BROOKE STROUD: PAINTINGS

THE BURN, 2015 ACRYLIC, PASTEL, AND COLORED PENCIL ON BOARD 10 x 8

HERE IT COMES, 2014 ACRYLIC, PASTEL, AND COLORED PENCIL ON BOARD 10 x 8

WILL OF THE WEST, 2014 ACRYLIC, PASTEL, COLORED PENCIL ON BOARD 10 x 8

FLOATING REALM, 2014 ACRYLIC, PASTEL, COLORED PENCIL ON BOARD 10 x 8

THE CALLING, 2014 ACRYLIC AND PASTEL ON BOARD 14 x 11

SEA BEAMS, 2014 ACRYLIC ON BOARD 14 x 11

PASSAGE, 2014 ACRYLIC ON BOARD 14 x 11

LONESOME HIGHWAY, 2015 ACRYLIC AND PASTEL ON BOARD 14 x 11

ANOTHER GREEN WORLD, 2015 ACRYLIC AND PASTEL ON BOARD 24 x 18

APPARITION, 2014 ACRYLIC ON BOARD 24 x 18

STAR NURSERY, 2014 ACRYLIC ON BOARD 24 x 18

NEW LAND, 2014 ACRYLIC, COLORED PENCIL, WATERCOLOR ON BOARD 24 x 18

BROOKE STROUD: PAINTINGS

7 March – 25 April, 2015

Visiting Brooke Stroud in his Houston studio recently, I was taken by the sound of ambient music that played quietly from a set of speakers beneath a window. The gentle early spring light and serene sound set a fitting tone for a first look at a group of new paintings that would constitute our current exhibition. Although I didn’t recognize it at the time, the framework that I now apply to this body of work was implicit in the context of that studio visit: the introspective space of the studio, the observable world (seen through the window), and the imaginative space of music and abstraction. Curiously, this includes a number of seemingly contrasting dualities that Stroud employs harmoniously. These works are simultaneously introspective and expansive, grounded and boundless, familiar and unknown, and linear and painterly. Stroud’s modestly scaled paintings are composed in the form of theme and variation. In most cases, each painting is arranged according to a consistent formal structure, which includes a prominent horizon line, a solitary rectangle, and brilliant coloration. These few pictorial elements yield seemingly endless states and meanings. This may be due in part to Stroud’s varied and numerous sources of inspiration. Although it would be difficult to locate specific references in these works, each painting’s title gives subtle cues to sources in music, sci-fi movies, the West Texas landscape, and art history, to name a few. Evoking a sense of landscape has long been a component of Stroud’s work. He is quite familiar with the landscape of West Texas, where he also has a home. The long drive from Houston to Marfa is enough to imprint the landscape in one’s memory after one or two visits, let alone the frequency with which Stroud commutes. While Stroud’s paintings evoke a sense of landscape, they are prevented from becoming too steeped in a description of illusionistic space by their vertical orientation and brilliant coloration. That is not to say that they are devoid of space. In fact, there is a great vastness to many of the images. The radiant coloration of these works endows them with the great space of memory and imagination. Stroud has worked in museums for nearly thirty years. Perhaps most significantly, he has served as the exhibitions designer at the Menil Collection—a position he still holds today. This has undoubtedly informed his work as an artist. Barnett Newman’s “zips,” Mark Rothko’s atmospheric color, and Richard Serra’s highly textured drawings are all at hand in Stroud’s day-to-day experience. It is not surprising that Stroud’s paintings employ similar visual languages and in doing so often refer to those other works. The paintings in this exhibition are made by a variety of applications that are built up in layers: they are rolled, drawn, brushed, and washed. Few brushstrokes are to be found, and when they appear, they are announced clearly by a thick impasto—perhaps a loaded gesture. Drawing has been of particular importance to Stroud for quite some time, and his work of the last fifteen years distinctly reflects this. This body of work is no exception, and Stroud pushes drawing to a new arena, where it merges with a more painterly treatment of surface and color. At times it is difficult to distinguish between drawing and painting in these works, which adds yet another dimension to the complexities that make these panels so rich. JP

PATH TO EDO, 2014 ACRYLIC, COLORED PENCIL ON BOARD 24 x 18

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