{"id":69290,"date":"2023-09-25T09:06:18","date_gmt":"2023-09-25T15:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=69290"},"modified":"2023-10-17T09:41:26","modified_gmt":"2023-10-17T15:41:26","slug":"brent-godfrey-acts-natural-in-a-gallery-exhibit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/brent-godfrey-acts-natural-in-a-gallery-exhibit\/","title":{"rendered":"Brent Godfrey Acts Natural in ‘A’ Gallery Exhibit"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Brent Godfrey, “Act Natural,” oil on panel, 50×50 in.<\/p><\/div>\n

An art gallery which contains a courtyard with water and fish (as ‘A’ Gallery does) can run a show called You Animal <\/i>and succeed in a way those without a “water feature” cannot. Consider the magic and necessary pull of water, whether in drought conditions, or not: settlements\/towns\/cities of any success have almost always formed around water. Egyptian royalty could never have happened without the Nile. Goods anywhere, upon a time, couldn\u2019t be brought in without terrible or arduous difficulties, without water; people could barely exist without water\u2014in large quantities. A watering hole, for animals, for humans, meant survival. Life.<\/h4>\n

In You Animal<\/i> Brent Godfrey\u2019s chickens, wolves, horses, humans, rabbits, turkeys, cranes, and cattle settle securely and naturally in this gallery, in oils and acrylics on canvas. According to the artist himself, in his artist statement, \u201cfur\u201d, \u201cfeathers,\u201d and \u201cflesh\u201d are equally and “democratically represented\u201d in his show.<\/h4>\n

\u201cTurkeys 2,\u201d an oil painting, is the richest painting here: unexpectedly, the turkeys\u2019 plumes\/feathers are a frothy, velvety, compression of September light; shadowed by frosty, yet warm, blue, all of the colors have the richness of colors in wool carpets, as the birds turn to each other and soak up remaining summery bits of light.\u00a0<\/span><\/h4>\n
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Brent Godfrey, “Turkeys 2,” oil on linen, 36×24 in.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n

Deer in \u201cAct Natural,\u201d \u201cStag,\u201d \u201cWilderness,\u201d and \u201cGuardian” are so full-eared, so startled-looking, facing the painter\/viewer, they make your own ears ache: what is a lifetime of super-listening like? Do deer ever hear complete quiet? (In some ways, a painter\u2019s goal always seems to be that perfect quiet.)<\/h4>\n

In \u201cWitness\u201d a single rabbit faces the fireworks of an electrical power station in the distance: you see the rabbit in profile. The rabbit\u2019s ears almost seem to glow red with fright. What good does a power station do a rabbit? You hear that question in your head, sense the rabbit\u2019s confusions as it sees\/hears the power station\u2019s noise and sizzle, in once-quiet night.<\/h4>\n
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Brent Godfrey, “Howl,” 2014, oil on linen, 54×56 in.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n

Godfrey\u2019s work often includes the daringly sensual: here, nude men and their animal grace are on display in \u201cTiger\u201d and \u201cHowl I.\u201d Not many painters could find the similarity between a man roaring and a bear roaring, but Godfrey does: see his \u201cHowl I\u201d (a man and a bear running together through a forest) and \u201cHowl II\u201d (one bear roaring, in full snarl).<\/h4>\n

In \u201cPerspective\u201d one bear leans against an old, round-eyed car. The bear looks overwhelmingly human, and, weirdly, so does the car, in this vintage Yellowstone-esque scene. The metal car becomes an armored helmet protecting frail traveling humans from the hungry bear.<\/h4>\n
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Brent Godfrey, “Empowerment,” 2023, oil on linen, 36×48 in.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cEmpowerment\u201d \u2014 an oil painting featuring a young girl in a Red-Riding-Hood\u2019s cloak who brandishes a small axe as she approaches an unaware wolf from behind \u2014 includes an unusual detail: her little eyes are covered by child-size dark-lensed sunglasses. Are the sunglasses to blot out the horror of the act she is about to commit? Or to protect us from the view of a child\u2019s eyes as she contemplates such an act?\u00a0 <\/span>In popular and current terms, this version of Little Red Riding Hood is females (women) arming themselves against predatory males. Stripped of gender, it\u2019s humans versus animal, our continued rise to alpha superiority over creatures we once were regularly terrorized by \u2014 if we are on guard, are vigilant.<\/h4>\n

Or \u2014 could these sunglasses represent an artist\u2019s special protection against a predatory world? Or an artist, in her\/his private world, seeing through special lenses what the rest of the world cannot see? An exclusive exclusion, an exclusive inclusion?<\/h4>\n

More commonplace girls appear in this show, each holding stuffed animals, anonymous, unthreatening-looking lambs and monkeys, in \u201cLittle Lamb\u201d and \u201cComfort.\u201d Godfrey has also had some fun with \u201cFamily Portrait\u201d \u2014 six monkeys with differing facial features and expressions are presented as a neatly arranged display of portraits with matching red frames.<\/h4>\n
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Brent Godfrey, “Submerged 3 (four impressions),” oil on canvas, 32×44 in.<\/p><\/div>\n

The most peaceful paintings in the show are of fish: flame-colored carp, or goldfish, passing each other in \u201cSubmerged 3\u201d and \u201cSubmerged 4.\u201d Surely theirs is a simpler, sweeter, more silent life than any of the other creatures in this show could ever have. Here, at the art gallery, these fish are royal creatures, safe from predators and harm. All they must do is swim, go dormant in winter, and re-emerge in spring to glitter brilliant in the sun.<\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

Brent Godfrey: You Animal<\/em>, ‘A’ Gallery,<\/a> Salt Lake City, through Oct. 28<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An art gallery which contains a courtyard with water and fish (as ‘A’ Gallery does) can run a show called You Animal and succeed in a way those without a “water feature” cannot. Consider the magic and necessary pull of water, whether in drought conditions, or not: settlements\/towns\/cities […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1568,"featured_media":69295,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,14],"tags":[554,555,2153],"class_list":["post-69290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exhibition_reviews","category-visual_arts","tag-a-gallery","tag-brent-godfrey","tag-salt-lake-city"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/BrentGodfrey-Painitng-LookNatural-48x48-1.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-25 05:10:51","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1568"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69290"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69296,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69290\/revisions\/69296"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}