We met at Georgia's new studio near Prospect Park. I hadn't been familiar with Georgia's work and was greeted with lots of oil paintings. They range in size from a couple as small ones about 4x4 inches to very large works roughly 4x5 feet. The paint is very thinly applied and some paintings have the luminous quality of water colors. The colors are predominantly pastel. I wouldn't call them abstract because all of them have an uncanny quality of vaguely bearing resemblance to something -- but I was not quite sure what. Georgia told me that she does not work from specific imagery. Instead, her paintings are the results of a collective imagery that she has amassed from personal observation. The imagery is reminiscent of ornaments, decoration, and opulence in some works while other pieces appear to be about animated computer keyboards. Georgia has developed her own language that, because it seems recognizable, causes the viewer to want to continue looking in an effort to decipher her code. However, the paintings do not offer concrete answers and because they are rewarding to look at, I was not disappointed, but rather perpetually engaged.
Georgie's paintings also have a delightful humor to them. One piece, "Lifeboat" appears to be depicting keyboard keys at a theater. Another work, appropriately titled, "Stacked" has a lot of different textures "stacked" atop one another as in a layer cake. Georgia also makes works on paper -- also in oil -- some of which were cut out with curved edges. She had two small works that looked like they could be details from another work and I asked is they were a pair. She said that she has not worked in series but is interested in it. This is where I saw a fertile area for her to create something for our show and gave Georgia my assignment/selection for the Collectively Assembled exhibition. I look forward to seeing what she cooks up, not only for our show, but also for her upcoming solo exhibition opening September 14th in Hudson, NY.
-- Asya Reznikov
