‘Once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward’
The artist: Angela Fraleigh Where: Inman Gallery, through Sept. 9 Why: Even before close inspection, this gorgeous painting knocked me silly with its grand scale. More than 8 feet tall by 6 feet wide, it dominates a show of smaller works by various female artists, looking like something that could hang next to Renaissance masterpieces at the Louvre, if you don’t mind seeing one of the figures’ hands chopped off.
That’s because the central image is a cropped close-up borrowed from Jacob Jordaen’s c. 1645-55 “The Rest of Diana,” minus its original male woodland creatures. Fraleigh brings the viewer’s focus to the seminude Goddess of the Hunt and her nymphs lounging in the woods with a dead deer.
But what’s this? Cartoony lines filled with flatter colors surround the edges, like this is a yet-to-be-finished, monumental paint-bynumbers piece. Actually, the background is also lifted from another era and place. These flat bits are elements of Japanese Edo-period prints. Less of a culture clash than one might imagine, they refer to the first novel ever written, “The Tale of Genji,” by Murasaki Shikibu, a woman.
The Diana figure appears to be telling a story, too. Judging from the painting’s title — taken from a quote attributed to Leonardo da Vinci — her tale conveys a message that is presumably about more than how to slay a deer.
Still, I can’t take my eyes off the animal, whose chest is skyward but whose head and eyes are decidedly earthbound. Its folded front legs are nearly parallel with Diana’s outstretched arm, creating compositional tension.
The artist says the painting is about the power of women’s words. Her brushes speak volumes, too.