Introduction

Lynette M.F. Bosch, 2011

It seems to me, that the paintings we see here depict a series of turning points in life -- pivotal moments of transition, where complex and conflicting emotion are offered or rejected and are presented for the spectator to complete -- with meaning and significance or identification -- as they wish.

Tension or expectation is evident in the interaction between participants, with these tensions and expectations indicating underlying conflicts. The conflicts come with the presence of second or third participants, present or implied, as it is the introduction of others that brings complexity. Sometimes, the others are not other people but other desires, agendas, plans, hopes...

The simple emotional offerings from one person to another are not received as they are given. Instead, that which is freely and overtly given meets with covert rejections of different kinds -- and because they are covert -- become complex with the unspoken and unrevealed that is nonetheless present.

Only the offerings are evident -- on the surface -- the rejections are subterranean -- but not subconscious. The rejections of offerings presented in this series of depicted moments of transition must not be openly expressed because they emerge from secret lives of the mind and the heart that cannot be brought to the surface and expressed. Because that which is hidden, once expressed, would ruin the offering of that which will not be accepted. Yet while that which is offered is not desired, that it be offered is nonetheless wanted.

The whole series is about hide and seek between the emotionally paralyzed and those who are emotionally alive, which is exactly what life and love are...

CATALOG CONTRIBUTORS

Stanley Crouch is an American poet, music and cultural critic, syndicated columnist, and novelist, perhaps best known for his jazz criticism and his novel Don't the Moon Look Lonesome?

Serge Gavronsky is a poet, novelist, professor and chair of the French department at Barnard College. Recent publications include poetry collection, And Or The, and novel, The Sudden Death of...

Lynette M.F. Bosch is Professor of Art History at SUNY, Geneseo, and author of Cuban-American Art In Miami: Exile, Identity And The Neo-Baroque.