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WHO- Laura Leiden's "Prisms of the Sou!"
WHERE UGA Tate Center Gallery
WHEN >Through September 21
HQW MUCH "FREE! j.
SEPTEMBER 6, 2000
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Become sensitive id the deep inner stillness, the peoce,
ihe calm that rodtates from the core of our being.
"Underwater Motion" by Laura Leiden
including the Curator's Choice Award by the Greenville Museum of
Art. She spent the first years of her career as a high school art
teacher and started what is new a successful calligraphy business
in 1980. At first her artwork was more traditional, exploring soft
sculpture, watercolor and jewelry. She showed a great deal, until
the business came along, and added family responsibilities kept
her fine art on the back burner for a little while. But all that slow
cooking paid off. Through workshops and mentorships, Leiden
found her real focus.
"Acrylic touched me so deeply," says Leiden, speaking of an
acrylic painting workshop during which she discovered her new
medium. "I knew I was home." Visiting museums across the
country, Leiden saw abstract works and ioved them. "And I asked
myself, who are you trying to prove what to, with all this tradi
tional work?" An influential instructor encouiayed Leiden to quit
the workshops and head for the studio. "But I studied composi
tion," she says, "and learned what goes into a good painting. I
wanted to do the paintings that I would want to see.' Now, her
goal is to complete at least 100 paintings per year. By the time
she felt she hud 20 good paintings an opportunity at the Oconee
Cultural Art Foundation's arts center in Watkinsville arose which
allowed her to show her work in a small group setting. She hasn't
looked back since.
"WINTER LANDSCAPE"
Located on the left wall as you enter, this painting recalls a
December pre-dawn twilight pierced bv a distant ascending sun.
It's an acrylic on paper, with stained layerings the colors of oxi
dized copper—greenish turquoise, milky blue and coppery daubs.
Metallic gold paint pressed into shapes of leaf and petal shows a
veiny, aged skin while acid greens and yellows beiiind a slow,
muddy red form like bubbles of moving water trapped beneath ice.
These are not winter colors in my Midwestern expenence, but the
stark stripped trees in the foreground against the impending sun-
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PAINTINGS LIKE JEWELS
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You can compare the work of Laura Leiden, and perhaps the
personality of the dynamic Leiden herself, to a jewel of expert
faceting. With her exhibition at the Tate Student Center Gallery,
titled *«.vJa J. Leiden: Prisms of the Soul," the artist offers us 20
works which reveal balance, discipline, grace and great loveliness.
The first thing you'll notice is the floorcloth: 120x120 inches
of acrylic on canvas, placed squarely in front of the doors with
the invitation to "Please Walk On the Floorcloth." Art under your
feet! It's a luminous luxury that paves the way for wonders
within and ties the room together with the hanging artwork most
completely. The other multi-layered acrylic and mixed media
paintings are produced by various methods, including collage,
printing, finger-painting, wire stitching, sewing and writing.
Materials range from netting and cloth to sequins and gold leaf,
tissue paper and paint, on a canvas or paper base. It might sound
messy, but don't be discouraged. This work is not at all amateur,
displaying instead the maturity and solid academic training of an
experienced artist.
THE ARTIST
Laura Leiden was a Fulbright Art Scholar and received an MAE
from the Rhode Island School of Design, as well as a BFA from the
Massachusetts College of Art. She is the recipient of awards
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rise far away compel memories of time spent alone outdoors. This
piece shimmers but doesn't shout, reminiscent of artworks by Wolf
Kahn. The layering holds up compositionally and can be viewed
from a distance or up dose with equal effect.
"Multi-layered acrylics speak deeply to me," says Leiden, who
goes on to explain that while much of the process is intuitive,
with the artist adding and subtracting elements to build an overall
feel, her foundation in solid design allows tlos intuitive approach
to produce successful works. It's a balance of lett-brain and right-
brain, for those of you who subscribe to such divisions, that the
deft creator gracefully manipulates.
"AUBURN WINDOW"
This is an coylic/mixed-media work on canvas, with a window
suggested in the midground by a cross-hatching of finger-painted
lines through layers of color. The overall tone is a misty gold, as
the deep green distance gives way to a brittle metallic explosion
of light, glowing through the disembodied windowpane. A silver
patina drifts down from magenta heights, a gauzy curtain to pro
tect the eye from holy radiance. A block of disappearing/reap
pearing text anchors the base of this lofty scene, weighting the
bottom of the compositional foreground with snatches of word
play like "you always know how we will fell" ana "Higher Powers."
Surface textures created with coUaged and
painted layers of paper and doth lend a
thickly tangible effect.
Leiden works in two themes, compositional
hierarchy of shapes and the development of
multiple visual planes. Sh« is drawn to art
work that is less hard-edged and obvious,
including works in encausdc with their waxy
layers and art devoted to color. She names
Rothko and William Morris for their mastery of
color, and the uncensored joy she takes in hue
and tone is apparent in her work. She's not
afraid of neon pinks, add greens, gold
metallics and blaze orange, but she knows
how to keep these brash scene-stealers in
their place. Her process or building the layers
and blocks of color into en^'getic fields of
movement is very visible, decoding easily for
the observer. Her creation process is so
intense that it leaps to the mind of the viewer
from the canvas as if witnessed firsthand.
"UNDERWATER MOTION"
This work on paper is a calm series of color
fields. The piece shows an integrated use of
applied fabric collage. The thick mottled
depth of blue in the background mimics light through water, with
distortion and ever-changing movement. A pale miasma of red
floats midground and transitions to the formal geometric elements
of gold and copper mesh front and center. Leiden shapes the net
ting and fits the pieces together in right-to-left directional flow,
diagramming the dynamics of watery interactions, suggesting
principles of physics. One layer of water slips quickly beneath
another opposing layer, while ripples and glimmers suggest the
surface of a stream rather than its cross-section. You can almost
hear it, fiver over rocks.
THE EXPERIENCE
"It's contemporary work with content," decides the artist.
"People who don't normally respond to abstract work respond
immediately to the complexities—! get good feedback from a
broad audience." Leiden did not release any of her work for sale
until this January, but has been surprised and gratified at her suc
cess. "It's a real compliment to be chosen for this show by college
students," she says. "I'm so pleased that they connected with this
work." Laura Leiden's personal story, the narrative of her artistic
growth, is synthesized in her current artwork. "Perhaps as I get
truer to myself, maybe I can connect with people on their own
deep level," Leiden muses modestly. With "Prisms of the Soul,"
that spiritual reaching-out truly communicates to the viewers,
touching us in ways that go beyond "art appreciation" to the core
of experience. C
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