Betty Cuningham Gallery Presents Rackstraw Downes Drawings, Opens 6/3
By: Gabrielle Sierra
Betty Cuningham Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of a survey of drawings by Rackstraw Downes. It will be the artist's third show and first drawings show at the gallery. Included in the exhibition will be approximately twenty works on paper selected from the past thirty years. Downes will be present for an opening reception on June 3.
Due to the outdoor nature of nearly all of his work, Downes moves with the seasons, and therefore the drawings included in the exhibit cover a vast array of geographic locations: Maine where he lived in the late 70's and 80's, New York City where he currently spends seven months of the year, and Presidio, TX where he spends the winter months. As Downes does not typically prepare studies for his large scale work, most drawings are done as a means to investigate sites. As a result, the drawings have significant distinctions from the paintings, bringing to the forefront his "gift of sheer linearity" defining the objects in the scene, as stated by Sanford Schwartz in the 2005 Downes monograph, published by Princeton University Press.Similar to his paintings, Downes creates his drawings on site, from start to finish. As he draws precisely from observation, without manipulating the scene before him, both the drawings and paintings are devoid of narrative, rhetoric or cliché. Consequently Downes selects austere sites that are not particularly picturesque from a traditional point of view and uses technicality to record the details. He is most concerned with capturing the particular light and particular time of the largest vista possible, being able to see the maximum distance in front of himself as well as to either side.On View: June 3 - July 30, 2010
Opening Reception: Thursday, June 3 from 6 - 8pm
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