For Volta New York, Tufenkian Fine Arts is pleased to present a selection of works by Sigrid Burton, Sam Grigorian, and Paul Paiement. These artists make works that are rooted in the exploration of environment and atmosphere through their varied approaches to coloration, texture, material, and form.
The ineffable aspects of the sublime and the transcendental power of painting are the foundation of Sigrid Burton’s practice. Burton believes painting concerns an interactive visual colloquy, providing a view to an interior dialogue and an immersive experience beyond the quotidian, much like a symphony engages the ear. The artist embeds gestural abstractions of organic forms in chromatic atmospheric grounds, reflecting on ideas of space and depth, employing idiosyncratic mark making and the resonant use of color.
Although incidental references to notational factors such as writing and musical notation recur in his work, Grigorian is principally interested in texture, structure, and muted coloration. He achieves a relatively uniform (if still vital) "skin" by layering, treating, and scratching away outer layers. Not preoccupied with qualities of weathering, Grigorian subtly depends on them to achieve tonal balance from area to area. The bigger the work, the more it becomes a map or topography, regions defining themselves and roads and borders emerging to connect them. Color, even in the most decorative arrangements, enters quietly and maintains a respectful subordination to composition.
Paul Paiement’s paintings attempt to reconcile the differences between inorganic, synthetic elements of culture with the organic elements of the natural world through the visual languages of linear/atmospheric perspective, representation/abstraction, and the use of layering. The artist chooses to paint landscapes that lack any specific identity or location. Paiement uses atmospheric perspective to create a naturalistic scene that is vast and infinite. The airbrushed plexi-glass overlays are flattened architectural drawings and though flat, they are drawn in perspective and create a geometric abstraction that contrasts with the detailed representation in the landscape.
