Halee Roth, “Mountain Ash,” oil on panel, 76.75 x 44.25 in.

Apparently I’m not the only one who thinks the most interesting art these days is to be found in the littoral zone where abstraction and representation blend. The new show at ‘A’ Gallery, Love in the Abstract, “invites viewers to explore emotion, connection, and intimacy beyond literal representation.” In other words, where what began as visual truth tips the scale into emotional expression. A good example would be the show’s announcement card: Gary Ruddell’s study for “Homestead,” in which a shirtless builder and a very pregnant woman are seen on top of a fancifully framed construction project, gazing together into a numinous, cloudy sky. More on that later. For now, though, it’s going to be up to the audience to evaluate how well Allen+Alan accomplish their goal. When I got there, something more immediate struck me: something to do with how various galleries practice their craft in different ways.

Our contemporary venues tend to function like theatrical stages. They fill their space with a single curatorial effort, which after its run is done, clears out. Springville, the Kimball, UMOCA, Finch Lane, OCA provide good examples. These are public spaces and possibly coincidentally receive public funding. On the other hand, privately-owned galleries keep a portion of most exhibitions, which they move about. At Phillips, they go upstairs or down. David Ericson also uses his basement, but rings a dedicated, central space with a satisfyingly rich assortment of his favorites. ‘A’ Gallery does that as well, and anyone who sticks to the devoted offering has more discipline than good sense. Not only are there too many good things to see just a few feet from the month’s display, but because the staff does not ask that those peripherals first be part of a posted show, it’s often possible to see what a given artist has done since their last outing without waiting for a possible next one.

Take Halee Roth, for example. Last September she presented a collection of figure studies set in abstract, but recognizable landscapes. Most were solo nudes, but a few featured two figures. The more such figures there are, the more challenging it becomes to compose them. Her contribution to Love in the Abstract takes on that challenge with three figures. “Mountain Ash” fits into a wide, indeed panoramic format, which regardless of whether it’s read from left to right or the reverse sees the heads of the three swivel successively around their center of gravity: an example of Love in action and effect.

Jeff Juhlin, “Incline,” oil, cold wax, and unryu paper on panel, 24×60 in.

Roth’s new work continues her previous traverse of the supposed space between abstraction and reality. An artist who departed from a longtime use of pure abstraction to try something more representational is the encaustic master Jeff Juhlin, who backed away from the layered, geological structures of his wax works to collage recognizable desert landscapes, which he showed last August. In these, the textures and colors of his salvaged papers take over the part of similar qualities in the encaustic medium. In both bodies of work, what Juhlin arguably shows us is his love of the Earth, whether as a geologic structure or a spatial vista.

Which brings us to Gary Ruddell, whose study for “Homestead” is literally a trial run for a larger painting, such as artists traditionally made in centuries past to test an idea before making the larger version. Visitors to ‘A’ Gallery should have noticed a large painting by Ruddell that depicts three women, one rollerblading while two others support her on either side. Titled “Politics of Dancing,” it takes place in a magical realm of mist and shallow water, through which the skater creates a trail like a contrail or a memory that, unlike the artwork, will be soon enough gone. According to Ana Cruz Hardy, one of the gallery’s genial experts, this two-foot square study for “Homestead” was intended to confirm a large work similar to “Politics of Dancing,” but when the gallery staff saw it, they asked the painter to add it to the four other works that together form the core of Love in the Abstract.

Gary Ruddell, “Politics of Dancing,” oil on panel, 54×54 in.

Hardy and I agreed that Ruddell’s paintings belong to an arguably new genre—a kind of positive, even contented cousin of Surrealism. Whether it’s the unlikely perch of the couple in “Homestead,” or the shattered boardwalk bridge across which the “Reckless Dreamer” seems intent to cross a seemingly endless flood, or the lantern-like spheres identified as the “Phases of the Moon,” in all but one of his recognizable, yet otherworldly scenes a couple are seen to—as the title of another has it—“Fade Into” each other. If there must be Romance, at least let it take us out of this mundane, uninspired world.

There are other artists making advances in their work here. Lizzie Wenger, Linnie Brown, and Brent Godfrey, to name three. There is no strict limit, of course, because any of the those painters and sculptors who show here can, at any time, bring in a new vision or relate an experience that taken their art in another direction.

Love in the Abstract, ‘A’ Gallery, Salt Lake City, through Feb. 21

Geoff Wichert

Geoff Wichert objects to the term critic. He would rather be thought of as a advocate on behalf of those he writes about.