Aggregating Lapidary Still Lifes

What do fish tanks, earrings, mineral displays, license plates, and disco balls have in common? Onemight ask this question in search of a theme linking the pictorial subjects of Melancholy and theInfinite Salads, Rachel Schmidhofer's first show at Glike Gallery. However, their apparentinconsistency is a clue to greater coherence. Schmidhofer's paintings exude ambivalence forsociety's complex manifold of items and information, buoyed by optimism for painting's power as amedium whereby selected cultural fragments can be filtered and re-classified into new systems ofsignificance.

"Everything in the world is an awesome thing to paint, except when everything in the world is justclutter and meaninglessness," the New York-based artist says in a statement included in the gallerypress release.

"The casual arrangement of objects on a table, a specific jewelry rack amongst a thousand googledones, a license plate from a state out west--otherwise unconnected, when looked at in the right wayand at the right time, incite feelings of excitement, like I've just been let in on a secret.

"When I paint I'm looking for that feeling. Searching for that secret in the debris."

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Singles and Pairs," 2014. Oil on panel, 20" x 24." Image courtesy of GlikeGallery.

In her paintings, that ineffable feeling suspends at the crux of timelessness and evanescence,

oscillating between shimmers and shadows, materializing in tenuous glimmers of specificity that arein danger of disappearing into miscellanea. Schmidhofer's pictures appear as wistful efforts to savortransient moments of clarity and save them from subsumption.

Hung side by side, "Shadows" and "Here" evoke this transience. "Shadows" shows a dim cabinetrendered in broad gray strokes, its contents illegible in the dark. "Here": the title indicates presence,the fact that the gems in this painting are visible, lit to resplendence in a natural history museum-style display.

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Shadows," 2015. Oil on panel, 40" x 30." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Here," 2015. Oil on panel, 40" x 30." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

Minerals arranged in curio cabinets suggest agelessness owing to the incalculable age of stones andthe ancient tradition of exhibiting them. Geologic specimens defy the effects of time, yet theircoruscant beauty is transitory inasmuch as it only exists under specific conditions. Rocks must becut and polished to reveal their inner transparent color whose effulgence, in turn, depends oncertain illumination. Each sparkle is precarious. Schmidhofer crystallizes these instants youtube inpaint while acknowledging the futility of such an undertaking; perhaps this is the origin of"Melancholy" in the show's title.

Like geologic exhibits, paintings rely on conventions resulting from historical precedent. Like theminerals themselves, paintings are potentially long-lasting; but their significance depends on optimaldisplay, the conditions of which are difficult to achieve. Artistic context--historical, critical, andfinancial--constantly changes, rendering success elusive. A geode's glitter seems fresh, distinct,striking; then it's gone. Flashes in the pan are all too common in art worlds.

Schmidhofer's likening of art exhibits to displays of crystals, fish, and jewelry is reinforced by herpaintings' similarities to their predecessors.

French painter Alexandre-Isidore Leroy de Barde was known for painting minerals in the early 19thcentury. Schmidhofer's mineral paintings are remarkably correspondent to his in composition and

format--some, in fact, are identical. ("Here" is a copy of de Barde's 1813 "Minerals inCrystallization.") Schmidhofer's paintings are reductive compared to de Barde's renderings ofexhibits in scientific detail. De Barde's picture gets lost in translation, just another subject forSchmidhofer to make her own. By innovating his painting, she restores it to our zeitgeist whiledeclassing it to the level of the rocks that he originally painted.

Schmidhofer's painterliness conjures Karen Kilimnik and Rosson Crow, sometimes JosephineHalvorson. Halvorson paints directly from observation, whereas Schmidhofer's sourcing of pre-existing imagery is more aligned with Luc Tuymans. Materially, though, Schmidhofer's vision isoriginal.

Her paintings seem to emit a diffuse glow like the shiny objects they depict. Forms emerge throughsophisticated yet idiosyncratic looseness. Facets of amethyst are carved with a palette knife. Brightneon under-painting shines through Gerhard Richter-esque smears of variegated jewel hues. Upclose, points of paint peak to and fro as if dancing on a floor of flowing trickles and aggregatebrushstrokes.

Though intricate, the portrayed objects defy representational logic, floating within encompassingstructures. Rocks liquefy, dripping onto shelves below. In "Neons," an aquarium and its supportingbureau are contrived as elaborately as the fish inside. Schimdhofer's emphasis on cases and shelvesalludes to the correlation between depicted framework and rectangular canvas. Like other prizedentities, paintings are collected, categorized, and connected by way of interpretation, curation, andexplanation.

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Neons," 2015. Oil on panel, 45" x 60." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

"Eons" depicts a display table scattered with indistinct items. The setting is indefinite. Perhaps it's athrift store. Maybe it's a fading memory, or a nearly forgotten scene shimmering into recollection.

This painting evokes the sensation of being overwhelmed by miscellany at a thrift store or amuseum. Everything coalesces into indifferent haze; one doesn't know what it all is, where it camefrom, or where it's going. Suddenly, one begins to sense the ponderous continuum of timerepresented by the assortment. In the context of eons, the current moment seems, paradoxically, atonce dizzyingly monumental yet absurdly insignificant. Past permeates present, coloring it withdread of the current scene's future as mere memory.

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Eons," 2014. Oil on panel, 30" x 40." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

Origins are slippery, difficult to trace. Schmidhofer conflates art historical paintings and imagesfound online with her own professed interest in the items they portray. She doesn't quite let theviewer in on the secrets she mentions. Her cryptic statement and romantic titles don't reveal thesources of her imagery. ("Prelude" and "Sunspot," for instance, were apparently painted from aphoto on a display cabinet purveyor's website.) That denial is germane to her paintings' tantalizingvisual qualities and their content. Still, one wonders how much richer her work could become wereshe to approach her compositions as inventively as she applies paint. It would be easy for a painteras adroit as Schmidhofer to get comfortable and settle into a groove. As with any other artist, thequestion remains: What's next?

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Prelude," 2015. Oil on canvas, 14" x 18." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

Rachel Schmidhofer, "Sunspot," 2015. Oil on panel, 12" x 15." Image courtesy of Glike Gallery.

"Melancholy and Infinite Salads" is on view until May 17 at Glike Gallery, 5890 Blackwelder St.,Culver City, CA 90232. For further information, see glikegallery.com.

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