The Nielsen Gallery of Newbury Street recently introduced its 11th solo exhibition of artist Sam Messer's latest work. Including mainly recent portraiture, the exhibition is a breathtaking representation of Messer's physical and human style of painting.
Messer, a 45-year-old New York native, and his wife Eleanor mingled with friends, art-buyers, and the gallery's patrons this Saturday during a two-hour reception to introduce the show. Eleanor is the subject of several of Messer's portraits, including "Madame E.," a striking work in the style of John Singer-Sergeant's "Madame X." The piece depicts her clad in a lace gown, and half bare-breasted against a bright green background. Accompanying her portrait are several others also generally reminiscent of other well-known paintings. Messer does not hide his artistic influences in his work. "I took the shape of the canvas from El Greco," he says, "where you can't see it all at once."
When the viewer takes in a Messer work - especially a Messer portrait - he finds that there are many things on which to concentrate, and immediately becomes engrossed. There is a grand focus placed around the eyes of the portrait subjects, as well as attention to the backgrounds in which they are painted.
The vibrant colors, chunky layers of paint, and sweeping, physical brushstrokes of Messer's work (along with his focus on eyes and background) are reminiscent of Van Gogh's portraiture. Messer relates his work to Van Gogh's in that they both "tell a narrative," and he is interested in what the background has to say about the subject. For example, an early portrait, "Stuart," depicts a young man sitting amidst a background of painted sign language characters. This background might tell the viewer something about this subject that they would not have been able to grasp from simply viewing his eyes, his dress, or even his home.
Included in the collection are several self-portraits, all titled "Birthday Portrait" and numbered chronologically. To date, Messer has painted 45 such portraits, all of which give a little more insight into Messer as a man and an artist. One depicts him amidst a sea of stars, another among brightly colored flowers. These all reveal his markedly optimistic character. This can also be seen in titles of works such as "In the End is My Beginning," a more positive rearranging of T.S. Eliot's words, "In the beginning is my end."
The subjects of his portraits bring their own art with them - poetry and other forms of writing emerge as great influences on Messer's work. Several of the portraits are of Paul Auster with his typewriter, or of just the typewriter alone. "The tools people use tell something about them," Messer notes, "if the person has a strong enough connection to the object."
Not only are painters and writers great influences, but musicians are also a source of inspiration to Messer's work. Perhaps the most arresting piece in this exhibition is the portrait "George," a lively interpretation of the notorious composer and musician George Gershwin. Though Messer did not know Gershwin, the musician was an acquaintance of his father's, and a most interesting New York character to Messer. His portrait of Gershwin is alive with motion. Messer depicts him with a curving piano and three sets of hands. Only these hands and Gershwin's face are in color, while the piano, body, and background is in shades of black and white. Gershwin smokes a small cigar while his hands cast shadows across the keys. Ghostly lights and chorus girls mingle amidst the background. As one patron passed this piece, she precisely described it as "wild and wonderful."
Wild, wonderful, interesting, and beautiful are all words to describe Messer's work. The brightness of his later works and the more introspective, darker hues of his earlier pieces fit together nicely to give insight into this New York painter. Messer's fall exhibition at the Nielsen Gallery is worth the trek on the Green Line, and certainly worth visiting if you happen to already be in the Newbury area. The exhibition proves most timely in light of Van Gogh's recent "Face to Face" exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts. Art is at its most interesting when you can simultaneously view the works of both the artist and one of his great inspirations.
The Nielsen Gallery is at 179 Newbury Street. The show will be exhibited from Sept. 23-Oct. 21, 2000. For more information, visit www.nielsengallery.com or call the Galley at (617) 266-4835.
