Barbara Steinberg’s paintings have that rare quality of enriching the viewer on may levels. There is a visionary quality about the work that touches on the intensity of late Turner. There is also a visually seductive, painterly confidence in her works that reminds one of the best of the American abstract expressionists. This is a mysterious world of light and colour, held together by a keen artistic sensibility and a wise and passionate soul.
Indeed, for Steinberg oil paint itself is a source of passion. It lives for her. The process of creating a work is a collaborative journey with the paint, from darkness into rich glowing light. Never quite sure where a painting will take her the artist applies layers of paint and by a process of elimination or inclusion (accidents that work) the finished piece begins to emerge. Underneath these layers ‘ghosts of paintings that were not born,’ as the artist describes them, create their own impact on the final tapestry of shape and colour.
In her new solo show at Signal Gallery, Panoply, Barbara has focused her interest in myth and ancient storytelling on the contrasting forces of Bacchus and Pan. For her Pan represents nature, birth and rebirth - the healing qualities of warm sun and the framework for the living world. While Bacchus is all night-time pleasures, of excess, of losing yourself in pleasures that are potentially destructive or cleansing. These contrasting forces take visual shape in her works for the show. Greens and yellows broadly represent Pan and Bacchus is portrayed in reds, oranges and purples.
The overall dramatic structure of the fourteen works in the show reflects the seasons and rhythm of light, with the darker more muted works being painted at the grey/green beginning and the end of Barbara’s painting season (March to November). The vibrant, conflict driven or sensual works being the product of midsummer. As a group, these works will certainly make a powerful impression on those who see them in the gallery in February.
Barbara was born in Philadelphia, USA. She studyied at Smith College in Massachusetts, she won a much-prised scholarship to study at Yale University summer school. On graduating from Smith, she received a grant to study sculpture in England, first with Ralph Brown at the West of England College of Art, then privately with Michael Ayrton in London. She returned briefly to America, to teach sculpture and take a Master of Fine Arts Degree at California State University at Long Beach, before settling permanently in London. She has exhibited across the UK in group and solo shows, most notably her solo exhibition at the Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh. This is her first solo show at Signal Gallery. |
