Tim Gardner at 303 Gallery

by Merrily KerrDon't Miss, Hottest ShowPosted on Comments are Disabled

A gold panner in moonlight, a lone boy at a scenic outlook and a camper van headed into the mountains were some of the evocative but lonely subjects of Canadian artist Tim Gardner’s last solo show at 303 Gallery, created during the days of pandemic isolation.  His new watercolor and ink paintings at 303 have subtracted humans from the picture entirely, instead featuring horses, police bikes (minus riders) and flowers.  While the bikes beg the question of where the humans are, Gardner’s horses and flowers have a powerful and lively presence of their own. Here, a cluster of tulips sways in unison, a welcome pronouncement of the arrival of spring and nature’s beauty.  (On view in Chelsea through May 25th).

Tim Gardner, Untitled (garden), watercolor and ink on paper, 11 x 13 ½ inches, 2023.

Hayal Pozanti at Timothy Taylor Gallery

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Although it’s their vibrant color that leaps out, Hayal Pozanti’s oil stick paintings of the natural world rely on shape to reinterpret the landscape as a conduit to emotional states.  Over many years, Pozanti has devised her own language of forms, here rendered in curving and organic masses as blushing, enormous pink flowers. Via her new, large-scale paintings at Timothy Taylor Gallery’s new Tribeca location, the artist not only celebrates her recent move to the Vermont countryside but explores how intense color can release strong feeling. (On view through May 27th).

Hayal Pozanti, Magic Music We Make With Our Lips, oil stick on linen, 2023.

Ho Jae Kim at Harper’s Gallery

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Ho Jae Kim’s new paintings at Harper’s Gallery in Chelsea manifest a divine light perceived just beyond reach through archways or stage backdrops.  As he was preparing work for this show, this young Brooklyn-based artist’s step-father ended his own life, prompting Kim’s desire to help his family heal and appreciate the beauty of life.  Inspired by Dante’s vision of supernatural light as he ascended from the Inferno to Purgatory in ‘The Divine Comedy,’ Kim announces the arrival of hope through floods of bright color that counter the literal deep waters surrounding the marooned character in this painting.  (On view through May 6th).

Ho Jae Kim, Day 19: Wilson, oil, inkjet transfer, enamel and paper on canvas, 2023.

Clare Rojas at Andrew Kreps Gallery

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The title of Bay Area artist Clare Rojas’ show at Andrew Kreps Gallery, ‘Go Placidly,’ captures the quiet and restrained feel of paintings featuring a reserved, dark-haired woman.  It also casts an ominous pall on this painting, ‘They Were Both Stuck Inside,’ in which it appears that a woman who has fallen from a ladder (perhaps in an interaction with the bird in the background) has ‘gone’ in a final way.  Complicated by a tiny mosquito which has landed on the woman’s leg, the painting’s narrative – perhaps best explained by a book on the back table titled ‘The Same Old’ – suggests that sometimes the unexpected arrives in a profoundly impactful way.  (On view through May 6th).

Clare Rojas, They Were Both Stuck Inside, oil on linen, 60 x 43 1/8 inches, 2022.

Jaime Miranda-Bambaren in Foley Square and Thomas Paine Park

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Surrounded by the notable buildings of downtown Manhattan’s civic center, Jaime Miranda-Bambaren’s sculptures crafted from the roots of felled Peruvian trees add an additional historic component to the urban landscape.  Scattered around Foley Square and neighboring Thomas Paine Park and located in front of New York’s most prominent courthouses, 13 spheres sculpted from the abandoned root systems of illegally felled Peruvian trees act as witness to destruction but also offer hope.  Titled 13 Moons (Seeds), the sculptures represent the regenerative possibilities of nature.  (Join an architecture tour and see the pieces in person!  On view through June 20th in Foley Square).

Jaime Miranda-Bambaren, installation view of 13 Moons (Seeds) in April 2023 in Foley Square, Manhattan.