Crawl Space: March 2021

East Nashville   

The highlight of the March gallery scene is the pair of exhibits at The Red Arrow Gallery. I recently read a description of Paul Collins’ creative practice in which the word “diaristic” caught my eye — it captures both Collins’ everyday subject matter and observational gaze so precisely. Collins’ point of view is the strongest aspect of his work, giving his paintings, drawings and sculptures conceptual depth while also informing a recognizable style that’s offhand, but always thoughtful and sincere. Again, that description of his art fits so well because his work always reads like notes he’s taken during the day — stuff he saw, things he did. His new series of avian watercolors will look very familiar to Nashvillians who might have gotten a kick out of all the winter bird-watching the recent blizzards brought us. Collins also noticed the chromatic pop of crimson cardinals flitting through the falling white; the puffed-up orange chests of cold-weather robins; black squadrons of starlings lighting on bare branches. These works are full of color and dynamically abstracted. The overall effect is buoyant and joyful, and right on time for those of us who are sensing an oncoming case of spring fever.  

Sharing the Red Arrow space with Collins is Matt Christy, whose creative practice is multidisciplinary. Painting, poetry, live performance, movies and animation are all included in his overall body of work — Christy and his artist-brother Joe even teamed up to write a novel in 2020. Christy’s works at Red Arrow are oil-pastel transfers, which utilize drawing techniques to create colorful monoprints: First, Christy covers a piece of paper with oil-pastel crayons. He covers that with another blank piece of paper that he makes an abstract drawing on. As he presses his pencil into one side of the paper, the other side adheres to the pastels on the paper beneath it. When Christy peels up the top sheet, it reveals a full-color version of his drawing on the opposite side of the paper. It’s an interestingly indirect way to make a drawing, and it’s a technique that introduces a fair amount of randomness into the mix. I suspect that’s what appeals to Christy, whose aesthetic has always trended away from perfectionist impulses in favor of inexact techniques and unpredictable materials. It’s the same reason that Christy’s live performances at his last Red Arrow show were of the improvisational variety. Christy isn’t making these drawings as much as he’s discovering them. The works in this show feature flowing lines and biomorphic forms — you could be looking at topographical maps or at specimens on microscope slides. Christy’s show is sort of fun, sort of weird, and pretty gorgeous as the inconsistencies in the transfer technique result in surprisingly complex renderings of relatively simple abstract line drawings. Collins’ Cardinal Shift and Christy’s Muscle Spasm will open with an artist reception Saturday, March 6, from 6 to 9 p.m. Both shows run through March 28.  

Wedgewood-Houston  

Linda King Ferguson’s new show at Channel to Channel opens Thursday, March 4. Ferguson’s The Waiting Room features the artist’s painted textile wall sculptures. These elemental abstracts deploy a muted palette of oranges, pinks and purples in squares and circles and triangles. Some are very minimal acrylic-on-linen paintings, but many are shaped and feature cutout sections and exposed, raw linen. Ferguson does a lot with a little, and this sharp show balances its formalist preoccupations right at the tipping point between painting and sculpture.   

KT Duffy’s Cataclysm/Catechism opens at Coop on Saturday night. The Chicago-based new-media artist uses installation, sculpture, animation, printing, audio, video and even interactive web-based works to explore the idea that we are increasingly ensconced in microcultures, where every individual has their own separate and unique perspective on the nature of reality. It’s a super timely theme — you were warned about your social media bubbles.  

Open Gallery is exhibiting a display of work by artist-in-residence Allison Woods. Woods is an interdisciplinary artist, and this show of recent work focuses on the intersection of her fine art and her work as a photojournalist.  

Zeitgeist Gallery will continue its excellent display of new creations from Alicia Henry. Alicia Henry: 2020 and 2021 features the artist’s signature wall-sculpture masks, which are some of the most iconic works being made by any Nashville artist.  

David Lusk Gallery will continue its display of photos by the legendary Memphis photographer William Eggleston. These snaps of life in the Mississippi Delta circa 1990 capture small town life in big, bold color. The gallery will open two new painting shows by Rana Rochat and Mary Sims on Wednesday, March 17. 

Downtown 

Tinney Contemporary opened a new show of abstract works by Scott Andresen on Wednesday, March 3, but will not host a reception on Saturday night. I want to call Andresen’s show a painting exhibition — it does include stretched canvases colored with hushed tones of muted color. But the gestures that flow and mutate across the surfaces of these works aren’t rendered in textural brushstrokes. Andresen uses transparent silk veils held in place with metallic threads to create these designs. The threads lend their own shiny markings to the overall composition, but they also mend the torn spaces in the veils. These restorative techniques give Beyond Repair its themes of healing during this time of widespread illness and anxiety. This show is also the first curatorial effort from Tinney Contemporary’s new gallery manager, Joshua Edward Bennett. The show is viewable by appointment.