It probably seems as though I’ve been on a Mac student kick lately, but the fact is that the busy little buggers have been downright prolific lately in their occupancy of James North Studio, henceforward to be referred to as Show & Tell Gallery (it’s a better name anyway). The addition of an exhibition requisite in the third year program probably helps - certainly wasn’t the case in my day (and didn’t that just make me sound unbearably old) but the practice clearly does pay off.

No Word. Image. is, despite itself, a thought-provoking title for a show, one in which the artists are clearly rejecting conceptual concerns in favour of painterly play with images and materials. It’s a position that is most frustratingly apparent in the labels of Kari Beddell’s geometric abstractions (those three lower square canvases in the foreground, above, are strong examples), all of which simply state ‘Title. Date. Media.’ in place of the information itself, though I can’t help but think that the gesture is incomplete so long as the artist’s name isn’t being represented by ‘Artist.’

Dana Jaunzemis, Highly Expandable Stomach

Dana Jaunzemis had two sculptural works positioned front and centre in the gallery - wonderfully lavish things playing on outdated fashions and live flora - but I was especially drawn to this weird little triptych of paintings with their dried floral elements mimicked in the murky blue depths of the canvas. The illusion is near-perfect, let down only by the use of a flattening black acrylic where colour - or better, oil paint - would have served her better, but even that doesn’t diminish the curious fascination of these works. And I love that weirdly fanged blowfish.

Krysten Bell, Shake the Sun

I unfortunately got overly fixated on this issue of straight black paint as the evening wore on, especially when it came to paintings that would have been otherwise brilliant works, but Krysten Bell at least gave me pause in my doubts with this small painting. That dark impasto in the bottom third is made up of several bands of varying dark tones that shift from blue to brown, and while I did spot that drearily flat black-from-the-tube among them, it almost seemed to work in context. There’s really many things in this painting that I feel shouldn’t work (sunset imagery? pink?) but they really do. Bell gets huge props for that.

Theodora Roman, Temptation

Also in the category of things that work despite a first reaction is the above diptych by Theodora Roman, which was being shown alongside many other hasty portraits of nymphettes that uncomfortably reminded me of my own days as a Mac artist (I just cleaned out my closet-full of undergraduate work, don’t get me started), but these two stand out from the lot with a braver use of colour and some truly substantial chunks of raw wood as painting supports. Both her handling of the paint (love those drips) and her use of line (love that hand-shape in the left panel) are rich with potential once left to stand on their own strengths instead of being lost in the smaller, fussier works.

What’s truly impressive overall, however, is that each of these four artists already has a readily identifiable visual voice, distinct from each other yet cohesive unto themselves. With the exception of one truly abhorrent drawing, there were many intelligent choices made to pull this show together, which can only be a good thing when the time comes for this lot to pull this same stunt again next year. Best of luck to them in the meantime.

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