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| Although Mark Greenwold’s
densely structured figurative paintings may first draw one’s attention due to
the ingenuity with which the artist constructs and deploys pictorial space, the
works’ meanings do not become clear until one has begun to delve into the implied
narrative between characters within the canvas. Drawn irrevocably into the tangles
of human intimacy, Greenwold is particularly involved in the interpersonal dynamics
of family life: its needs, desires, fears, pitfalls and revelations. He is at
his best when the insights he provides thrust his subjects’ (often including himself)
primal fears into the foreground of a claustrophobic suburban existence, and he
does not shirk at revealing the suddenness with which our obsessions can transform
us into pathetic and/or violent creatures. In his most recent paintings, such
as The Addiction of Innocence, Greenwold mixes the sources of his imagery in such
a way that the intimate details of life overlap with other references that seem
to be either more casual (incorporating portraits of friends) or else bordering
on the fantastic (children depicted as angels), forming a potent and invariably
compelling psychological brew. (excerpt from Dan Cameron's catalog essay, click to see full text) |
