ART OF KEITH SCHALL: ENCAPSULATION OF MODERN ART

 

 

 

 

An Encapsulation of Modern Art

The Works of Keith Schall

 

A focus on the aesthetic Keith Schall's art is a sensual delight, however to miss the opportunity to view it as a survey of modern art history is to miss its depth, intensity and scope. After investing some time with any of his paintings and "Machiavelli's Princess" (2006) in particular, one comes to appreciate its complexities and references.  At first one garners the bright palette and unblended brush strokes of such masters of Impressionism as Monet and Renoir.  Yet one also notices the Post-Impressionists use of arbitrary versus local colors of the Fauves like Matisse and Derain.  Yet somehow his use of color is also reminiscent of the pure Expressionists coloration beginning with Kandinsky (the first painter to use pure color as expression without any figuration or representational references ).   He seems, at first, not to refer to the Dadaists as DuChamp or Picabia, nor to the Surrealists as Magritte and Ernst.  On deeper penetration he does so by his swirls, daubs, and most especially an almost 'stream of consciousness' in his painting technique.  This also denotes the views of the more recent Abstract Expressionists as Rothko and Pollack, not only in the freedom and coloration but also in their concepts of "action painting".  One can feel the energy and physical dexterity of whole body involvement with the brush strokes, the use of empty spaces, and the "overall" use of the canvas without limitations of foreground-middle ground -back ground (\which began with Manet and reached its zenith with the Cubists Picasso and Braque).  Schall's  historical journey seems to end at the Abstract Expressionists.  Yet, his constructed canvases can be interpreted as a reference to the more contemporary melding of sculpture and painting such as Rauschenberg and Johns as well as to recent contemporary installation art.  He even moves beyond the accepted frame of the picture, as a rectilinear or ovoid construct, and thereby relates to the more painterly Post-Modern artists.

 

On a more integrative approach to modern culture his art is a fusion of related artistic media.  Painters have for generations attempted to align and interpret their art with great poets, writers, and musicians of their time.  Many even wrote impassioned manifestos to detail their import and reflection on contemporary art and society.  Schall has more concisely aligned these artistic media -literature and art - in the apparently simplistic though actually involuted methodology of the nomenclature of his titles with all of their literary and musical allusions.  Further, the constructed canvases noted above, can be seen as homage to another artistic media, architecture.

 

 

 

This historical amalgamation of the arts deserves greater thought and discussion.  Thus Schall's art deserves, not just a passing glance, but a more determined and thorough introspective view.  His work can be seen in Sedona (Goldenstein Gallery), Scottsdale Galleries, and many private Southwest collections.

 

 

By C. Lawrence Decker