Melanie Pankau at Thomas McCormick

 

Melanie Pankau : Two Solitudes, 2022

Geoform painting often emphasizes the elements of graphic design. Cleverness appears to be the issue -- as triggered by a dramatic, or even delicate, balance of color, tone, size, or space. Consider the “Homage to the square” series by Josef Albers (1888-1976). The visual elements are so simple and so few - yet their precise arrangement of tonal values and sizes remains intriguing.

Locally, geoform painting has often been more about the intensity of personal expression - beginning with Rudolph Weisenborn (1881-1974) and continuing today with William Conger , Nicholas Sistler , Stanley Edwards , and Anna Kunz. They can express everything from humor to horror, aggression to passivity.

Recently, an exhibition of the German-British painter, Tomma Abts (b. 1967) , traveled to the Art Institute. It was a kaleidescopic playground of visual effects. The current exhibition of Melanie Pankau (b. 1977) is similar in its cold precision -- but it’s also fundamentally different. It’s the eruption of an inner spirit rather than an acrobatic entertainment for the roving eye.

Melanie Pankau is a meditative seeker and her paintings are what she has discovered: the emerging life energy in herself. There is a constant gentle flow, emanating from the center. Nothing is jarringly off kilter - yet the inner movement still feels unique. They are kind of symmetrical - but not quite. Every line denotes the closest distance between two points. None are broken, blurred, or curved. A mathematical idea, rather than an emotion, is the generative principle behind this pictorial universe.

Many of these pieces are not very exciting - at least from a distance. Only up close can you attach to the subtle perfection. “Two Solitudes” is the exception. The warm colors and jagged rhythms can capture attention across a room. Then the closer you get, the more satisfying it becomes.

Pankau tells us that her intention for last year’s show was “ to provide a space that is calm and contemplative to counter the noise, negativity, and combativeness of our current cultural experience.” Isn’t that what a yoga studio does? And that’s where these pieces really belong - rather than an art gallery. Just as that Zurbaran crucifixion belongs in a church, not the Art Institute.

Note:  A quick Google of "Yoga studio art" pulls up a lot of figurative and geometric drek.  I certainly do not intend to associate Pankau’s fine paintings with any of that.