Tim White
HUGO DE PAGANO GALLERY

At first glance these smallish painting appear as enigmatic abstractions. resonating with subtle chiaroscuro. Soft lights and streaky shadows play across their surfaces, with dark streaks of imagery submerged beneath textural layers of translucent glazes. They are not unlike the surface of a lake after the first hard freeze or two when ice has immobilized all upper turbulence and begins to thicken downward into the depths. The underlayer of`ice freezes unevenly -- it appears milky where it is thickest and dark where it is thin. The darkness is wintry water which under the new ice appears frighteningly bled of light, signifying an underworld cold and infinitely lonely.Upon learning the source of Mr. White's imagery, the cold underworld analogy seems unnervingly fitting, His paintings originate from photographs found in World War II bombers that had
crashed, a source not obvious because of the artist's manipulations of his materials While nothing literal remains in the work, a certain mood of melancholy leaves its shadows. The men flying in these planes had left behind traces of what they had seen, perhaps in part during their last moments. Now these paintings with their inscrutable· imagery reflect visions, unfocused and nebulous, that had not had the time to be turned into memories. The series, appropriately named ''Evidence," bespeaks the lingering presence of these minds and men - the work both subtly honors them and the mystery of their experience. It is not necessary to know the story.however, to appreciate this wok which is as formally coherent and quietly beautiful as Chinese landscape paintings.The paintings are layered both literally and figuratively -- their subtlety invokes a state of meditation and thoughtfulness that goes deeper than much of current art.

Jeanne C Wilkinson

Cover Vol 12 #1, 1998