On the water front

[ ARTS
]

By Reena Dutt
Arizona Daily Wildcat
March 5, 1998

Photo courtesy of Old Pueblo Frameworks and Gallery.
Arizona Daily Wildcat

From Left: Kathi Doudnik, Barbara Lewis, Ann Rodgers, Joan Shaw, Perdita Andrews, Joanne Garry and Lois L. McDonald. The women, along with Cindy Reves and Diana Davis (not pictured) are members of the Southern Arizona Watercolor Guild.

Old Pueblo Frameworks and Gallery, located at 6290 E. Grant Road at Wilmot, is holding "Les Neuf: Nine Views in Watermedia," an exhibit of female artists' work running through the beginning of April. The exhibit is the culmination of a 10-year artistic dialogue between the nine artists, who met through the Southern Arizona Watercolor Guild and have been meeting monthly ever since to discuss ideas, share critiques and encourage each other's work in water mediums.

Each work in the exhibit has a different style, though most pieces draw from similar and familiar subject matter. The artists featured are Lois McDonald, Ann Rodgers, Diana Davis, Joan Shaw, Cindy Reves, Kathi Doudnik, Barbara Lewis, Perdita Andrews and Joanne Garry. Like many Arizona artists, they base their works on the Southwest - more specifically, desert landscape and culture, such as the Old Pueblo.

McDonald uses extreme contrast to present her watercolor paintings. For this exhibit, she displays flowers using vivid colors. One of her paintings, "Sundrenched," has a dark blue background that looks almost like it was painted in oils, while the flowers seem to be transparent, a defined contrast. The painting as a whole is strikingly different from the rest of the works in the exhibit.

All of the other artists also use at least one form of water medium. Garry and Shaw's unique styles come through in their works on display; Garry's painting, "Kokopelli," represents the sharp features of what seems to be Native American artifacts, using layered solid colors one on top of each other, while Shaw delivers her images with a very different technique - simplicity. With "Old Pueblo," her main purpose is to show texture. The piece is realistic; it seems like you could actually step into the small painting. Yet it's not that the painting looks like a photograph - it just feels believable, like something you would picture in a folk tale - simply a home facing a small dirt alley.

The next exhibit to be featured at Old Pueblo Frameworks and Gallery is another group project, although the gallery rarely exhibits more than one artist's work at a time. The show will be entitled "Layered Elements," and will run April 4 through May 1. Until then, you can see Les Neuf's work at the gallery. For gallery hours, call 885-0746.