, where her simple approach to her canvas keeps an unspoiled feeling. In both “Stag” and “Fawn”, she abstracts the figure and leaves just an outline of the animal surrounded in rich color, a ghostly reminder of the perfection of nature.

Christine Nguyen’s experimental use of photography comes alive in her large-scale installations. One feels like they have passed into another world- deep in the nadir of ocean, discovering schools of undersea neons with a mineral-like frequency. Alternately traveling to outer space with crystalline frost growing outside your view and minimally scattered fragile hexagon colonies. The black backgrounds with nearly celestial light leaks are highlighted with brightly colored creatures and constellations stemming from her imagination. Her imagery draws on elegant science and imagination-provoking wonder.

Karen Florek’s series of lith prints are explorations of the internal world of the body. Her hand altered images made in the darkroom are mysterious. X-ray photon blacks and whites with glass like elements add to the scientific beauty of an almost unclassifiable, yet organic skeletal subject. The process of creating a lith print involves time and dedication; there is nothing instant about it. The visual outcome is unique with a grainy surface retaining dark shadows and soft delicate highlights. Different colors and hues can be achieved by chemical reaction as the developer begins to oxidize and age, which adds to the unpredictable effect.