Cindy Jane's Morphic Adaptations opened Friday night at the Sidney & Berne Davis Art Center. The show exceeded everyone's expectations.
Jane previously confined herself to small and mid-sized canvases. But for this show, the venue demanded that she go bigger. Much, much bigger. The scale of the Davis Art Center's Grand Atrium required Jane to completely revamp her painting style. For the guys out there, what Jane did was tantamount to changing her golf swing or batter's stance in just six month's time.
"Scale makes all the difference," observed urban expressionist Marcus Jansen, whose large scale works demand a commercial warehouse like UNIT A Contemporary Art Space in order to be properly viewed. "Cindy's work has its own vocabulary. She occupies a different position than most of the other artists around here." In fact, in the genre of surrealism, there simply isn't anyone else working in transformative allegories or biomorphic imagery. That not only makes her unique; it imbues her work with artistic importance.
"This series of work is nothing short of amazing," assessed artist Dan Venditti, whose The Burden won Best of Show honors at the Alliance's State of Mind: Politics 2012 show in October. "It's very cohesive. It combines strong imagery with an amazing softness. I've always admired her vision." Venditti also praised Jane's luxuriant palette and gentle transitions.
For his part, fine art photographer Doug Heslep wanted to "crawl inside her brain for just ten minutes." He raved about her saturated, mind-blowing compositional content. "It's hard to take it all in the first time through."
Jane doesn't work from a blueprint or script. Since she comes to the canvas with no preconceived notions, "the shapes in my paintings come up subconsciously," she reveals.
The same thing is true of the names she ultimately confers on each piece. "I don't think The Emergence and then do the painting. Instead, the names come to me as I'm nearing the end of the composition."
Like an exclamation point or hash tag.
By Jane's own characterization, her paintings “delve into a world of transgenic and geomorphic landscapes made up of agglomerative shapes that merge terrestrial, aquatic and celestial environments to create an ambiguous terrain with forms reminiscent of anatomical and botanical structures.” Some of the images that populate these environments include fish, birds and other familiar wild and botanical life. But her compositions also contain imagery that viewers find suggestive, even erotic, which can either be a positive or a detriment depending upon their point of view.
"I think the elements in my paintings that people refer to as erotic are really my way of expressing my feelings about the emergence of life and transformation," Cindy responds expansively. "Many could equally be interpreted as botanical elements, depending on the viewer's response."
But it is ultimately left to the viewer to ascribe meaning to Jane’s poignant and enigmatic landscapes. “I always prefer that the viewers interpret [my imagery] for themselves,” Cindy insists. “I don’t like to impose my meaning on them.”
Instead, her goal is to open a dialogue between viewers and her paintings that they can contemplate for years to come. And that explains why Cindy Jane is clearly emerging as a talent of unique and resolute vision.
Morphic Adaptations will remain on view through February 22. For more information about viewing times, please visit www.sbdac.com or telephone 239-333-1933. To find out more about Cindy Jane and her work, please visit www.cindyjane.com or telephone her at 239 - 994 - 2262.
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