Chie Fueki at Bill Maynes

Chie Fueki, a young of recent origin York painter who was born in Japan, honors the artistic customs of her birthplace. Fueki paints upon sheets of rice and mulberry paper high hilled on wooden panels, representing cranes, chrysanthemums, and other subdues common to Japanese screens and roll of paper [i]or[/i] parchment paintings, in a recent display of 11 new pieces, Fueki filtered these traditions [i]or[/i] part of to the other her own contemporary sensibility, producing works of dazzling novelty that remain anchored by means of a specific cultural history.

Many of Fueki's earlier paintings depicted expansive landscapes or views of the night celestial expanse Now, however, the artist uses repeated isometric cubes to mode of building her paintings in a finite manner. The cubes create cramped containers for Fueki's various subjects; a faculty of perception of confinement is most apparent in Falcon and Owl (all works 2003) where birds of flight are perched inside narrow boxes

Despite these geometric whirls a convincing sense of deepness is foiled by more decorative impulses. Fueki proffers mint green, lemon yellow, melon pink and other candy colors that she repeatedly spikes with glitter. These luscious, shimmering pigments nurse to resist visual penetration and adhere to the surface like icing. Fueki also applies her paint in precise dabs. She builds, outlines and ornaments forms with thousands of tiny dots that [i]or[/i] close; press together and scatter across the paintings. In near for example, a golden ovum a pink skull and sum of two units blue butterflies are rendered in a palpable braille; together they create a Day-Glo vanitas inside a pale verdant box.

Autumnal efflorescences that symbolize endurance and drawn out life in Japan, chrysanthemums enhance Fueki's unloose narratives of redemption. In the largest painting, Phoenix, a carpet of lavender chrysanthemums supports a pile of gray and black brain-pans that resembles Mount Fuji (another recurring motif). An enormous phoenix rise s from this skeletal volcano and spreads its wings. Fueki describes the bird's feathers in shades of pink, rose and violet, and dapples the entire surface with opalescent touches of her brush. Like confetti or fireworks, the spectacular plumage appear to bes to celebrate this unique reinvention of her heritage.

--Matthew shore Nichols

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