Garden Variety
In its building in Quality Hill, HNTB Architecture operates the Stairway Art Space (715 Kirk Drive). From 5 to 8 p.m., the gallery opens an exhibit by painter Joel Sager called Onion Skins and Armor, depicting closely observed everyday objects against wood-slat floors and wallpaper. “The process is mixed-media collage,” Sager says. “I’ll raid vintage stores for rolls of fabric or wallpaper, and then that’s collaged, and I paint over it with oil pigment and stain it with a roofing-tar mixture. And then I do more oil painting on top of that. It’s a lot of layers, but I really like tactile paintings and I love the consistent matte appearance of the wallpaper. I’m often using it as if it’s literally the wallpaper in the painting or the upholstery of a chair.” The effect is striking and deep, exploiting the contrast between the flat pattern of the fabric and the dimensionality of the painting. Sarah Handelman curated the exhibit. “She picked the theme,” Sager says. “She chose some newer pieces and some older pieces from two years ago that she thought created a larger narrative. The paintings are inanimate objects that I find quirky or interesting.” The gallery opens to the public only on First Friday.— Chris Packham
Fri., March 5, 5-8 p.m., 2010
