Second Street Gallery curator, Kristen Chiacchia, has invited a group of local artists to submit paintings using only black, white, and shades of grey (grisaille). Artists participating in the exhibition include: Pam Black, Jessie Coles, Gray Dodson, Sam Gray, Lou Haney, Krista Townsend, and Laura Wooten. She’s in Monochrome was on view in Second Street Gallery’s Dové Gallery from October 4 to October 25. An opening reception with the artists was held on First Friday, October 4 and saw a great crowd.

Grisaille is a centuries-old painting practice, popularized first in Europe during the 14th century, where a painting is executed entirely in shades of gray or another neutral color. Artists often utilize grayscale paintings to imitate sculpture, and many students of art are required to extensively study the technique before being permitted to graduate onto the use of a full color palette. 

A chapter in neurologist Oliver Sacks’ 1995 book, "An Anthropologist on Mars: Seven Paradoxical Tales", also served as an inspiration for the exhibition. "The Case of the Colorblind Painter" discusses an accomplished artist who is suddenly struck by cerebral achromatopsia, the inability to perceive color, due to brain damage. This exhibition will challenge these traditionally intensely hued artists to delve into new ideas of tones, texture, composition, and expression using this limited palette, instead of their typically hued palettes.

The goal of She’s in Monochrome is to encourage viewers to look beyond the typical appreciation of a work only for its color palette. The exhibition instead aims to facilitate the presentation of ideas and the exploration of the work’s surface, as well as provide a vehicle for meditation on the influence of  color through its very absence.

EXHIBITION SPONSORS

This exhibition is made possible in part by Pamela Friedman & Ronald Bailey and Les Yeux du Monde Gallery.