Stuart Fullerton and Ronald Guzman

Ronald Guzman

Perhaps because he was born in Puerto Rico,

Judge Guzman seems especially sensitive to Chicago winters.

These two pieces make me shiver.

… and feel lonely, too.

Stuart Fullerton

This piece might well have hung in the "Modern Landscape" show that recently closed at the Art Institute - even if it was painted 136 years after the Van Gogh and Seurat pieces in that show,

And it would have been one of the better pieces on those walls.

Van Gogh, Factories at Clichy, 1887

Call it the poetry of desolation.

It’s Man destroying the planet,

and the bill is finally coming due.

Stuart Fullerton

Hasn’t Stuart shown this piece before?

No matter - I really like how that the appeal of fresh young female buttocks 

has  been overwhelmed by delight in composition.

That  hip is so perfectly drawn and toned.

It glows.

I immediately thought of William Merritt Chase,

and as it turns out, he painted a similar pose.

William Merritt Chase, 1888

But Stuart’s piece is better.

(at least in reproduction)

Chase just shows us a sleeping model.

Stuart presents a lover who has turned away from us in bed,

Stuart Fullerton

There has always seemed to be some sad or morbid backstory lurking behind Stuart’s pieces, and here it jumps out from the foreground.

A cemetery on a bright sunny day.

The well-ordered aspiration of the steeple 

versus the chaotic dispersal left by death.

Sculpture and Drawing Show - 2023

Misha Livshulz

A certain tradition of pedagogy lives on among the painters of the PNC, thanks, perhaps, to all those Impressionist paintings in the Art Institute and the ongoing legacy of Richard Schmid.  Sargent, Sorolla, Zorn, and Monet are among it’s heroes.

In sculpture, however, there is no widespread connection to what’s found in art museums -  only to the kind of stuff  found in gift shops and toy stores.

Misha and I both grew up in the studios of traditionally trained artists - so we share a certain taste for, as Misha puts it, things that "look big regardless of size".  

And so I salute the above entry into this show.

Tom Zamiar, Isis

Tom grew up in a less esoteric world - and he collects toys.

(He’s got an amazing collection, by the way)

And yet —- toys are not necessarily as

goofy and banal as the ones collected by Chicago Imagists like Roger Brown.

Roger Brown study collection.

Tom’s homage to his deceased wife

is tender, elegant  and fascinating.

Perhaps not as powerful as this equally sensitive memorial  from Old Kingdom Egypt:

2400 BC, Oriental Institute of Chicago

….. but fitting quite nicely into the more casual Ptolemaic period.

Paula Herrera

Likewise with this voluptuous mermaid

by our resident Andean folk musician.

Not as personal - but still  too intense for a typical gift shop.

Daralyn Rist

Evelyn Brody

A late bloomer in visual arts,

but blooming none the less..

Belongs on the cover of the old Saturday Evening Post.

Fabiola Roquena

This piece is from 2011.

Hopefully it’s not the last good drawing she made

James A. Burrell

I recognize the model,

but still think the subject is Biblical.

Jeffries R. Wells,  Selfie

Soko Okada, Hope

Indeed, she does seem hopeful 

Okada, Sophia

… and indeed she may be wise ( or, at least cautious)

Okada - Ode to Brockhurst

Gerald Leslie Brockhurst, 1934

A fine example of one of our painters 

being inspired by a recent master.

I doubt that even our sculpture instructors 

have that kind of connection to the past.

Sondra Pfeffer

She’s lopped off the head, both arms, and both legs.

Yet, for some reason,

one appendage remains

Pat Brutchin

Early Modernist figure drawing.

Rarely seen at the PNC.

Debra Balchen

This piece looks so much better in the 

strong ceiling lighting Debra has arranged for  it

Larry Paulsen

Channeling Ingres and the probity of line