Object as Color; Paintings by Malcolm Christhilf

Frame Shop Gallery
January 22, 2010 through April 24, 2010

A free public opening reception will be held during
Gallery Night, Friday, March 12, 2010 from 7–10 p.m.

Still life painting has been around since ancient times, and has been a mainstay of western art since the 1600s. Malcolm Christhilf embraces this ancient tradition with the enthusiasm of the true artist, gifted with the ability to perceive beauty in the everyday object. “The perfectly functional proportions of a glass bottle, or the condensed energy in the sphere of a rubber ball amaze me with their beauty,” he notes.

“I used to believe that the particular objects that intrigued me the most must possess subconscious meaning. That they were symbols of internal content brought to consciousness through image making. While I continue to believe that there is an element of this at work, lately the attraction seems more existential. Looking and painting is a form of recognizing the world around me. To observe and articulate the plain existence of the thing itself seems to be reason enough.”

“The plain existence” is a humble description of Christhilf’s jewel-like renderings. His meticulously crafted studies of banal objects transform and elevate them to the realm of mystery.

Christhilf is an Associate Professor of Art at Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, where he teaches Design, Drawing, and Painting. A native of Maryland and graduate of Towson State University, he is also a skilled printmaker and a former Fellow at the Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque. He earned his MA and MFA degrees from the University of California at Berkeley.