Two By Land: Review

Two By Land
By Katherine Sandoz & Nicole Donnelly

Two By Land is a contemporary collaboration between artists Katherine Sandoz & Nicole Donnelly. The works are made up of acrylic, oil, and water based on canvas are on display at the Sheppard Contemporary Gallery. Two By Land portrays the experience of landscape. Each different landscape can provoke different responses and emotions. The two artists use abstraction, but each has a different approach in creating landscape pieces. Sandoz is painter of detail. Her landscape abstractions are of actual places invoking in the viewer intimate feelings and memories. Places such as coastal waters and the Deep South are used. Donnelly’s works are of imaginary landscapes depicting chaos and disarray. Using recognizable things in an uncomfortable and frightening manner does this. A tree is overturned. A sky is horizonless, giving the feeling of no end in sight. Each artist uses a similar color palette but different techniques to achieve their works.

This Ship By Nicole Donnelly

This ship by Nicole Donnelly is a landscape piece using oil and acrylic on canvas. The size of the piece plays a big part in its effectiveness. At a size of 44 x 64 in. the piece can be overwhelming and as the artist says “information overload.” The piece is an outline of an old sailing ship. The mast and sails can be seen in a thin white color outline. The body and no other part of the ship is present. The piece is divided in two with two different colors. At the bottom of the piece, a gray green is used. The color is depicting dark mud like water. A darker blue color is used for the upper part of the piece. The blue resembles a storm or coming doom. The sky looks as if lightning could strike at any second. Around the white outline of the ship’s mast, a red color is used. It looks as if the mast and sails are on fire and the ship is going to be lost at sea. The emotion this piece provokes in me is that of chaos and danger. In other works of Donnelly, the same apocalypse and all out disasters are portrayed. Even with this piece’s minimalist approach, this feeling is present.

(Snowscape) Big Moose Lake By Katherine Sandoz

Snowscape by Katherine Sandoz is a landscape piece using water-based media on panel. Unlike the works of Nicole Donnelly in this showing, Sandoz’s pieces are much smaller. Snowscape is only 18 x 18 in. This helps her theme of intimacy and emotion be achieved. The piece used the color palette of grays with a mixture of blue and white. Like other pieces in the showing, the piece is divided. From the middle to the bottom of the piece, a gray-blue water feature is shown. The mixture of colors shows movement of the water in various places. No area in this section of the piece looks the same. Just as with the movement of water on a shoreline or beach, no area of water looks the same. At the top of the piece, a rise in the land is depicted. This could be portraying a hill or mountain. Above that, a cloudless gray sky is present.  This piece could be portraying a number of places. I have no memories of being at a place like this, but I’m sure someone visiting the gallery has. In seeing the piece, the emotion of being there will be remembered. Even with the minimal use of colors, a large amount of detail is present. By presenting this piece in a smaller size, all of the details can be observed. I don’t feel that this piece would be effective in a larger format.

Each artist in this showing presented landscapes of different fashions. Even with their similarities, each are very different is their construction and viewer response.  As with any collaboration, it was enjoyable to see two different depictions of the same theme. This gallery shows that artists can present their own ideas and creativity on the same topic.