Joanne Greenbaum – New Paintings
October 4 – November 1, 2003
Opening reception: Saturday, October 4, 6 to 8pm


D’Amelio Terras is pleased to present its fourth solo exhibition with New York artist Joanne Greenbaum. In her colorful new abstract paintings, partly inspired by a recent trip to Lake Como, Italy, Greenbaum explores systems of structural disjunction. Larger and more graphically complex than her previous work, the paintings simultaneously reveal multiple aspects of forms on the canvas. These multifaceted compositions nonetheless mask the effort that goes in to their making, appearing as natural as a spontaneous drawing.

Greenbaum lays down slightly off-kilter arrays of circles, diamonds, zig zags, cascading lines, drips, steps, and discs across expanses of primed white canvas. Her recent exploration of silkscreen techniques at a print studio has led to semi-transparent layers in her paintings that reveal more of the structure underneath. Each element in the painting floats weightlessly and shifts on its supports; the viewer is aware not only of their relationship on the surface, but also cognizant of the painting’s three-dimensional sculptural or architectural depth.

Eric de Chassey, in an essay published in Vitamin P (Phaidon, 2003), writes: “She has shown a unique ability to fuse the frailty of drawing with the monumentality of painting without losing any specifics of these opposite qualities in each of the works.” Working with an assemblage and overlay of forms, Greenbaum creates intimate spaces that reflect the zone between painting and drawing in which her work resides.

In 2003, Joanne Greenbaum was the recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation grant to work at the Bellagio Study Center in Lake Como, Italy, and was a faculty member at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. In addition to her autumn solo exhibitions in New York, she will participate in Signs, Lines, and Codes at Galerie Anne de Villepoix in Paris, France, from September 12 to October 18. She has recently exhibited in London, Paris, and Switzerland, and Washington, D.C.