Purchasing a work of art is a very personal decision. Sometimes you know what you like when you see it. Other times, you are not so sure.
Let me help you.
For 20 years, I have been making and exhibiting art. I visit museums and galleries on a regular basis, socialize with artists and keep an art blog.
I can locate "weak spots" and point out evidence of bad working habits in works of art. I have made many of the same mistakes in my quest to become a better artist.
I am capable of clearly explaining the formal merits and liabilities of paintings and sculpture.
How I can work for you...
1. I can look at a work of art (original or reproduction) and write about its strengths and weaknesses. If you show me a group of paintings or sculpture, I can choose the best one and explain why.
2. I can introduce you to the work of talented unaffiliated artists. These hardworking artists do not have formal gallery representation, but are dogged in their determination to make top quality work and get it into the best galleries. Most exhibit regularly in group shows and at alternative spaces.
3. I can arrange introductions and in many cases studio visits to members of the East Boston artist community.
4. I can help you set collecting goals.
5. I can represent you at a purchase by requesting a discount, making a payment and arranging shipping.
I provide personalized service that is informal, yet focused and thorough.
Here are a few undervalued works by unaffiliated artists...
Maureen O'Connor's Compote of Lemons with Ducks
What I like about this painting is its potential accessibility to a varied spectrum of viewers and its understated presentation of painterly ability.
This is a work by an artist who projects her love of art history through the depiction of a very idiosyncratic cast of still life characters with the utmost attention and affection. Colors are specific and intentional with no evidence of muddy mixtures.
Figures are positioned so that they engage in a dialogue with the colors and shapes on the printed fabric. Simultaneously, a dynamic composition (that is symmetric and geometric) carries the viewer's attention to specific locations in the work.
There is much in this work for many a contemporary viewer to enjoy. While I sense a genuine engagement between the artist and the objects she paints, others may respond differently.
Some may delight in the over-the-top simutaneity of pattern and decoration in this work. Others may enjoy the presence of irony and kitsch. Still others may detect in the works unabashed happiness, a foil to much of contemporary visual culture.
Kasia Bytnerowicz's Tablecloth
The general virtues of this work are that the artist successfully employs an "all-or-nothing" working method to bring a complex work into existence solely through the addition of paint and that the resulting complexity is presented in an unassuming way.
The pared down elegance of this work initially deflects the viewers attention from the wealth of abstract, formal and self-referential elements within.
Ostensibly a representational work, this work clearly offers an abstract sensibilty. Note how the shape of the unpainted (canvas) linen in the top half of the work imitates the shape of the white draped cloth.
The triangular expanse of raw canvas at the bottom of the work suggests individual shapes within the folds of the draped cloth.
This work is part of a series titled "threadbare". Interestingly, the artist has manipulated the raw (linen) canvas by removing and bunching individual threads so that it suggests material which is threadbare.
Literally being able to see through the work calls the viewer's attention to the wall, hanging wire and wooden stretcher bars.
The opened up linen drawn tightly over wooden bars loosely suggests a portable loom and the discernible presence of a hard flat wall behind the work amplifies the lightness of the hanging cloth.
Bo Petran's Untitled
An endearing quality of this work is that it "opens up" over repeated viewings and rewards the observer with a rich variety of visual associations.
The first time I viewed this work, it appeared to depict lotus leaves floating on a pond. At a subsequent viewing, it reminded me of air bubbles rising to the surface of the ocean...
As I write, the pearlescent blues and whites remind me of the interiors of dessicated mussel shells.
Each disk-like shape in this work is a little patch of wax and pigment which has been blasted and dispersed by a hot air gun. These shapes are "stacked" and orchestrated in an "all over" manner.
This "all over" compositional strategy, loosely based on a grid (imagine a square around each disk), suggests that this work is indebted to the most significant art movement of the 20th century, Abstract Expressionism.
I've always thought that Bo uses Abstract Expressionism as a point of departure rather than as a destination. His works are far more personal in scale, more idiosyncratic in their mark making and more suggestive of natural phenomena.
The two colors in this work are used primarily as light and dark values. The contrast and tonal shifts between them define a shallow (essentially planar) topography closely allied with the picture's surface.
My Credentials
Education
Painting Department, Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, MA, BFA, 1994
School of Management, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA, BS, 1988
Select Exhibitions and Programs
The Drawing Center, New York, NY
"Viewing Program", November 2007
Fuller Craft Museum, Brockton, MA
“Trashformations East”, January 2005
Rose Art Museum, Waltham, MA
“bad touch”, September 2003
Blog
www.mikesartnook.blogspot.com
Contact
Michael St.Germain
26 Tremont Street
Chelsea, MA 02150
617.448.4313
michael_stgermain@yahoo.com
