Between Observation And Sensation
Ever Baldwin
Curated by JAG projects / Hudson House
Sept. 17th - Oct.10th
In Ever Baldwin’s new body of work sculpted and torched wooden frames act like appendages, fused to thick oil painted images. Flickering between obvious and questionable faces, body parts, or possible architectures. An eye or a nipple both can simply be points of focus. A lip, eyelid, vulva, or doorway, all as entryways. Baldwin works in the back and forth between observation and sensation. Every distinguishable image is adorned with double visions. Every stroke is empowered with marble dust or other thickening agents. Making each mark something substantially more alive than additive.
These paintings are immensely generous as if Baldwin is handing over evidence as an invitation to help find some greater truth or missing part. The full compositions act like characters. The reduction of their elements seemingly creates the shape of their identifying logo or trademarked icon. Torch burning these frames is like a cleansing ceremony. Black charred and sooty, like a heavy hairdo the painting stares out at you from under their bangs. You could give these paintings names like a child, others like mythical beings. Some; a trick, like a face caught in the wings of a moth catching you in your curiosity before it flutters away revealing mechanisms and a world beyond your expectations. - Jesse Greenburg
