David Shapiro: Solo Exhibition

October 5 - 25, 2006

"Astonishment is usually sudden. When looking at the paintings of David Shapiro, it develops slowly, as a question comes into focus: how can so much pictorial activity seem so calm? Dividing a painting into two, four, or six parts, Shapiro gives each one its own character. From a distance, we see colors brought together in defiance of all routine ideas about visual harmony. Up close, you might focus on a border separating textures so dissimilar that you have to remind yourself that both are made of paint. Yet an atmosphere of harmonious resolution pervades Shapiro’s canvases."

 

(Excerpted from the catalogue essay Infinite Possibility: The Paintings of David Shapiro by Carter Ratcliff.)