Art visual np2

Erik Feely at 101 Art Gallery Doubles Line The paintings of Erik Feely walk a fine line. They travel, tirelessly, through Dante's dark wood, the setting of The Inferno . Here, no traveller returns. Light and dark meet: they form the central crisis and theme. The palette becomes a kind of Technicolor explosion, a kaleidoscope of embers which retreat, hotly, into a classical sense of painting. This is still, perfectly composed and--without a doubt--great work from an artist who is in dialogue with the Baroque painters and others. All Soul's Night, St Joseph Feely also regards his work as a battle of ideas. "The things I read gradually pervade my process and the final product, in this case my art, is the result of an anxious battle between intellectual actions and visceral rejections," he says in a preview for his recent show at 101 Art Galley .  "I like making things, beautiful things if possible or at least meaningful things. I believe in the studio. I like the id...

Jasmine Thomas-Girvan's Gardening in the Tropics Sculpture Photo by Michelle Jorsling, courtesy y art gallery. How to describe it? The extraordinary work of Jasmine Thomas-Girvan, who twists pieces of palm fronds into tongues of flame, who places a cage within a cage within a cage, whose human figures twist into tortured, glorious creatures: bodies illuminated by the mahogany that encases them? I am referring, of course, to Thomas-Girvan's most recent show held at the Y Art and Framing Gallery at Taylor Street, Port of Spain. The show took its title from Olive Senior's now classic collection of poetry and fused poetry with sculpture to create meditations that, for me, were profound and deeply affecting. This was work commenting on society: Caribbean and beyond (Thomas-Girvan was born in Jamaica but lives in Trinidad). Consider 'Seeing Red', a lacquered box painted post-box red (of is it blood red?) with a figure sitting with legs split atop it, fingers to its ears. ...

Glass ceiling: 'Shattered' by Linda Ahwal-Kowlessar, 2004, tempered glass, currently on display at the 'Women in Art' exhibition at the National Museum and Art Gallery. *** THE IDEA that art can have a gender: that the sexes approach art differently and that the products of male and female artists differ in clear ways is one that some people still seem to cling to. Consider VS Naipaul’s latest comments which have triggered controversy (and at least one cool feature on the UK’s Guardian website). In an interview at the Royal Geographic Society at the UK on Tuesday, Naipaul was asked if he considered any woman writer his literary match. He replied: “I don’t think so.” Of Jane Austen—whose work he has dismissed as “gossip” —he said he “couldn’t possibly share her sentimental ambitions, her sentimental sense of the world”. Naipaul said he felt that women writers were “quite different”: “I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woma...

Two figures (likely male, though possibly female) are upside-down. They wear t-shirts (or are they robes? Kurtas?) that hang with v-shaped necklines over their chests. On closer inspection, the 'v's are more like arches that look something like this { as opposed to < (or rather ^). The two arches that serve as necklines are, on closer inspection, also different. One is slightly pointed (or more pointed, more pointedly). One arch is arguably Muslim in style (though I will not vouch for this), the other is possibly Hindu or Christian. One is filled with silver glitter, the other gold. This is a description of the kind of play that happens when you encounter a piece in The Ideal Marriage , a new exhibition by Ashraph at Y Art and Framing Gallery at 26 Taylor Street, Woodbrook. The piece described above is completed with two drawings of the same arches meeting at the bottom of the canvas with a small circle (ring, eye, egg) inside. The show, said to be in the works for "a c...

IF A SINGLE dish can define a restaurant, then for Chaud Creole it must be the corn soup. This is not corn soup as you know it. This is corn soup broken down, post-modern style, analysed and reassembled into something fun, fresh and completely unexpected once plated in front of you. Corn soup purists everywhere may be slightly alarmed at this. But they have no reason to fear. Here is a soup where the solid ingredients (silky dumplings, christophine, potato and vegetables) have been uprooted, revived through their exile and then re-introduced to the corny goodness. The vegetables were cooked separately, plated and then the corn-soup itself thrown over them like a ridiculously rich sauce. This allowed each ingredient to maintain its integrity; for flavours to pop in the maize stew and, thus, avoided the sometimes bland melding together that tends to happen in a long-gestating broth. It was absolute genius to have this dish unfold. Here was a traditional local dish, re-invented in a way ...

Adam Williams works in clay. These are from a recent outdoor show in Toronto. SEE MORE here . READ a review of Adam's work, based on one of his annual shows, here . CHECK an interview with the artist here . ***

  Inside the National Academy for the Performing Arts, Port of Spain on Friday. To say it got mixed reviews is an understatement. Some people loved it. Others hated it. I wish I had seen all of it. But of what I saw, the following moments from the opening cultural show for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting stood out most: 1. Dave Williams was golden. He performed a shortened version from the opening act of his 'Scan-creation, civilisation, anarchy' piece. Unlike when he performed the full version of this piece at Queen's Hall earlier this year where he was draped in red , Williams was clothed in gold. It's a good thing too because under the lighting at the $518 million National Academy for the Performing Arts, we could barely see him. However, his moment was a triumph of technique and concentration; he quite literally placed everything in the hands of the world leaders gathered on stage before him. I wish he got to stay on longer though.   2. The poui trees a...

These are ordinary objects. Cups, vases, dishes and bowls sit silently on tables set up in an airy space at a house in Diego Martin. But the pieces at Adam Williams' annual studio sale, which was held yesterday, are touched with the specific vision of an artist striving to ennoble the everyday. This is the work of a painter, who uses clay as his canvass to create fine and delicate sensations. Text and texture meet in subtle relationships; colours and palettes blend and ooze secrets--like having a conversation with the artist, meeting his family and chatting with his loved ones. The result is unusual: we encounter ourselves, take away a piece of him and then usher it all into our everyday lives.   Consider the teacup with the protest, "this is not my cup of tea". Or two bowls that look like they have been graffitied by a student given lines to do as punishment in secondary school detention. "I will not speak in class", says one, the other, adds, "I will not ...

From 'Inner Glory' (2009, mixed media) If, as Embah says, art is measuring life, then how do we measure art? Or the artist's engagement with his art, over the years? Can we even measure art at all? Can we measure life at all? What does it mean to say that life is measurable? Do we even have to measure life? Shouldn't we just be living it? These were not the questions that were, at first, at the forefront of my mind as I strolled through Embah's current exhibition 'Measuring Tape' which is enjoying an extended run at the Fernandes Industrial Estate. I'd left work early to stop by before 6pm when the exhibition normally closes. I had decided to convince my dad to come along. He and Embah hit it off instantly, beginning a very long, intense conversation at the front space of what used to house CCA7. As they chatted, I took a look at the work. 'Measuring Tape' is like a retrospective of the artist and his life. There is a deliberate blend of old and...