Artist makes viewers part of dream
NORMAN — An artist who says “I am living the dream” makes us part of it in a show of his landscapes, animal pictures and portraits.
The artist is Jeff Tabor, who has galleries in New England and Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he lives. He was born in Clovis, New Mexico, in 1951.
Tabor’s “Recent Paintings” are at The Depot gallery, 200 S Jones, with receptions from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. June 8, and 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. July 1.
Tabor’s “Our Backyard” is a very big one, indeed, with the overgrown path of a dry arroyo leading us to distant mountains at sunset, in an oil.
“Chimney Rock Near Abiquiu” provides a good focus for an acrylic, in which a deep blue ridge contrasts nicely with the red sandstone formation.
Tabor is able to “simplify” other landscapes with “bold colors” and “broad patterns,” such as a thin blue “Lake Edge,” under rich-hued bands of sky, in one.
Expressive brushwork of sunlit tall grass makes a “Running Buffalo with Black” look ready to charge, while a mother buffalo with a “Nursing Calf” is less threatening.
Portraits are another subject Tabor handles well, in his oils of “Lambert,” wearing a dark T-shirt, and of “Doug,” wearing suspenders, a flowery shirt and big hat.
Filling their frames well, too, are an acrylic canvas and a gouache study of a pioneer covered “Tabor Wagon” that looks like its waiting to have a team hitched to it. Tabor’s small sepia-hued gouache of a “Hollyhawk in (the) Landscape” takes us into the blossom, in a manner somewhat reminiscent of Georgia O’Keeffe.
By contrast, he combines a bugling elk, an acrobat and adobe buildings in a small acrylic collage called “Art You Do.”
Tabor’s work is recommended in his show’s run through July 1 at the downtown Norman train depot gallery.