Paul Behnke, An Awful Rainbow
April 18 – May 23
“[Paul] Behnke’s paintings are capable of igniting the viewer’s imagination, setting it off in an unforeseen direction.”
– John Yau, A Theatre of Color, 2012
Inspired by an 1820 poem by English poet John Keats, which reads “Do not all charms fly/ At the mere touch of cold philosophy?/ There was an awful rainbow once in heaven/we know her. . . texture;” Paul Behnke’s latest work is, first and foremost, an exercise in color. Behnke uses pure, unadulterated color-straight from the tube-to create dynamic experimentations of form. The paintings require of his viewers deeper contemplation, so that they may move past the immediate appeal of highly saturated color and on to the complexity of the relationships of the forms contained therein. Only then do these forms begin to reveal their true nature; they seem to compete with one another, and to jostle for place in the limited space of the canvas.
Kathryn Markel Fine Arts
529 W. 20th St., Ste. 6W
New York, NY 10011
http://www.markelfinearts.com/
Image: d’Artagnan, 2013 Acrylic on canvas, 48 x 50 inches
