Openwork

Description

In her still lifes native Michigander Sondra Freckelton elevates ordinary household objects to a level of grandeur. By making them overlifesize, enhancing their coloration, and stressing their corporeality, the artist insists upon their importance as pictorial subjects. A former sculptor, Freckelton became a painter in the early 1970s. At the same time, she moved from abstraction to realism, while retaining her interest in formalism. Rather than describe objects minutely, she generalizes form, renouncing an exploration of differing textures. In "Openwork," her placement of an embroidered placemat across varying planes allows her to explore space and depth, and her inclusion of a glass vase enables her to play with reflections, and the resulting interplay of two- and three-dimensional forms.