Since his last show at Bridgette Mayer Gallery, Mark Brosseau seems to have thrown caution to the wind and the results are mostly exhilarating. His paintings of four years ago - eccentric, charming compositions that brought distant views of old-fashioned amusement parks to mind - have given way to more expansive, fluid, and abstracted visions of the scenes that catch his eye.
The window composition, a staple of Sir Howard Hodgkin's paintings, is a framework in several of Brosseau's recent paintings. But while the British artist's windows seem to frame a lingering appreciation of something seen or experienced, and offer a powerful whiff of the exotic, Brosseau's appear to catch a view of architecture - and unexpectedly at that, in a snapshot, drive-by fashion. At times, different sections of his abstracted views seem to zoom out and in. Merging (2010) looks like apartment buildings as glimpsed by the driver of a car, a quick impression that captures the essence of fast seeing, but thoughtfully reimagined in paint.
Brosseau's obvious affection and eye for vivid color stood out before this show, but his juxtapositions of colors have become edgier.
Somehow, he's managed to make hot pinks, life-jacket oranges, parrot greens, and sunny yellows straight out of Lilly Pulitzer fabrics look a little ominous together in Parading (2010). (I can remember some scary Lilly moments, come to think of it.)
A group of small, entirely abstract paintings in the back gallery seems tangential to Brosseau's show, but I liked this indulgence and the deliberate untidiness of these works. Here, in similar palettes of Chinese red, ultramarine blue, and lemon yellow, Brosseau communes with Kandinsky, Gorky, Stuart Davis, and maybe even our own Arthur B. Carles. You sense he is enjoying a fling with these uncharacteristic (for him) strokes and colors.
As with a few other shows at Mayer, when an artist has been given the entire gallery and the Vault space to fill, the latter's gloomy environs are not made the most of. Two of Brosseau's long, accordion-style notebooks are mounted on the wall parallel to each other, and although they provide an interesting insight into his working process, they don't command the space. And they would have been easier to see in good light, on a table in one of the two galleries.
Bridgette Mayer Gallery, 709 Walnut St., 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. 215-413-8893 or www.bridgettemayergallery.com. Though July 31.
The African Kings and Queen Mothers are Coming!!!
