Visual Art: Reviewed - Things Being Various, paintings by Kate Warner.Cross Gallery, 59 Francis St Until May 5 01-4738978. Arno Kramer, Tjibbe Hooghiemstra and Rineke Marsman, paintings and drawings.Cavanacor Gallery, Lifford Tues-Sat noon-6pm Until May 30 074-9141143. Redemption Road, Patricia Burns.Ashford Gallery, Royal Hibernian Academy Gallagher Gallery, 15 Ely Place Tues-Sat 11am-5pm, Thurs 11am-8pm, Sun 2pm-5pm Until May 10 01-6612558
As the title Things Being Various hints, Kate Warner's paintings at the Cross Gallery span an eclectic range of subjects, though all of them relate to places and all of them are relatively understated.
Sometimes they are places on a close, intimate scale, and sometimes they are expansive landscapes. Mostly she does not specify where they are, geographically, though there are clues, such as a reference to Uyuni - Bolivia? - and geysers, and jungle. Perhaps it doesn't particularly matter where they are, because the paintings seem to be very much about an experience of and response to places, rather than about places.
To this end, information is pared down to essentials. House in the Mountains is just that, a simplified house in a blank tract of land. The consistent element is the level of measured scrutiny applied to whatever is there or, more accurately, whatever makes a particular impression on the artist. So the world is filtered and distanced and, while feeling isn't dispensed with as such, there is a sense of detachment and cool appraisal. So many empty spaces, often with wintry associations, do suggest a certain air of desolation, though without any hint of glumness. All of which may make the work sound unappealing, which is not the case at all.
In fact, most of the paintings are extremely well made and visually engrossing. They are painted on what looks like plaster on board - though the list of titles doesn't specify this - and their surfaces have the delicacy and immediacy of gesso. Much depends on this quality of surface, something that doesn't reproduce effectively, so it's worth making the effort to see them at first hand. Warner is one of a number of younger painters who are exceptionally capable, canny and well informed, which is another good reason for checking out her show.
OVER THE YEARS, DUTCH artists Arno Kramer and Tjibbe Hooghiemstra have built up a significant presence in Ireland, not merely on the basis of sending pieces over for exhibition but in terms of coming here and working. Each has clearly taken to the place to an exceptional degree, the place being generally the western seaboard and the inland regions directly adjacent to it. This is not to say that they have responded in the stock way to the stock attractions; you're not going to find formulaic views of spectacular scenery in anything they do.
They are not directly affiliated and their artistic personalities are quite distinctive, yet they do have a certain amount in common, so the idea of their exhibiting together at the Cavanacor makes sense and, as it happens, the inclusion of Rineke Marsman is also appropriate. Both Kramer and Hooghiemstra tend to work primarily in drawing and watercolour, both have a strong interest in poetry, and artistically they share a reflective, introspective quality. Hence their avoidance of the obvious when it comes to the west of Ireland. They prefer quiet, unnoticed backwaters to tourist haunts, places tinged with melancholy and neglect, but by no means simply sad.
Hooghiemstra prefers to work on paper that already has a history, such as sheets from old ledgers (he has been taken to task by some for dismantling such volumes). This can be viewed as a counterpart to his desire to absorb the history and mood of a place, to visualise a scene in terms of memories and narratives, always glimpsed obliquely, in fragments and perhaps hypothetically. He is not being vague for the sake of it. The point is not to curtail the possibilities, to allow imaginative space for us, the viewers.
Much the same sentiments can be discerned in Kramer's work, though it differs in method and appearance. He often counterpoints passages of very accurate representational drawing with more abstract elements, the latter characterised by repetition and uniformity, as in a honeycomb or some other grid construction. The representational motifs recur: human figures, swans, hares, and dresses have all featured. Often his finished pieces are layered in such a way that it's impossible to grasp any single image on one viewing, and you have to acclimatise yourself and wait for the various elements to disentangle themselves and become visible.
As for their work being melancholy but not sad, while it carries implications of loss as part of the package, it is actually positive overall, evoking a state of dreamy meditation in which past, present and longing are offered for contemplation.
ON THE FACE OF it, Rineke Marsman's work has a more specific historical agenda. Ghostly faces regard us from her canvases, veiled by thin glazes of pigment. They seem to be fading away, drifting into the past, and indeed her original inspiration for the work was a set of photographs of Jewish children deported during the second World War. Her project since has widened to incorporate people who disappear in more general contexts, and also the idea of the disappearance of who we once were. It is in all a beautifully balanced, quietly persuasive exhibition.
Patricia Burns's Redemption Road at the Ashford Gallery ventures into comparable territory. Her paintings take the subject of home in terms of views of houses, often seen by night, promising refuge and comfort. It is a good idea but alas the delivery is flawed. She has not managed to find a technique appropriate to her aims, opting for a half-hearted variation on Gerhard Richter's blurred photographic look. The result is that the impact is dissipated and the paintings are largely unresolved.
