Art History

Lauralee Franco: Bringing the internal and external together

Creating gesture,Lauralee Franco: Bringing the internal and external together Articles motion, energy and space on canvas is the objective of Lauralee Franco’s oil paintings. “I use paint to begin a conversation,” Franco says, and that conversation is conducted through a juxtaposition of textures, colors and forms. From outdoor scenes composed of soft lines and blocks of tone to abstract works that bring internal moods and emotions to vivid external life, the artist is constantly balancing contrasts, giving her work a liveliness that draws the viewer in. Franco also notes that dance has been a strong influence on the rhythm of her paintings, and the physical freedom found in dance is reflected in their dynamic brushstrokes and vibrant color combinations.

But the energy of the artist’s work goes hand in hand with harmony. Her balanced compositions give a unity and order to each image, placing their contrasts in a framework that renders them all the more powerful. “I hope to illuminate our true desires,” she says, and her paintings shed new light on the secrets that lie within us. Franco lives and works in Sea Cliff, Long Island.

Exhibition Dates: April 1, 2017 – April 21, 2017

Reception: Thursday, April 6, 6:00pm – 8:00pm

Gallery Hours: Tues-Sat 11:00am – 6:00pm

Gallery Location: 530 West 25th St, Chelsea, New York

Event URL: http://www.agora-gallery.com/artistpage/Lauralee_Franco.aspx

Featured Artists:

Contemporary Perspectives

About the Exhibition

Contemporary Perspectives: The New Art History

Agora Gallery is pleased to present Contemporary Perspectives, a new collective exhibition highlighting all the ways which show that the past and present are in constant dialogue. Contemporary Perspectives assembles a small group of artists who approach classic subject matter with fresh eyes. Their work contains echoes of art history while managing to be entirely forward-thinking.

Half of the six featured artists work in oil. One depicts romantic landscapes as a series of highly stylized, streamlined patterns. The second paints florals, with an updated hyperrealism and irregular canvases. The third paints portraits that are composed as traditional reverential busts. However the colors are saturated, the body language is animated, and her subjects are women of color, a historically overlooked group. There are two acrylic painters: one creates dramatic visions of completely imaginary forests, and another places realistic figures in foggy, abstracted landscapes. The last artist works in ink and mixed-media to create meticulous botanicals that recall both scientific catalogues and the watercolor works of nineteenth-century leisure painters.

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Jazz, Painters, and Comic Strips: The Work of Gail Comes

Growing up on the Upper West Side of Manhattan,Jazz, Painters, and Comic Strips: The Work of Gail Comes Articles Gail Comes was nurtured by jazz musicians, dancers, actors, writers, and painters. This world sparked her curiosity, but it was an unlikely pairing—John Coltrane and Michelangelo, van Gogh, Bacon—that set her on her artistic path. Taking added inspiration from R. Crumb and the sights and sounds of the city, Comes pursued her craft, studying anatomy and drawing through her teenage years at the Art Students League. These influences—jazz, comics, and legendary painters—are ever-present in her work.

Bold lines are a hallmark of Comes’ oil paintings, linking her work, binding realism to the semi-abstract, the surreal, and those paintings that hover between art nouveau and graphic novel. Occasionally her figures burst with jazz-like improvisations, bursts of rich colors. Other times they are muted, melancholy. Some exist in a sublime peace. When asked why she paints these figures, Comes replied, “I see a body or a face that grabs me and I try to grab it back!”

Gail Comes lives and works in New York.