There's a special place in the hearts of art lovers for landscapes. They transcend artistic movements, schools and styles; they can be pastoral and serene (Thomas Eakins, Edouard Monet), satirical (Gary Bolding's Suburban Wasteland II), infused with spiritual transcendence (the Hudson River Valley painters) or deeply unsettling (Alexandre Hogue's Mother Earth Laid Bare).
"Landscapes Unmasked," a new exhibition at Hearne Fine Art, sheds light on another aspect of landscape painting -- historical works by influential 19th-century black artists Robert Scott Duncanson and Edward Mitchell Bannister, and their present-day counterparts.
Duncanson, born in northern New York in 1821, was self-taught. His calm and serene paintings were celebrated in Europe and Canada. His works have been praised alongside other American greats such as Thomas Cole and John Frederick Kensett, an important Hudson River Valley painter.
The exhibit at Hearne has Duncanson's 1865 oil on canvas Landscape (Waterfall With Rock Lion Formation) and his 1852 oil Untitled (Rushing River Downstream), which evoke classic Western landscape scenes.
Bannister made history in 1876 when he became the first black artist to win a major American art prize at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition.
One can see an appreciation of artists such as Jean-Francois Millet in Bannister's landscapes at Hearne, including Landscape 3 Cows with trees on right, an oil on board, and Untitled (Stream and Trees on right), an 1880 oil on canvas.
The historical works lay a foundation for the paintings of three current artists -- Little Rock native Wade Hampton, Pittsburgh resident Dean L. Mitchell and Ohio native Mason Archie. The three present a diverse range of settings: deserts, swamps, forests and urban scenes.
Archie's gorgeous oil on linen, Water Lilies will especially resonate with viewers. Yes, you'll think about Monet's water lily paintings at first. But Archie's ability to blend the sensibility of impressionism with realism gives his work a different and striking tone and presence.
Also appealing are his oil on linen, The Great Dismal Swamp, with its beautiful execution of the sun and its reflection, and his Down by the Creek, a pastoral scene of cattle, creek and surrounding land.
Hampton's inviting desert landscapes include Morning Walkway and Red Row, in which the artist uses abstraction to great effect. His serene 5-by-7-inch landscape, The Wilderness of St. Vincent, is intimate and imbued with mystery.
Mitchell explores the urban landscape to great effect with his photo-realistic watercolors, including the urban decay of buildings and a dead tree with Damaged Spaces, and his vibrant light and shadows on buildings such as Morning in the Quarter and Urban Light Work (French Quarter Street Shadows). He is equally skillful with nature scenes, especially Zion's Untamed and the stark Early Winter, which depicts a barn after a snowfall with an almost Andrew Wyeth sensibility.
"Landscapes Unmasked" is an impressive exhibit that shares history and points to the future.
"Landscapes Unmasked," through Dec. 21, Hearne Fine Art, 1001 Wright Ave., Suite C, Little Rock. Hours: 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday. Receptions: Mason Archie and Wade Hampton will give talks at the gallery at 5:30 p.m. Nov. 18 and 3 p.m. Nov. 19; Dean Mitchell's talk is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Dec. 9 and 10:30 a.m. Dec. 10. Info: hearnefineart.com, (501) 372-6822
CUSHMAN'S "SHADOWS"
Brad Cushman, a Grand Award winner at the Arkansas Arts Center's Delta Exhibition in 2002, is the subject of a sweeping exhibit at Pulaski Technical College of new work and pieces dating back as far as the early 1990s.
So, is it a retrospective?
The "r" word brings a chuckle from the artist, who also is gallery director at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
"It's kind of a retrospective, but that word makes me sound too old and more important than I am," he says, laughing.
"Shadows in the Water" is in a wonderful space that gives Cushman's varied work a lot of room to breathe. As you enter the Windgate Gallery, three new works -- Shadows in the Water I, II, III -- invite the viewer to take a closer look.
The show's theme is based on a musical work of the same name by James Wintle, a former colleague of Cushman's in Oklahoma, who was inspired by a poem written by 17th-century English writer and minister Thomas Traherne. Cushman used the musical score as an element in these three graphite, oil and collage on paper pieces. Other works in the "Shadows" theme are polymer gravure etchings. The idea of music inspiring art is hardly new, but these works have a palpable emotional depth.
A fine new painting, Fireworks in Sitges, was created from photos the artist took while visiting the Spanish city near Barcelona. The graphite, acrylic and oil on canvas piece puts one right in the midst of a street fair, with fireworks exploding all around.
"The fireworks were going off at ground level; it was very exciting and felt dangerous at the same time," Cushman says. "People were in costumes, it was quite a scene." And it inspired a memorable work of art.
The show is also an opportunity to see Cushman's 2002 Grand Award winner, Film/Strip/Tease, which combines enlarged and amusing family photographs with pictures of his eye into a work exploring how photos can help us recall -- or forget -- events in our past.
He tapped the family albums again in the humorous and delightful Basement Games, cir. 1967, a 2002 work. Cushman's parents had parties and their friends participated in games. The photos are charming, but hidden behind what Cushman calls Wonder Bread curtains, which resemble the bread's packaging. Polka-dotted curtains hung in the basement party room windows at his childhood home, and his mother still had some of the fabric. He made a curtain from the remnant to cover the photos, and invites viewers to lift it and enjoy the display.
Cushman has explored a number of directions and themes over the years. "Shadows in the Water" is an opportunity to explore his distinctive oeuvre.
Brad Cushman, "Shadows in the Water," through Nov. 9, Windgate Gallery, the Center for Humanities and Arts, Pulaski Technical College, 300 W. Scenic Drive, North Little Rock. Hours: 8 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday. Reception: 5:30 p.m. Nov. 3. Info: (501) 812-2715
R'S BUDDY
Little Rock artist Diane Page Harper's show of pen and ink drawings, "Rorschach's Buddy,'' was inspired by the Rorschach test, which some psychologists use to analyze a person's personality based on their perceptions of a series of inkblots.
There's a lot going on in Harper's stream-of-consciousness and intuitive works. She used outlining and color to bring out forms in the blots, which can appear to be a little weird at first glance. But as we look a little deeper, the works also are wickedly funny, a little unsettling and thought-provoking.
The show has been well-received -- many of the 8-by-8-inch works have sold.
''Rorschach's Buddy,'' through Nov. 15, Mugs Cafe, 516 Main St., North Little Rock. Hours: 7 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Saturday. Info: mugscafe.org, (501) 960-9524
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Style on 10/16/2016