Edward Thorpe Gallery Presents NEW WORK NEW YORK

Edward Thorp Gallery is pleased to announce New Work New York an exhibit showcasing five painters. The works selected highlight the complex range of subject matter and technical approach in recent painting. A diverse array of images culled from daily life, inner imaginary realms and contemplative gestures are reflected and delivered with verve, mystery and humor.

Farrell Brickhouse's narrative paintings engage the viewer through an intimacy of scale combined with a limitless depth of perception. Resonant surfaces are achieved by an unexpected melding of materials such as oil paint and glitter. The barely legible figures that emerge are celebrating our everyday experiences and illuminate the magic that lurks within the commonplace.

Sarah Gamble's new paintings reflect her continued desire for blending a patterned abstraction with representation. Eyes, hints of bodies, and faces lurk behind veils of pattern, a narrative cohesion is suggested but never fully achieved. Gamble disguises, the reality that appears briefly in her work with a mystery and humor. Her works conjure an alternate mystical reality.

In Andrea Belag's deceptively playful paintings on wood panels strokes of semi- translucent color accomplish an eloquent and expressive surface. A lexicon of marks is created via a contemplative yet physical discipline that combine with the surface grain of the wood. The results produce an unexpected and immediate statement on the creative process.

Billy Copley's non-functioning "bags" are a perceptively crafted comment on function, desire and transience in society. These objects are structured from heavy watercolor paper then collaged with strips of hand painted Japanese mulberry papers for the highly colorful finish. The results are candy colored pop statements that elevate often-discarded blights on society into loaded decorative objects.

Brimming with vigor, Judith Simonian's paintings present us with a multifaceted interplay between perceived space, residual memory, and technical prowess. Interiors and landscapes produce unsettling, alienating and often hallucinatory territories. Physical objects and locations are incessantly interrupted or even decimated by the introduction of light and color. Her work removes the distinctions between the internal and external realms, real and imagined spaces, and creates a radiant but fractured world.