Spotlight Reviews

Gallerie at Opaline/Burlington
www.opalinevt.com, www.benningtoncenterforthearts.org, www.vmga.org/washington/wood.html
Art of Achievement: An Exhibition of Award-Winning Vermont Artists

Paul Aschenbach, Key Slot in Rock, ink on paper, 14 x 17".

Art of Achievement is not a definitive presentation of Vermont Art—the constraints of the curatorial framework perhaps made that an impossible goal. Forty years ago, a group of citizens, with the backing of the state legislature, sought to offer financial support for the too-often underserved and underrecognized community of visual artists in Vermont. Anyone who values the vibrancy of Vermont’s art scene owes the Vermont Arts Council no small debt of gratitude.

Over the years, by bestowing awards on a select group of artists, the Vermont Arts Council helped to define and legitimize certain artists. In honor of the Council’s 40th anniversary, Margaret Lampe Kannestine, a recipient of a 2002 Citation of Merit, was invited to curate an exhibition of work by honorees.

The art is exhibited without narrative, explanation, or grouping. The one exception is a series of black-and-white works that represent the rich tradition of printmaking in Vermont. The cluster of five works includes a harrowing, moody, and dark lithograph by Rockwell Kent titled Merry Christmas (13 x 9.25", lithograph, 1951). Two etchings by renowned landscape painter Luigi Lucioni demonstrate the artist’s heightened sense of realism. In Trees and Mountains (8.75 x 11", etching, 1937), two trees stand aside a winding mountain road, a field overlooks the valley below, and mountains rise off in the distance. Lucioni’s nearly photographic attention to detail provides the viewer with a peak into the past, to a landscape that is no longer there. Mary Azarian is a contemporary printmaker whose At Sixty (14 x 17.75", woodblock on paper) shows an older woman standing amid the branches of a leafless tree. The woman, rendered in Azarian’s customary dark, thick lines, is holding onto an older branch as she glances toward her future.

The exhibit contains a number of pieces by artists one doesn’t often get to see in Vermont. Orv’s Barn, Marlboro (11 x 14", pastel on paper) is a classic example of work by the grandmaster of Vermont landscape painting Wolf Kahn. Francis Hewitt is represented by the geometric abstract Vermont Sunset Postcard (paper painting), a work that exemplifies the artist’s phenomenal comprehension of light and color. Early modern works include WPA artist Ronald Slayton’s 1937 painting The Idea (oil on canvas, 1937), which shows a collagelike painting of a face with two mouths, a fist above, a hand pointing up below, and a brilliant moonscape in the distance.

Mary Azarian, At Sixty, woodblock on paper, 14 x 17 3/4".

Each year, Vermont continues to produce art and artists of high caliber. Notable newer work from the exhibit included Jonathan Gregg’s semi-abstract gestural drawing of an angel, Guardian (20 x 28", drawing, 2003), and a monoprint by Louise von Weise, We Fools (10.5 x10", 2004), which shows her remarkable sense of composition. Perhaps Art of Achievement will inspire a future curator to look seriously at the evolution of art in Vermont and present a more meaningful exploration of the subject. The genuine contribution Vermont artists have made to the evolution of art history and practice would make rich subject matter.

[Art of Achievement will be on view at the Bennington Center for the Arts June 11 to July 30, 2005. The exhibit debuted at the T.W. Wood Gallery in Montpelier in March 2005.] Ric Kasini Kadour