The MAC Presents “Now and Then”

The Marion Art Center’s latest exhibit featuring artist Leslie Baker and sculptor St. George Tucker Aufranc opened on July 17 with a reception, giving MAC members and the public the opportunity to view the artwork and talk to the artists about the pieces selected for display.

Baker, based in Martha’s Vineyard, exhibits a casual boldness in many of her monotypes, using color almost with an intentional happenstance as she expresses in her work her perception of change – in the landscape and in her response to it.

Stand before one of her monotype series on the main floor of the MAC and be confronted with pure green, orange, and turquoise, and resist the urge to dive right into one of them and let the bold, defiant strokes of paint on the surface of serenity draw you further and further in.

The series of landscapes evokes a feeling of the familiar stillness of a Mattapoisett estuary afternoon. The pinkish orange haze that appears to billow out from the canvas into the second floor gallery; the passing of the seasons by the sea at twilight, dawn, and dusk; the ebb and flow of the estuary tide that empties into the sea. Moments captured in time that is ever changing.

“Now and Then,” said Baker, is “showing where I came from.”

In her series, “Birches,” Baker says her work is all about observable change and preserving the moment.

“The vertical, always shedding trunks, tiny green buds opening to almond-shaped leaves…” says Baker, describing the essence of change among the seemingly static birch trees. “Then light changes everything. Small changes, every day.”

The work reflects the hitting of the light and the landscape’s response to it. She said she approaches the series with playfulness, invention, and surprise: “a refined vision.” Baker tends to work in a series, she said.

“Some ideas can’t be expressed in a single piece,” says Baker. “It has to be a way for me to develop and change as an artist.”

Aufranc has several sculptures on display inside the MAC, but the most notable are the large kinetic sculptures on display outside around the gallery. “Osprey” stands before the front of the building, reaching for the sky as an abstract figure of an osprey comes to land atop its delicate twig nest.

The exhibit runs until August 19 and can be viewed during operating hours: Tuesday – Friday from 1:00 to 5:00 pm, and Saturday from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm. The Marion Art Center is located at 80 Pleasant Street in Marion.

By Jean Perry

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