SHE MAKES FACES
When you look in the mirror, do you smile with delight? Probably not. When we look at our reflections, it's usually in critical self-assessment. So it is with Catherine Kehoe, whose show of small, oil-on-wood self-portraits suggests her to be a dour, angry, and exhausted woman.
As paintings, these are little gems. Kehoe fashions faces from planes of light and shadow. In "Runs in the Family," you can see it in her brow, which is deftly crafted of graduated flat blocks of light; her nose looks almost carved from a cliff's craggy edge. Each piece is 8 inches square. The background, the slant and potency of light, the way the head takes up space (or doesn't) all add up to subtle, smart presentations.
"Chip off the Old Block" has her almost swarmed by a background that looks like a sand cloud, giving way to blue only in the corner near her face. She is at once weighed down by the weather system, and part of what generates it. The background in "Damson," in contrast, is a deep, forgiving purple; she raises her face, eyes closed, to a warm yellow light.
Kehoe's unforgiving self-examination has a cumulative effect: The frowns start to seem as much a pose as any perky smile. As good as these paintings are, you may still long to see her caught up, unsuspecting, in a moment of mirth.
� Cate McQuaid
When you look in the mirror, do you smile with delight? Probably not. When we look at our reflections, it's usually in critical self-assessment. So it is with Catherine Kehoe, whose show of small, oil-on-wood self-portraits suggests her to be a dour, angry, and exhausted woman.
As paintings, these are little gems. Kehoe fashions faces from planes of light and shadow. In "Runs in the Family," you can see it in her brow, which is deftly crafted of graduated flat blocks of light; her nose looks almost carved from a cliff's craggy edge. Each piece is 8 inches square. The background, the slant and potency of light, the way the head takes up space (or doesn't) all add up to subtle, smart presentations.
"Chip off the Old Block" has her almost swarmed by a background that looks like a sand cloud, giving way to blue only in the corner near her face. She is at once weighed down by the weather system, and part of what generates it. The background in "Damson," in contrast, is a deep, forgiving purple; she raises her face, eyes closed, to a warm yellow light.
Kehoe's unforgiving self-examination has a cumulative effect: The frowns start to seem as much a pose as any perky smile. As good as these paintings are, you may still long to see her caught up, unsuspecting, in a moment of mirth.
� Cate McQuaid