Exhibitions

DECONSTRUCTING LANDSCAPES

Lilienthal Gallery / 23 Emory Pl. July 11 - September 30th

Ann Marie Auricchio, David Butler, David Underwood, Gary Heatherly, Joseph Ashman, Micah Ofstedahl, Paul Paiement

Appalachia’s sprawling beauty has captured the imagination of artists for centuries, finding profound experiences within the environment. The Romantics, lovers of the Sublime, and the influential Hudson River School all depicted mountainous landscapes in their classically inclined compositions. Landscape art played an important role in the preservation of the Smoky Mountains, saving them from development, and instead establishing them as a National Park.

Though a favored historical genre, landscape paintings persist in the contemporary milieu through reimagined configurations. This deconstruction of the natural world can be seen first through impressionism’s thick, imprecise brushstrokes. Modernism developed complete abstraction, depicting nature through color fields and geometric shapes with seeming detachment to reality.

The technological revolution of the last hundred years has radically shifted humanity’s relationship with nature, forcing artists to reexamine their perspectives as they experience an era unlike any other.