Abstract paintings and prints selected from the 30-year career of Fresno State professor Dan Nadaner will be on display from Aug. 26 to Sept. 13 in the Phebe Conley Art Gallery at Fresno State.
The community is invited to an opening reception at 5 p.m., Thursday, Aug. 29 in the Conley Gallery and an Artist Talk at 3:30 p.m., Tuesday, Sept. 3 in Conley Arts, room 101. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Friday, closed weekends and holidays. Parking is $5 in lot P5.
In the exhibition Current/Undercurrent, artist Nadaner channels the currents of the sea and the undercurrents of human emotion. Experiences of long-distance swimming in the ocean, with the current and against it, have been important to the artist in the development of the paintings. The paintings convey the sense of being in the currents while also suggesting the undercurrents of human experience that come to mind through the metaphor of the sea.
“Painting shows me something I haven’t found in any other medium. It’s the traces, the layers, the forms barely revealed within layers, the undertones, and reverberations, the hints of forgotten images and half-heard sounds. Painting, for me, is a floating space with unpredictable overlays and many possible points of focus, permitting the viewer to interpret the works in multiple ways,” said Nadaner.
The paintings are built on numerous drawings, a multi-layered painting process, and a search for a visual language related to the themes of currents and human experience.
Travels, losses, moments of encountering the unknown, feelings of being anchored or casting loose, and the flow of consciousness, all play a part in the content of the works. The works are an attempt to render visible those thoughts and emotions that might not otherwise find outward form.
