I curated a painting show titled Three Painters at Duck Creek for the Arts Center at Duck Creek.  The show went up on August 8th, 2020.  It will be on view through August 30th, 2020.

Last year, there was an exhibition of my own paintings at the barn at Duck Creek.  It was challenging, but it was also very rewarding.  The warmth of wood, the irregular elements of patched walls and the natural elements of the historic site define this attractive venue.  I live seven minutes away from there.  I care about the place and I wanted to organize a show that people in the community could truly enjoy.

To me, the process of painting involves honesty, dedication and patience.  It allows us tremendous freedom, but it also forces us to work with all elements with fairness, keen observation and a broad view to grasp the wholeness.  We become one with the momentums, dynamics and mechanisms within the visual structure, which is built by our dialogues with the visual elements.  Our paths become the work.  The work therefore is authentic in a way, and it can capture a profound something that can resonate with our soul.

The work of the three painters that I selected for the show somehow share the above quality.  They can be complex but they also convey solid cohesiveness.  These three artists are versed with their own visual languages and they all speak to us in their own ways:  but as they harmonize colors, shapes, lines, and layers, they reveal profoundness that goes beyond the framework that binds us as “civilized” beings, yet often as alienated beings.  Their paintings have the power to move us unconditionally if we care to listen.

I thank Duck Creek for giving me an opportunity to organize this show.  It has been rewarding on many grounds.

In order to introduce the artists to the Duck Creek audience, I interviewed the three painters.  We talked about how they get started, their processes, their philosophy on art, and more.

Conversation with Eric Banks

Conversation with Elliott Green

Conversation with Sean Sullivan

At the Duck Creek barn, the interviews are available in a booklet format.

Read the booklet in a pdf format.  You can also print your own booklet.

Elliott Green (b. 1960 Detroit, Michigan – eg@elliottgreen.com). He attended the University of Michigan, where he studied World literature and Art history. He moved to New York City in 1981 and has been awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, the Jules Guerin Rome Prize at the American Academy in Rome, a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, a Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation Residency, a The Peter S. Reed Foundation Grant, a residency at the BAU Institute, Cassis, France, a MacDowell Colony Residency, and three residencies at Yaddo.

Eric Banks (b. 1954 Brooklyn, NY – ericbanks54@gmail.com) Brooklyn-native, Banks lives and works in Rhinebeck, NY. In 1977, he obtained his B.A. from Queens College of the City University of New York, NY. After receiving his M.F.A. from Maryland Institute College of Art, Hoffberger School of Painting in 1981, Banks was awarded the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, Edward Albee Foundation Grant, and Walters Fellowship. Banks has exhibited nationally; most-recently, his work has been on view at NYC galleries, such as Amos Eno Gallery and Sideshow Gallery.

Sean Sullivan (b. 1975 Bronx, NY – paradepimlicopearl@gmail.com) lives and works in the Hudson Valley, NY. He received the NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Printmaking/Drawing/Book Arts Grant in 2017. He has participated in group exhibitions at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz, NY; the Markus Luttgen Gallery, Cologne, Germany; and the Museum for Drawing, Huningen, Belgium.

Here are images from the show.

List of works from the Arts Center at Duck Creek web site