Juxtaposed: Brett De Palma, Gary Mayer, Bea Ortiz, July/August Exhibition
Juxtaposed features Brett De Palma, Gary Mayer and Bea Ortiz, July/August exhibition at Green Kill.
Juxtaposed features Brett De Palma, Gary Mayer and Bea Ortiz, July/August exhibition at Green Kill. The opening party is Saturday, July 2, 5-7 PM.
The exhibition runs from Saturday, July 2 until Saturday, August 27.
Exhibition hours are from 3-5:30 PM, Tuesday through Saturday. You may make special appointments by calling 347-689-2323.
Juxtaposed
Brett de Palma, Gary Mayer and Bea Ortiz, three painters working in the realm of improvisation and intuition are exhibiting new works. As elements, drawn together in an exchange of natures and viewpoints, express the fruits of their conversations in the form of new compounds, these three Catskill-based artists—each prowling the borderlands of inner and outer districts for wordless answers to unformed questions—present their findings, the physical remains of their explorations, to reverberate in diverse presences and in those reverberations take on new tones and new meanings. An interplay of intersections reveals interstates and what is lived and felt, and what thoughts are found to be moving in the quiet there.
Bea Ortiz
For me, making art is an act of surrendering, allowing myself to open and dive into mystery, or like opening a door to a different realm. When I paint, I embrace the present, trust the unknown, let go of the mind, of judgement. I breathe in and out with every stroke and gesture. As part of the process, I wrestle with self-doubt, unworthiness and meaning, but ultimately each painting is a depiction of a battle won, an expression of an unspeakable story—it’s kind of a miracle.
—Bea Ortiz.
Brett de Palma
My artworks are the residue of my experience; they are witnesses created to reflect their time and place. They are consciously and unconsciously crafted to mirror the ever-evolving information of my personal perceptions and are tangible reminders of a remembered life for those who come after.
"We rest: a dream has power to poison sleep.
We reuse: one wandering thought pollutes the day.
We feel, conceive, or reason; laugh or weep,
Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away;
It is the same; for, be it joy or sorrow,
The path of its departure is free.
Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his 'morrow;
Naught may endure, but mutability.
~ Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
Gary Mayer
Gary Mayer is from Detroit, Michigan. He studied art at Wayne Sate University in Detroit and became influenced by a group of artists called the Cass Corridor School, named after the area where they lived and worked.
“I made a lot of large expressive work which was included in many shows at the Willis Gallery and at Feigenson Gallery which represented many of the Cass Corridor artists I mentioned. My first solo show there, Saints, featured work in a very expressive but also irreverent manner like “Saint Sebastian”. Some of this work consisted of very large collages of 8 x 12 feet.”
Gary moved to NYC in 1982. During that time he had numerous solo and group shows. He has shown his work at museums such as The Bronx Museum of the Arts and the Everson Museum in Syracuse, NY. He had a two person show at the now defunct Exit Art Gallery in NYC which was reviewed in Art in America. He received his MFA from the Maryland Institute School of Art where he was a graduate assistant to the renowned Abstract Expressionist painter, Grace Hartigan.
In 2004, after spending over 20 years in NYC and Brooklyn, Gary moved to the Catskills. In the last decade he has shown his work widely in the area and helped form the GreenKill art space in Kingston. He is currently a member of the Longyear Gallery in Margaretville, NY.
“My work has always fluctuated between abstraction and figuration. I find that one feeds and sharpens the other and they both share an intensity and painterliness.”