Art Beat: Exploring reveries, self-reflection, and nightmares

Deviating from the norm, this week’s look at the arts will not be a lengthy in-depth approach focusing on a singular exhibition. Instead, it will be a short trilogy of sorts, looking at but a few works of art in three different venues that are the highlights of their respective shows. But enough exposition…

“William Shattuck: Reveries,” currently on display in the New Bedford Whaling Museum’s Big Braitmayer Gallery, is an enticing and lush exhibition which highlights some truly extraordinary paintings by one of the elder statesmen of the regional art community.

Shattuck is not a plein air painter “by any means,” but he does spend a good deal of time walking through the fields, woods and marshes of southeastern Massachusetts, considering the nexus between land, water and sky.

He does not paint in nature as a traditional plein air artist would, but rather seems to absorb the essence of nature and reimagine it in a new way, that weds the muscle memory of an experienced painter with a certain preternatural sense of something that doesn’t quite exist in this reality.

“Reveries” is a perfect name for the exhibition, as Shattuck’s landscapes resonate with a vibrant daydream transcendence. His “Pilgrim’s Progress,” a reference to John Bunyan’s 1678 Christian allegory “The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World, to That Which is to Come,” could very well be a cover illustration for the famed book.

The protagonist, Christian, seeks the Shining Light of Paradise. Shattuck’s painting manifests that heavenly glow as if it were fact itself, if one but stays on the path.

With his “Flood,” Shattuck depicts the trees, reeds and rocky outcroppings of an island, with an ethereal luminescence above it, all perfectly reflected in the water below, as still as a looking glass. As in all the paintings in the exhibition, magic seems just below the surface and if a mythological sea god or a Tolkienesque dragon were to emerge from the still water, it would fit right into that world.

Meanwhile across town in the South End’s Kilburn Mill, gallerist Judith Klein is displaying her own work, much of it freshly minted. To a degree, the exhibition is a bit of a placeholder in anticipation of a “Holiday Exhibit,” which will open in early December and feature the work of Klein’s malleable stable of artists, including Phyllis Dobbyn Adams, Ron Lister, Anthony Miraglia, Kathy Miraglia, Adrian Tio and a few others.

As to the new work that Klein is currently showing, they are indications of a sense of hopefulness in response to a few years of world-weariness fed by pandemic, war, gun violence, political insurrection, and social unrest.

She responds to it all with two paintings with collaged upon elements. “Focal Point” features a hand touching a glowing orange orb that is as promising as a sunrise while in “Bluebird,” the feathered songstress stares off into the distance, as if looking for answers.

By the time this writing sees publication, trick-or-treating and costume parties will be done with and the Halloween-themed exhibitions that have become staples at many galleries will have closed.

“Nightmares and Dreamscapes” at Gallery X is no exception. As might be expected, monsters, skeletons, fantastic creatures and devils were heavily featured but in a number of cases, it was the more firmly-rooted-in-reality work that was jolting.

Eileen Riley exhibited an assemblage that featured a blue-skinned Barbie, bare except for some golden armor, with the head of a bat. But this Batgirl is no protector of Gotham City. It’s implied that she may not be ready for that kind of superheroics with the title: “Major Manic Episode,” as it acknowledges that what occurs in the mind can be more disturbing than what doesn’t.

J. Brian Clarkmore’s “Intrusive Thoughts” depict a naked man huddled in a corner, his head buried between his knees, as if trying to escape the darkness that encroaches upon him.

“Tetanus” by Zachary White is a morass of rusting nails, screws, staples and scraps of wire encased in a transparent block. It’s an aspic of agony.

“William Shattuck: Reveries” is on display at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, 16 Johnny Cake Hill, New Bedford until December 30.

“The Art of Judith Klein” is on display at the Judith Klein Art Gallery, Kilburn Mill, Suite 287, 127 West Rodney French Blvd., New Bedford until early December.

Gallery X is located at 169 William Street, New Bedford. The current exhibition, “Recycled Art,” will be on display until November 27.

This article originally appeared on The Herald News: Art Beat explores work of William Shattuck, Judith Klein, Gallery X