All but one of the pieces hang on a wall, but many of them curve forcefully away from that surface. The show begins with a Hedieh Javanshir Ilchi triptych that contrasts mosaic-like patterns with watery areas. Equally aquatic, yet fully abstract, is Willem de Looper’s “Trough Blues,” which glows as if sunlight is penetrating its azure currents.
The way those paintings simulate depth complements the fully 3D character of works by Sam Gilliam, Thomas Downing and Polish artist Magdalena Abakanowicz. Gilliam’s two offerings exuberantly loop and roll canvas, wood and metal; one is covered with thickly ridged pigment to add another textural element. Downing’s “Twenty Two” is a shaped-canvas painting in three shades of yellow that looks like a trio of overlapping rectangles but is actually a single, ingeniously fabricated whole. Abakanowicz’s sculpture consists of two layers of natural-hued, burlap-like sisal, with the top ply partly pulled back and curled like patches of dead skin.
Of the show’s two architectonic entries, only one is three-dimensional. Oddly, the piece that isn’t is by Anne Truitt, who is known for her minimalist standing columns. Her “11 Oct. ’70” is a painting on paper, executed in faint stripes of white and pale blue, that appears to depict two towers. Considerably more forceful is Lisa Scheer’s “Leviathan,” whose several steel forms include an angled obelisk. Where other artworks twist toward the viewer, Scheer’s thrusts toward the ceiling. It’s so dynamic that it almost appears to be jumping.
Jump, Twist, Flow … Through Aug. 19 at Hemphill Artworks, 434 K St. NW. hemphillfinearts.com. 202-234-5601.
In separate but neighboring installations at the Museum of Contemporary Art Arlington, Christina P. Day and Steve Wanna offer views into self-enclosed universes. One of them is much bigger, at least in theory, than the other.
Day’s “Depth Cue” centers on a large white box that contains a full-size closet, a light fixture and a bit of hallway. These features are visible only through slits that offer a partial, off-kilter perspective on the confined domestic microcosm. The Philadelphia artist, who works mostly with salvaged material, has also cut pieces of used linoleum into decorative shapes and assembled them into 3D collages; one is a sort of bouquet made of tiles embellished with floral designs. Day’s remaking and repurposing renders everyday materials and spaces gently strange.
Wanna’s “A Vast Expanse” consists of just two elements: a continuous horizontal line of white light that bisects the black walls of the darkened gallery and an oscillating soundscape. The line is fixed in space, but the audio keeps changing; it’s generated live, partly in response to ambient noise registered by a microphone in the room. The inspiration is the event horizon, the border between a black hole and its surroundings.
No one can say whether the local artist’s installation credibly simulates the experience of nearing a black hole, but it does conjure a sense of being on the cusp of something. The piece is womb-like and enveloping, and the sound crackles with anticipation. It’s a place to feel at home, and to get lost.
Christina P. Day: Depth Cue and Steve Wanna: A Vast Expanse Through Aug. 20 at the Museum of Contemporary Art Arlington, 3550 Wilson Blvd., Arlington. mocaarlington.org. 703-248-6800.
Dunn, Gubbiotti, Malis & Uhlir
The four artists of Pazo Fine Art’s “Q&A” are of a similar age — mostly in their 40s — and all have ties to the Washington area, where three now live. Stylistically, however, they diverge.
Brian Michael Dunn makes pattern paintings that double as gentle landscapes. Jason Gubbiotti (who lives in France) constructs paintings on wood that emphasize their own physical attributes. Jon Malis produces digital prints of color charts and other hard-edge ready-made abstractions. Eric Uhlir paints jam-packed expressionist scenes that appear fleshy even when they don’t literally depict the human body.
The works, assembled by curator Mandy Cooper, overlap here and there. Gubbiotti’s “Raising Butterflies,” whose surface is mostly raw plywood, includes wing shapes that dovetail with Dunn’s flowers, berries and, yes, butterflies. A black-and-white chart rendered by Malis complements Gubbiotti’s “Grey Life,” a single-hued expanse punctuated by straight lines and incised notches. The density of Uhlir’s loose, hot-colored compositions corresponds to the intricacy of Dunn’s cooler, tidier pictures. The four artists may not have much in common aesthetically, but the pieces in this show do have a few things to say to each other.
Brian Michael Dunn, Jason Gubbiotti, Jon Malis and Eric Uhlir: Q&A Through Aug. 24 at Pazo Fine Art, 4228 Howard Ave., Kensington. pazofineart.com. 571-315-5279.
Am I the Past, Am I the Future
The 20th annual installment of Transformer’s “Exercises for Emerging Artists” program paired four aspiring local printmakers with four mentors. The resulting show, “Am I the Past, Am I the Future,” demonstrates congruent skills but dissimilar visions.
The funkiest prints are by the Russian-born Varvara Tokareva, whose photo-derived pop-art collages jumble such incongruous figures as Godzilla and Lenin. Korey Richardson realistically portrays the faces of such African American luminaries as Angela Davis and Questlove, but fills their hair with elaborate patterns. Shyama Kuver’s “Wayfinding” series combines images of nature, history and travel to evoke her Indo-Fijian heritage. Natural forms also feature in the prints of Jeanette Bolden, whose signature element is a mound shape often filled with foliage, but sometimes with machinery.
Also on display is a realistic etching of four nude women by lead mentor Rose Jaffe and two collaborative prints that combine all the artists’ styles and motifs. These seem to express the overall spirit of a show whose prints tend toward assemblage and juxtaposition.
Transformer has one of the city’s smallest exhibition spaces, just a few hundred square feet, yet pursues big ambitions and outcomes. These are showcased in “Transformer 20,” a new book that marks the nonprofit’s 20th anniversary. It functions as a catalogue for the organization’s entire run, but is also stuffed with images, essays and testimonials. As sprawling as the gallery itself is compact, “Transformer 20” is a work of art in itself.
Am I the Past, Am I the Future Through Aug. 19 at Transformer, 1404 P St. NW. transformerdc.org. 202-483-1102.