Argazzi Art Dazzling Exhibit Review "Gold & Black & White”

Published on TriCornerNews (http://www.tricornernews.com)
Dazzling Exhibit at Argazzi

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Dazzling Exhibit at Argazzi
Wed, 01/03/2018 - 11:48am
Art: ‘Gold and Black and White’
By: Emily Gates

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The current show at Argazzi Art, “Gold & Black & White,” brings together a collection of works centered around those three colors. What could threaten to feel like a gimmick, instead feels like anything but. Argazzi has brought together a holiday exhibit of painting, photography and sculpture that is well worth seeking out.

“Suspended Stillness,” by Victor Mirabelli.

“Suspended Stillness,” by Victor Mirabelli.

The striking pure white of Jaq Belcher’s “Ascending” catches one’s eye because of the pure, seemingly uninterrupted field of snow white paper, but it is the precise and mesmerizing cuts that Belcher has etched into the white field that keep one’s attention. The petal-shaped incisions cast a series of fluctuating shadows which add an unexpected playfulness and depth to the piece’s seeming simplicity. Another piece in white, “Contemplation Form 463,” by the Woodbury based artist Ann Mallory also cleverly walks the line between the simple and complex. Mallory has several works in ceramic in the show, and her glazed white vessel manages to appear at once raised from the earth and otherworldly. 

Gold appears in the show often and in many forms: gold leaf on panel and gold-leafed clay. The color appears in oil and wax glazes and acrylic paint, as is the case with the work of Sabine Friesicke. Friesicke, a German-born painter who lives and works between New York City and Berlin, has works of acrylic on canvas and paper on view. In particular, two large paintings, perfectly titled for the Argazzi show, “Black/Gold/White,” feature mesmerizing series of undulating waves. The ordered tidiness of the waves moving across the horizontal plane of the canvas are broken up by the way in which the painter has allowed the gold paint to drip and drift down the large square canvases.

Sculptor Lisa Breznak works with unexpected shapes and forms and on a small scale. Breznak hand forms her sculptures in her studio in Peekskill, New York, and the results are pleasingly off kilter and engaging. The works she currently has on show at Argazzi each incorporate 22 karat gold leaf, and the shining metal can suggest that one has stumbled upon a small treasure. The shapes in her “Dances for Waxing and Waning” call to mind both the structures of Japanese temples and the phases of the moon. “Pompion Prestige (Abundant Harvest)” strikes a rather different note. The abundant, swooping pile of pumpkins, a familiar site in the local area during fall, here lends itself towards some fairytale landscape.

Many of the colors in Victor Mirabelli’s large landscapes exist in the space between white and black. Mirabelli’s impressionistic paintings depict stark white barns, some with dark colored roofs, while “Unchartered Terrain Collection #8,” features a black barn, hauntingly beautiful in the midst of the silent spare land in which it sits. 

A number of other artists are here with interesting and worthwhile pieces. Whether one is drawn to gold or black or white, the Argazzi show has much to please.

"Gold & Black & White" runs through January 31 at Argazzi Art, 22 Millerton Road/Route 44, Lakeville, CT.

For information, visit www.argazziart.com or call 860.435.8222.

A Review of Victor Mirabelli's Current Show "Naked Imprint" at Argazzi Art

Published on TriCornerNews (http://www.tricornernews.com)
Thu, 11/10/2016 - 12:39pm
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A Style Evolving Into Abstract
November 10/2016
ART By Leon Graham
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A Style Evolving Into Abstract

The appeal of Victor Mirabelli’s paintings is immediate. Both impressionistic and abstract, the contrast between white structures — abandoned farm buildings, alone or in groups — and gauzy, feathery landscape draws you into the picture and its possible story.

Mirabelli’s work glows under what appears to be heavy layers of paint. Yet the paint is actually quite thin, the layers of direct pigment scrubbed and brushed on canvas to a feathery texture that gives the pictures a ghostly, haunting quality.

The artist’s current show, “Naked Imprint” at Argazzi Art in Lakeville, is the third in three years presented by owner Judith Singelis. Each has revealed an artist in development, moving toward an increasingly loose style. Buildings that three years ago were more defined are now not as strictly painted. And many are slightly out of plumb. They draw your eye in by their impreciseness, their slight tilt.

Victor Mirabelli Heritage 60 x 60 Oil on Canvas

Victor Mirabelli Heritage 60 x 60 Oil on Canvas

Mirabelli has painted new work for the current show, all done in the past year. And there is not a weak picture in the group. You can see that he is moving into more abstract composition, a darker palette for landscape, a darker — yet viscerally appealing — world. In “Heritage,” the edges of a building seem to dissolve in a mist, they may not last much longer. The dark foreground encroaches on the building with feathery fingers.

Victor Mirabelli Bountiful 60 x 74 Oil on Canvas

Victor Mirabelli Bountiful 60 x 74 Oil on Canvas

“Bountiful” shows three white structures with solid walls facing a muted yellow field out of which gray tendrils reach into wall angles and up the sides of the buildings. There is an odd sense of movement, as if a process of decay is already underway.

Victor Mirabelli Above the Horizon 36 x 72 Oil on Canvas

Victor Mirabelli Above the Horizon 36 x 72 Oil on Canvas

“Above the Horizon” is unusual for Mirabelli: several buildings stretch across the canvas in a solid horizontal row, as if he has imagined a deserted village. And in “Afternoon Delight,” touches of yellow/orange suggest sunlight, maybe even fire, on a somber roof.

Victor Mirabelli, “Naked Imprint,” runs at Argazzi Art through Nov. 20. The gallery is at 22 Millerton Road in Lakeville, Conn., and is open Friday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Call 860-435-8222 or go to www.argazziart.com