Continuing through November 30, 2010
In his first American showing, Jordi Alcaraz introduces a sensibility well calibrated between the playful and the profound in a series of large and small scale works that reveal themselves in layers. Books appear literally and metaphorically to make you think as much about what you don't see as what is visible. Frames are routinely made integral to the physical presence of this work. Plexiglas is selectively melted to drill holes onto the surface or into the very heart of some pieces. One mirrored surface draws your eye to the single scarification, which sucks your reflected image down its drain hole as you move towards it. Just as frequently the glass nearly invisibly casts shadows that are clearly intended as a drawn element, often echoing forms painted, drawn, or appearing in relief.
The blacks and grays of the cast shadows reflect Alcaraz' dominant color palette. The effect is to keep you focused on the interwoven layering of the formal elements, which might otherwise be drowned out in a cacophony. Surfaces are active, compositions are lyrical, but a good deal of more or less open space lends permission to linger on the details and marks. Cardboard segments stapled together convey rapidly worked urgency and a desire to know what might otherwise be revealed beneath the paint and its support. The interaction gives you plenty to work with, but the holes in this work are not only of a sort to pull you into the depths but to generously release you into your own imaginative pursuits.
Jack Rutberg Fine Arts
