CONVIVIUM

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Thursday, January 21st, 2016
This show runs Tuesdays - Saturdays from January 19th to February 6th. The gallery is open 11am to 5pm

"De gustibus non est disputandem", is a Latin expression Shelby's Mother often used, meaning, "each man to his own taste". How true it is! Some like it hot, some like it cold. Some like spicy, some do not. There is no hesitation in showing one's preferences for red or white, rare or medium, "sunny side up" versus "over easy".

So whiy is it that many of us hove trouble asserting and expressing our opinions when it comes to ART? Why does ART have us second guessing ourselves?

CONVIVIUM, a festive banquet complete with all the trimmings, functions to draw a social group together. The exhibition was named "Convivium" to promote the idea that Art, too, can be a powerful catalyst, bringing people together to sample the fare. As at any feast, it can be taken in or left on the plate. Just as the cook in the kitchen, or the vintner in the winery begin their processes long before the guests arrive on the scene, so the artist in the studio labours over her creative process.

The final results are laid out and the experience is extended to the recipients to partake according to their tastes; to comtemplate, evaluate and savour.

Artist, Shelby Assenheimer, has been working diligently in her studio over the past year and has assembled a body of work for her solo exhibition, CONVIVIUM, showing at Gage Gallery, where she has been a member since its inception. Shelby paints on canvas with acrylics and employs large trowels and brushes to layer on glazes that impart depth, while expressive mark making and sgraffito interrupt the surface with their counterpoint rhythm. These large scale paintings are vibrant in colour and are often dramatic in subject matter. Shelby's abstracted scenes, of the transitioning seasons that impose their whims upon the accepting landscape, conjure messages of our relationship with each other and the world around us. The picture is finally completed when the viewer accepts the invitation and joins the "Convivium".

Here in this milieu, the viewer is given a chance to slow the pace, develop his/her tastes, explore the imagination, and sense the world through a different lens, all the while taking the arist's work to a new dimension with that viewer's added layer of perspective. Healthy and delicious, ART is "food for thought".

Try it it will make you grow!

OPENING RECEPTION  JANUARY 22 7-9 PM GAGE GALLERY 2031 OAK BAY AVE.

www.shelbyassenheimer.com