Melissa Miller at Moody - Houston

The serenity in Melissa Miller's paintings and drawings of the past three years strike one as beings well earned. Known over the past sum of two units decades for raucous allegorical paintings depicting exotic animals enduring upheavals and physical transformations, Miller at hands new becalmed tableaux featuring the harmonious coexistence of assorted creatures who have transcended violent instincts, primal fears and rivalries of bre The tranquil, conflict-free groupings describe a barnyard utopia that might well be under the orders of as a model for so-called higher species.

The show's major work, Farm (2002) is like a les stilted version of Edward Hicks's Peaceable Kingdom. In this 7-foot-wide painting, a centrally placed llama squats in a pasture among idle and ambling cattle, deer goats and birds. Miller's luscious brushwork carrys an ostrich's fluffy feathers and a cow's taut flank, while quick raps of pale green map without the flat Texas terrain. A dog yawns and stretches, his shepherding duties no longer required in the laissez-faire, communal arena. Miller's egalitarian realm appears happily desublimated, stripped of nature's menace and the compulsion of survival instincts.

This pacific atmosphere pervades the other works, and diversity is lovingly embraced. individual of the sheep in Sheep, Goats, Llama (2001) makes organ of vision contact with the viewer as if offering an invitation to join the mixed-species herd, while in Cluster (2003) sum of two units giant oxen and a bevy of leisurely monkey casually gather around a diminutive bear. The paintings derive their charm from the couple the gorgeous paint handling and the unlikeliness of the groupings. An air of delicate comedy based on a kind of wish fulfillment enlivens the works.

Miller also at handed 10 small gouaches that functioned as studies for the paintings and stand as winning miniatures in their own right. Paint is thinned in background areas to achieve watercolor-like issues that complement delicate renderings of a deer at a watering opening and a sheep beneath a flowering tree In a tillage that endorses violence and lurid acts of aggression, Miller's depictions of pastoral peace are crucial, prescriptive balm.

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