THE HUNTINGTON CONVENTION CENTER is pleased to continue its partnership with The Artists Archives of the Western Reserve (AAWR) through 2019 and into the spring of 2020. In February, The Foundations show will be replaced with Table for Two: Harriet Moore Ballard and Patricia Zinsmeister Parker.

Ballard and Parker have long enjoyed a friendship, and that common bond, combined with their mutual respect for the other’s artistic abilities and achievements, has served to strengthen the ties between them. This will be the first time that these two talented women exhibit a number of their works together, and while their creations are individually distinctive, their paintings mesh together visually like two old dancing partners. Each artist utilizes her sensitivity to surroundings as source material, and time spent together at Ballard’s home in San Miquel de Allende, Mexico, has inspired both of them. Table for Two focuses on still lives that each artist has produced.

Ballard, for her part, employs all of the objects around her, as well as impressions and references to her life, as fodder for her paintings. To quote Douglas Max Utter, “There is no clear division between the past and the present, things underground and those built on top. This melding of dimensions became the central content of her work.” She then uses color and line to flatten and either negate or pull together these apparently disparate elements. “Pressing multiple planes into one ambiguous surface and crossing planes with lines that deny the third dimension is central to my work,” writes Ballard.

As an artist, Parker continually challenges herself. She is equally at ease creating the beautiful, expressionistic still lives showcased in Table for Two, and making nonrepresentational abstractions. Mundane objects, phrases, political views and bits of contemporary fashion are items that also creep into Parker’s paintings. These items do not create a flowing narrative but rather surprise us, and force us to reengage with the painting under new terms. In her words, Parker is motivated to “seek new and original means of expression that will convey a unique response not only to the environment which we inhabit but to the world in general.”

As a mutual experience, the love of painting that these artists share is clearly expressed in their work and visible to the viewer in all ways that count.

 

FOUNDATIONS | NOVEMBER 7–FEBRUARY 8

TABLE FOR TWO | FEBRUARY 13–APRIL 12
RECEPTION 1-3PM SUNDAY, MARCH 8

FREE. OPEN M-F 8:30AM-5PM
Located inside the Huntington Convention Center of Cleveland

CLEVELAND CONVENTION GALLERY
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