Martinho Correia’s artwork results from rigorous, directed observation of the human form using only the artist’s eyes, wits, and knowledge. His artwork is both classical and realist – a fantastic, systematic, and radical example of art that is a new image, from new images as experienced by the artist. We should note the very long academic tradition of art that that implies, and how such artworks take quite a long time to create. Thus it may be most accurate for us to recognize that Correia’s work results from thousands of studies of his models, many visual exposures combined into one coherent new image. Such age-old painting traditions allow Correia’s work to be astoundingly realistic, making every muscle, structure and texture of the human form’s representation lead to a distinct and delicate psychology. By focusing on the perceptual, Correia’s work makes it possible for us to feel that we are immediately in the presence of the portrait, the figure, and the humanity of each individual in his art.

Gregory Scheckler’s work connects with trends in many of the other artists’ methods. Like Grass and Correia, he relies on renaissance, academy, and realist traditions of working from observation. But his artwork also collages field study, photography, and images from art of the past. For example, in ‘Study after Prud’hon with Multiple Nuclear Reactions,’ three images juxtapose: a painting inspired by a famous academy drawing by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon; next to a night view of the aurora borealis (from photos Scheckler took in Wisconsin); beneath which is a lightning storm (based on plein aire studies of storms here in the Berkshires). The repetition of S-curves creates literal and formal connections among the three sets of imagery, a shared patterning. Unlike Correia’s and most of Grass’s work, which each in their combinations harmonize into one new image, Scheckler’s artworks create a sense of divergence by juxtaposing multiple images, presenting parallels or multiple drafts of thoughts. In a world where it seems we are always multitasking, such multiple narratives (or pictures-within-pictures) can sometimes be a highly realistic way of representing reality. This tactic dates back to predella panels and multiple inlays such as in Renaissance altarpieces and frescoes.

Barry Goldstein’s exacting compositions create paralleled diptychs, by adding a written interview of each sitter, placed on the wall next to each photo. This provides us new insights into each sitter’s complex, unseen state of mind over a time period that was not included in the photo itself. The photograph contains a specific exposure, whereas the interviews contain an entirely different time exposure. When these two exposures are combined, we find a real human interaction and questioning between the artist and the subject. These are touching and often difficult stories that relate closely to our terrifying human capacity for war, specifically recent conflict in Iraq. Trained as a physician and biophysicist, Dr. Goldstein’s techniques bring forward a focused, case-study approach to complex international events. This humanizes these events, and helps us see them in the form of humane stories. Another aspect that humanizes these portraits is their connection with historical images. Goldstein’s use of a profoundly dark background reflects Rembrandt’s many portraits, as well as Caravaggio’s preferences.

Kevin Grass works from a disparate combination of observation plus purely invented imagery. Where Correia’s work leans towards perceptual realism, Grass’s leans towards a conceptual realism. For example, the figure in ‘Ascension’ is based on a series of his own self-portrait studies that he later adapted here, into a new and difficult spiritual statement about a mortality constrained, yet nonetheless at peace. With its intense, invented blue background color, the artwork stands firmly within Northern Renaissance conceptual traditions. Thus his artistic message aims less at the specific, realist individual and more towards a spiritual content that can apply to many people. His skull drawing shows a quite vivid example of this dual tension between what an artist sees (percept) versus what an artist knows (concept) – literally a cutaway approach to form that is not possible without significant anatomical understanding, an imagined x-ray vision. This drawing too is partially a self-portrait. Similarly his drawing ‘Manifestations of Belief’ reminds us of Gombrich’s questions regarding how different cultures represent human concerns, aiming toward humanity’s seemingly universal interactions with religion’s many iterations. Grass’s art gains a dreamlike quality thanks to the incredibly imaginative use of the artist’s choice to tip the art’s balance towards concept a bit more than percept.

Kay Canavino worked from the invisible. She took the darkness of night, when we are normally near-blind, and dramatically altered it by using her innovative light-painting technique to enliven each portrait. These are also people who are invisible to most of us, night workers. We sleep while they work. Thus we gain drama, as if the person is emerging from an unknown world of shadows or darkened dreams, the lonely quiet of night. The art also reveals a critical aspect of humanity: how we alter our environments to suit our needs, dotting the darkness with our own miniature stars that allow us to see. You might in this artwork discover a more sinister, brooding variation of ex-President George H.W. Bush’s frequent calls for a ‘thousand points of light.’

Jane Catlin’s paintings may seem the most distant from the other artworks in this exhibit, as hers is the only work here that does not rely on traditional figurative representations. Instead, Catlin developed her abstractions out of her rigorous study of the body’s internal biology and chemistry – images normally unseen by human vision. Like Kevin Grass’s work, Catlin’s aims towards a sense of the universal – in this case the biology we all share. Her piece ‘Cosmos’ links interior humanity with sources in the universe – that the same basic principles of chemistry and physics that serve our bodies also apply to a larger cosmos, or vice-versa – reminding us that the atoms we are made from are the result of distant explosive supernovae creating carbon, iron and other heavier atoms out of lightweight hydrogen and helium. Catlin’s abstractions aim towards events that you cannot usually see with the naked eye, punctuated by realistic natural-science observations. As a result, her artwork leads us to consider the interdependence of ourselves and the environment.

Laura Christensen uses a subtle version of juxtaposition and layering, combining found art, such as antique photos, with hand-crafted original adaptations in oil paint and fine woodworking. Often in Christensen’s artwork you cannot easily distinguish the old from the new, or what is realistic versus what is fantastic. These questions may cause you to wonder about the role of invention in our memories and willingness to make-believe. This can result in a great deal of wry humor, perhaps especially evident in her work ‘Shifts and Thrushes.’ Because of the work’s sliding door mechanism, you can literally see only half of the artwork at a time, and you must use your memory to consider relationships between the halves. This strategy allows Christensen’s work to cut to the very core of Ernst Gombrich’s “making and matching” thesis, which literally becomes a necessary, physical aspect of your interaction with her art. There are no passive interactions with such art, nor to the deeper symbolic content of her images. As such, Christensen’s artworks not only reflect the humane, but also cause the viewer to enact it.