Opening Reception: Stanford Kay: Collected Works

The
artist will be present and the public is invited. 

On exhibit will be 10 paintings from the artist’s

ongoing “Gutenberg Variations” series. A studio painter for more than 25 years,
Kay is primarily known for lyrical, painterly canvases depicting books— rigidly
standing straight up on bookshelves, casually piled on tabletops, or stacked in
sections on thin shelves.  This single

subject has been the springboard for a rich body of work of formal beauty which
simultaneously references larger societal issues.  Using gridded compositions of thickly painted
lines and riotous color, these paintings have the satisfying geometry of a
fully stocked library, overflowing with ideas, adventure and knowledge.  While no book titles are visible, hints of

subject and theme are, at times, conveyed in the paintings’ titles, decorative

book covers, or objects on the library shelf.

Both paintings and books are vessels for ideas,
experience and memory. The books we read, the objects we collect, and the
paintings we love and choose to live with, define us. A book requires the
reader to assemble images and ideas out of its signs and symbols. Likewise, a
painting asks that you translate its strokes and drips into reason and emotion.

"Learning
Curve" at first appears to be an unsteady pile of books

about to collapse or possibly not move at all because it is so well stacked and
balanced. In "Posthumous" Kay fills the
space and maybe suggests the space is not confining at all. "My Back Pages, Bluesette" does not give

the viewer a place to rest one’s eye encouraging the viewer to continue to

wonder and daydream.

Kay’s chosen subject is especially compelling when

considering the diminishing place of physical books, and painting in

contemporary society.  With digital
libraries, the Kindle, and decline in printed media, Kay’s paintings evoke our
disquieting acknowledgment of a pastime forever lost.