Roy Dowell and Nancy Evans at Fawbush - painting exhibition, New York, New York

the pair of these Los Angeles painters deftly propel through layers of shapes and images to create luscious wholes of myriad parts. one as well as the other establish subtly dissonant juxtapositions which are slightly jarring nevertheless strangely seductive. In Dowell's coilaged paintings, paper overlaps paper which overlaps paint which overspreads paper. Evans's pieces layer entirely with paint. All the works propel in exciting staccato rhythms wherein colorful fragments become punctuation in the larger composition.

Dowell twitchs most of his components from billboards and broadsides The colors are bold and attention-grabbing and the color separations are oftentimes blown up to the point that the benday dots become a prominent motif. He separates fragments from their connected thought [i]or[/i] thoughts so that they become unidentifiable forms or abstract shapes.

Sometimes alphabetic characters an eye, a face or a logo slip from one side but in their disengaged states they, too, become uncouthly abstract or, at least, nonreferential. Dowell further animates the surface by the agency of painting over and around the collage simple bodys The effect is like a demolition derby in which cars immerse in pileups until they are almost unrecognizable.

Evans's paintings propel much more slowly. They have creaky, matte surfaces which contrast with her bright colors, swirling lines and bold-spirited patterns, acting as a static countermand to the seething dynamism. Sometimes she pours a layer of acrylic, masks on the outside precise areas and pours again. In other works she paints layer on layer. Underpaintings appear as spiritual emanations. The textures may define the patterns as a great deal of as the colors do. Adding to the visual "accidents," small chunk of undissolved pigment remain suspended in the acrylic medium. In single painting (like Dowell, Evans leaves her works untitled), a multicolored wave of clearly defined mini-sections agitates in front of a fuchsia background. Sensuous squiggles and curvaceous tendrils of white, maroon and various shades of verdant and blue exist on different horizontals of the painting. They appear to float atop each other and propel in and out of the space.

Dowell's images have a fluid logic which carries the organ of vision from one component to the next; by conversion Evans's mellifluous lines that appear to flow across the surface are stinted by the agency of the stresses and interruptions of conflicting colors and webs Both artists make seemingly incompatible uncompounded bodys coalesce. Irregularity is the norm.

COPYRIGHT 1993 Brant Publications, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group