Peter Schenck

"The Conversation", oil painting, art history, collage, cubism, ideas discussion

2020

"Strengths and Weaknesses" is a portrait exploring several elements and strategies that fascinate the artist – notably the performance anxiety induced by simply being an artist, staring down the freight train of art history as it hurtles toward you every time you pick up a brush. Luck? Talent? Maybe. There are signposts and guides in this painting, of course (Cubism! Surrealism! Brancusi! Guston!), but they can clobber you too if you're not careful. Even the phrase "strengths and weaknesses" smacks of compromises and rationalization – deadly to an artist looking to construct their own integral world. "Strengths and Weaknesses" is an acrylic and charcoal on canvas measuring 54" tall by 54" wide. It was included in the artist's solo show "Comedy Cellar" at Freight + Volume Gallery, New York City in July 2018. (See last photograph for an installation view.) From Daniel Gerwin – "Schenck’s color is vibrant, wild, saturated to the point of overheating, and altogether brilliant in the balancing of hues, temperatures, shapes, and color quantities. The paintings have a remarkable coherence for their dizzying juxtaposition of so many small chromatic passages." (Essay: The Anxiety and the Ecstasy) Peter Schenck...

The large abstract painting "PEARL" by Jeffrey Kurland is an acrylic on canvas measuring 64" tall by 78" wide. PEARL is new work from the long hot summer of 2020. Often employing pai...

"Toys In The Attic" addresses subject matter that continues to fascinate the artist – on one hand the tools of painting, drawing and art making – brushes, pens, pencils and crayons. ...

"Endless Summer" is a well-known artwork among Peter Schenck's many remarkable paintings, and addresses subject matter that continues to engage the artist – the tools of painting and art making, including brushes, tubes of paint and palette knife are arranged in a child-like tableau alongside brightly colored and eroticized inflatables of the hand, the breast, the dollop of paint... And all of it reminiscent of toys on a beach under blue skies where anything should be possible. From Peter Schenck: "Endless Summer mixes up the time-honored tradition of the still life with my feelings on an artist's attachment to their tools – brush, palette, paint – an attachment at times bordering on erotic, at times feeling awkward and all-thumbs. I was also taking on Tom Wesselmann's concentrated still lives of the 60s and 70s, banal and erotic all at once." "Endless Summer" is an acrylic paint on canvas measuring 30" tall by 25" wide. It was included in the group show "Sitting Still" at Bravin Lee Programs Gallery, New York City in October 2017, and showed alongside work by Fairfield Porter, Thomas Nozkowski, Janet Fish, Robert DeNiro Sr...

"Woman in Pink, Blue, and Gray" is an acrylic on canvas painting measuring 24" tall by 18" wide. It's very active, with a woman wearing a colorful cap with feather, her tresses falling down behind/beside her, portrayed with cubist abandon as the artist folds in Picasso with Philip Guston... Note all the formal elements are present – her eyes, her smile, her dress and bosom – yet assemble and disassemble in front of our eyes. From Peter Schenck...

"Rembrandt Woman" is an intriguing painting, a woman in classic Dutch master portrait pose with a hand modestly holding her secrets dear, yet por...

Anne Finkelstein’s hard-edged architectural paintings are built upon a foundation of poetry and history. Inspired by a lifetime of walking through New...

Real dried flowers are secured into this composition by resin—which also gives Yektai's paintings their signature depth, as he paints below and on t...

A rare small painting from contemporary Abstract Expressionist, Darius Yektai. Although titled "pink flowers" the hue of the painting is really more peach, or a light orange. A patte...

the Ticking Sound Under The Ocean is oil on canvas by Hani Naji in his series Objects and Preselection. Hani Naji try to capture subjects and meaning using surrealism by repeating o...

Tropical plants and flowers are assembled along with partially hidden figures in this tropical scene. A Hawaiian Tapestry - Oil Paint By Marc Zimmerman This masterpiece is exhibite...

Robert Petrick's "The Dancer" is a fusion of meticulous geometry and bold abstract expression. From the artist's Chromatic Collisions series, this pie...