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  Michael Reafsnyder
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  It is almost impossible to look at a Michael Reafsnyder painting without smiling. This could be because in each of these paintings, bobbing up from the bottom is a half moon smiling face. Or it could also be the paint itself, which is on small wooden panels and is made up of brilliant wild oil color, applied so thickly in certain areas, that one could be forgiven for thinking of cake icing.

Looking for a while longer reveals more. In one painting, a little blue face is crowned with halo like bands of yellow, baby blue, and pink. The face is the same blue color often used to represent the Hindu god Shiva. It feels as if the colors above it are emanations of its own pure energy.

In another, the area above and around the "smiler" is made up of reds so deep they look like blood, mingling dangerously with dark blue. The face is their meeting place. It looks as if it is made up of tiny little fires. Its features are an unearthly violet, squeezed directly from the tube, they seem to cool it off, but you still can't help but feel a little sorry for this person.

The artist says about these pieces: "Perhaps these paintings ultimately become about the un-degradability of color. The paintings begin with the application of primary colors to the panel. All color mixing is done on the panel surface making the panel the ground for all activity. Slowly a figure emerges out of the ground. The figure becomes immersed in a vertiginous world. The figure is no longer returnable, or divisible, into the ground colors from which it came, taking on a character of its own, while retaining elements of its making.

Eventually what is produced is a complication of the figure/ground relationship. Exactly where the figure resides in the world and what aspect of the world the figure consumes or rejects becomes open to questioning. The world is concealed from and revealed to the figure. All the while, these paintings work as propositions and not conclusions. Each reflecting potential options for living in the world. Options which are alterable through the amendments made to one by the world, both additions and subtractions of color."

Michael Reafsnyder offers the viewer a gratifying selection of these propositions. After visiting with these images, one feels as if you've met yourself and made some new friends along the way.

Michael Reafsnyder is a graduate of the MFA program of the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA. He has had two solo exhibitions in California. This will be his first solo show in New York.