Marquis Art and Frame, one of the most reliable sources of contemporary regional art for decades, has, as all local gallery-goers know, two campuses, one in Scranton and the other in Wilkes-Barre. Featured this month to the South are three artists of such distinct sensibilities that it is a tribute to Ken Marquis, proprietor, that he can coax such diversity to cohabitate with such pleasing results.
David Hage, Lorraine Elias and Skip Sensbach, who make mixed-media works, paintings and ceramics with mixed media, respectively, are all presented in well-lit conditions and without the sort of crowding that can make some gallery visits as troublesome as a hangover.
Hage, who is an admirably energetic force in the Kingston area, is one of the vanguard thinkers behind the Paper Kite Gallery, the preeminent alternative space in Northeast Pa. The works presented at Marquis are the first large group of his efforts I’ve had the pleasure of studying, and the range of directions and implications bodes well. Most of the pieces carry the delicate balance of form and content well in Rauschenberg-infused combines.
One such work, “Happiness Only Exists When You Have Someone To Share It With” (be prepared to dedicate approximately 25 minutes to reading titles in this show — both Hage and Sensbach are among the wordiest designators in recent memory), might have been just as pleasing — perhaps more — without the figurine adorning the lower frame, but the presence of the plastic doll raises the possibility that the painting behind it is a found object as well. Maybe a piece of paint-peeling sheetrock found in an abandoned Edwardsville domicile, maybe some sensitive brushwork from his own hand — I don’t really know and want to avoid knowing. I do know that he can handle a brush. Throughout the space there are insistent color combinations and vigorous shape-making. “Fertive Woman” may be a joyful little love poem of an image, with its loopy red lines and suggestive doll’s head, but “The Space Between” has an off-handed painterliness that is admirable. All of these works are stimulating in a variety of ways, hinting at religious concepts, sexual tension and a sly range of pictorial interests.
Occupying an adjacent room, along with pottery by Sensbach, are several landscapes by Elias. These range from familiar tourist destinations like Venice and Prague to some much more inventive and seemingly felt beach scenes of “Oceanfront Property.” Unframed — wisely — and settled on ledges, these are remarkable engaging for their size.
Sensbach, a master of fine arts degree candidate at Marywood University, offers the most formally rigorous work in the show. There are, of course, the required examples of functional pottery in one room (a ceramicist is a sculptor who also makes cups and plates — I am told there is a metaphoric centering that takes place behind the potter’s wheel), and in the other, a pleasing limited palette of color and a surprising combination of materials — clay, steel, cast glass and cast concrete — assembled with gravitas. These are smoothly executed geometric volumes that pry open here and there, revealing steel rods in a jumble, evoking movement and staging the evocation of felt time in felt space.
“As it all piles up I wish I didn’t bite my nails,” one of several pieces whose labels strain my 800-word limit, is one such work visiting the intersection of serene planes and rods, spaced harmoniously if somewhat ponderously. It is intriguing that Sensbach, whose pottery in the other room is winning while still very traditional, with familiar shapes and muted tones, produces such structurally inventive spatial ideas in these more overtly sculptural essays. The question of how the steel rods were originally introduced nudges the viewer, but they are certainly necessary as accents to the otherwise gentle rectangles and triangles.
A few of the pieces are much simpler — one is an abbreviated prism form with a rectangular cutaway beneath, that quietly stabilizes itself in a restricted range of earth tones. These simple constructions rise quietly above what could seem a desultory minimalism. How this happens, I’m not sure. I generally tire of illustrations of the notion that, say, a cube will assert itself and define a space. We get it already, and how long can such an experience sustain us anyway? Not the case with Sensbach’s work. They are a real pleasure to engage, and my guess is that ownership is rewarding.
One hopes that Marquis’ public is expanding and that greater numbers of visitors are enjoying the gifted efforts always on view.
This particular show is up through Jan. 2, and the gallery is located upstairs from the frame shop at 122 S. Main St. in Wilkes-Barre. Coming soon, a look at the ongoing Landfill Project sponsored by Marquis at this same location.
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