First Friday 5/1

I'm sure this will come as no surprise, but my first friday plans were interrupted, once again.  I ended up having to work because a friend had to be at his other job and desperately needed me to cover.  So I covered.  And closed.  (that means 2am, he owes me a huuuuge favor!) 

Anyways, I ended up going to a few galleries, with Quirk being the most memorable.  I found this surprising because the majority of the work was paintings, and that is usually not my cup of tea.  I found it very interesting that it was a joint show, perhaps sisters? and their work looked incredibly different.  I really enjoy the juxtaposition of ideas on the same subject.  I started looking at Rita Root's work first, only to become bored with the repetition of horses.  Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they are bad pieces, because technically they are absolutely beautifully detailed, but it was just so boring.  It seemed like they were all almost the same, that is, until I came onto the off-colored and distorted paintings of the horses.  This was sooo relieving to see a bit of differentiation in Rita's work.  The painting of the green horse stuck out like a sore thumb, but in a very good way, on the wall with the about 4 or 5 other paintings.  On the larger wall, she included 2 paintings of horses that extended from their rectangular borders, and made the outer white border a part of the work of art rather than just a method of displaying.  I enjoyed these 2 paintings over the rest, by far.  I also enjoyed the little detailed lines and circle on all the borders.  I feel as if that compensated for the fact that the pieces had rugged edges.  Good touch, not too much.

On the other side of the gallery, Erin Root's work was displayed.  It threw me off how different their work was.  Rita seems to be focused on the beautiful, colorful, the alive, while Erin is focused on concepts, pieces, and composition.  I found the subject of her work to be quite disturbing, but displayed in a very effective way.  I found her pieces of "life" and "death" to be more influential than the pieces of separate pieces. (deer parts I believe? strange.)  Erin definitely used composition and the juxtaposition of black and white to further her daring concepts.  I absolutely love her use of negative space, especially in the pieces of dying animals.  She associates black with death, and displayed them tiny, in the bottom corner, surrounded by this black death halo. The use of negative space, to me, pushes the idea of being alone.

Overall, I found this show to be interesting and different, but would probably not go out of my way to see their work again.