Art & Critique » Linda Lucas Hardy

Linda Lucas Hardy: Wrapped in Plastic

elijah — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 18:03:53 +0000

I think I can guess why these paintings found such an understanding audience. It’s because they tap into a modern theme, controversy to some; because this is relevant art with political and social overtones — probably not the first topics arising in our minds when confronted with still life. But in this case (well, maybe in most) it’s best to look first and think next, — in other words, shed the preconditions of the genre. Still life painters usually seeks to highlight the aesthetics of the subjects, reshuffling composition, color, perspective and other elements, and, so does the artist here. But by including a piece of plastic, she evokes a string of current issues and interweaves them into the aesthetic processing. As a result, the viewers get the bonus of being challenged with the aesthetics of modern living — and in an aesthetic way too.

Looking at these piece brings to mind the agendas of recycling, suffocation of nature and depletion and exploitation of natural resources. On the other hand, the sheer mastery of execution isolates a sudden beauty: these plastic bags are simply pleasing to the eye. And yes, we lead a good and easy life by all conceivable standards, we can afford indulging in an artistic appreciation of such a mundane subject, which all the while threatens to cut short that lifestyle — and hence the controversy mentioned in the first paragraph. This is a thinking people’s art. It offers two often clashing perspectives and it doesn’t offer a compromise; it doesn’t even push towards one, but it exposes the public to the difficulties in seeking and achieving it. No answers, but the questions in their fullest and most penetrating form: the artist reveals the complexity and moral ambiguity of modern living.

But lets talk some basics too. If these interpretations have any real meaning it’s because the paintings they are based upon demonstrate the technical prowess of a virtuoso. Countless photographically accurately rendered creases, along with complex alternations of gray and white, accompanied by the hazed color of the bags’ contents, all in seemingly random and loose arrangements create an unexpected (and overwhelming) effect of liberation and daring. There is something provocative about the compositions. It may be the decision to keep the fruit — usually the central object — mostly off the center, allowing the plastic to wiggle freely right in the middle, or perhaps the lack of a definite shape and figuration, also the result of the plastic wrapping. What eventually comes to mind is that although we are not used to talk about avant-guard discussing still life, this is exactly what is going on in these series.

Linda Lucas Hardy: Portraits

elijah — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 18:19:34 +0000

You know probably at least one movie where a shrink tells a patient: “Think about your most beautiful memory, imagine the place where you felt most safe as a child.” Well, think about your most beautiful memory and imagine the place where you felt most safe as a child. But if you are having trouble doing that on the spot, these black and white portraits may just strike the spark of semi-spontaneous reminiscence and lead you to the haven of spotless past. These portraits are like portals, and the sting and the rush you might feel going through one is the painful recognition of the gap between its two ends. Maybe I should have taken psychology in university.

The fact that they were drawn by hand, a creative process that multiplies immeasurably the time and effort put into their making as opposed to the duplicate photographs, adds the needed touch of human care and involvement; somehow, knowing that an artist worked on the portraits makes the images more valuable and dear. The painter’s contribution establishes a kinship between her and the owner and adds another thread of sensibility to the cord that links the latter with the depicted child — particularly if it is his or her own younger self. Memories, like children, may also be pampered. The artist’s emotional investment adds, in a roundabout way to the owner’s, and supports and preserves the latter’s.

I could identify two features that seamlessly affect the viewer and trigger a recollection: the smiles and the image cropping. While the first works on the buoyant emotional level, the second seeps in gradually and imperceptibly, much like it happens in a movie, where the camera zooms in slowly on the actor’s face, but we notice it only at the end of the sequence or shot. The black and white palette might also stimulate nostalgia, but I always thought the correlation between dichromatism and our perception of past as rather arbitrary. Still, the two-colored scheme brings a brush of eternity; narrowing the palette down to a minimum distills the essence of the captured moment.

There is one interesting correlation, though: the two smiling children appear to be on the outside, light flooding and sculpting their features, whereas the brooding toddler seems to had been seated against a wall inside an apartment. It’s interesting to watch how nature influences and sets the mood, how such an immaterial thing as a gush of wind and ray of light exert positive joyful effect. It’s easy to light these kids, and these paintings emphasize this innocence. I think it’s best to leave it at that, without resorting to “losing” and “regaining.”

Linda Lucas Hardy

elijah — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 18:27:57 +0000

Linda Lucas Hardy is an American artist specializing in colored pencil painting. I browsed her website and several other links offered on this page and learned about the medium and some of its unique techniques; I became enthralled with its congenial creative problems and the surprising, sometimes astonishing solutions that it thereupon suggests. But in today’s review I would like to focus on Linda Lucas Hardy’s individual accomplishments, particularly in the genre of still life. Though the following interpretation may diverge from the artist’s intended meaning, it still fits with her artistic credo of being an “entertainer at heart,” while capturing the “conflicting forces between light and dark.”

The almost painfully blazing light you see in these fruit arrangements shines, in fact (if I got it correctly), from areas left untouched by the pencil’s tip: it is the pure white of the paper. I mention this particular technical detail because it has an unexpected metaphoric sense in the context that I am about to suggest: these paintings depict holy offerings, concrete religious sacrifices, which, as some rather tedious passages from the Bible state, must be uncorrupted. These pieces indeed show perfect fruit, while the purest light accentuates and compliments their impeccability. The harsh shades add dramatic element — and the said forces mutate allegorically to religious pillars of devil and God, of heaven and hell.

But there is a more practical reason for this viewing: the peaches, pears and plums are placed on surfaces that imply sacrificial connotation. The bas-releifed stone or alabaster resembles an altar and the pattern on the white table-cloth repeats or elaborates the solid design. If it were not for the chiaroscuro, I would be tempted to think more in the direction of a party, or perhaps a decoration of a spacious hall — but there is just too much in the air, too many details (not tedious this time, but mesmerizing and dizzying) that prompt to envision that space as a temple and the fruits as devotional offerings. Okay, maybe I am swayed by current fruit prices — we are on a sabbatical fallow year!

Sacrifices are always a celebration and a public festivity, they connect people and strengthen bonds between them and God as well as between themselves — this is why I think that the artist’s declared entertaining purpose remains relevant, and possibly even more than so. In a way, she orchestrates an event with her pencils — or should I say batons — with each color matching a certain note. And while the main “melodic line” captures the drama, the rest of a painting projects a limpid softness and an evasive sense of mystery. Linda Hardy has first proven the range of possibilities of her medium as nearly unlimited and, second, her own ingenuity in its exploitation.

Art & Critique » Linda Lucas Hardy

Linda Lucas Hardy: Wrapped in Plastic

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Linda Lucas Hardy: Portraits

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Linda Lucas Hardy

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