The Daily Campus

Issue date: 9/12/06 Section: Focus

Media Credit: Maureen McCombs

Media Credit: Maureen McCombs

Media Credit: Ryan Sayers

The Contemporary Art Gallery, located in the lobby of the Fine Arts building, recently opened its fall exhibition, "Figuring the Landscape," which features painters from around the world. "It'd be important in New York," said Barry Rosenberg gallery director of the show, "It's a lot more loaded than just paintings."

Rosenberg also discussed the theme of the exhibition, "It's a very traditional theme ... most shows have been theme or concept oriented, not material. The paintings are looking at the way people are painting ... the craziness and joy in the material of paint."

One painting of particular interest by Neo Rauch comes from the collection of John McEnroe. Rosenberg recounted the trouble they had with picking up the painting from McEnroe's penthouse.

"It was on the 21st floor ... it wouldn't fit out of the penthouse ... it had to be lowered out of the window 4 floors into the building ... it takes a lot to get the pieces you want."

Rauch is the most prominent painter of the East German Leipzig School, a group which focuses on painting and reflects aspects of social realism. Rosenberg called Rauch's painting, 'Nebel,' "the heart of the show."

"Rauch changes the way we look at realism today," Rosenberg said.

"Rauch ... 2002 winner of 'The Vincent' ... lives and works in Leipzig, [he's] considered one of today's leading European painters. His work is rooted in the German Realist painting tradition. In spite of the typically bleached, chalk-like colors he uses and the sparse way in which he uses them, his paintings have great eloquence. Rauch's work is at once animated and serene, evocative of solidified fragments just before something big is set to happen. The atmosphere of his paintings, in which archetypal human figures in everyday scenes and desolate utopian backdrops or industrial locations take up pre-eminent positions, is suffused with a sense of hallucination. In these days of photography and video, Rauch has remained true to painting, his medium," according to www.bonnefanten.nl.

Another painter, Till Gerhard, also comes from the Leipzig School. Gerhard's work aims to satirize American culture's commonly recognized landscapes and memories.

"It's a new generation remembering before the [Berlin] Wall came down," Rosenberg said about the painters from the Leipzig School.

The paintings throughout the gallery concentrate on the versatility of the media, the figures and landscape combination and the overall message of the work.

"It's more than one thing at a time, but it all comes together and still reads as a realist painting," Rosenberg said.

Although art classes commonly use the Contemporary Art Gallery academically, Rosenberg suggests that other departments could benefit from studying and discussing the exhibit, especially since this show has so much political, historical and sociological significance.

"[The gallery's] a good resource, and it's an incredible show ... most of these artists haven't been shown in Connecticut ... its 'breaking news' in painting."

"Figuring in the Landscape," will be open until Oct. 20.

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