Equity Gallery Rebound Series
Object Oriented: On Anne Russinof
By Gina Mischianti
As a non-profit membership organization, New York Artists Equity strives to find as many possible ways to allow the unique, diverse voices and perspectives of members to be heard and seen. Of the programs and initiatives we host to achieve this end, one of the most essential and meaningful opportunities we provide is the chance for members to curate their own exhibitions within our gallery space. Not only does this platform give artists the space to expand their creative and professional repertoire, but also allows Equity Gallery to better represent our community and to feature artists and artworks that may have otherwise not been included in the gallery space.
Anne Russinof, Double Dutch, 53 x 54 in, oil on canvas, 2019
In July of 2019, abstract painter and long-time NYAE member Anne Russinof’s group show Object Oriented opened in the gallery. Russinof curated the exhibition herself and featured her paintings alongside the artwork of Denise Gale, Tony Saunders, and Susan Still Scott. Conceived as a visual conversation between four like-minded contemporaries whose artworks play within their expected roles, each participating artists’ work pushed and subverted the often ambiguous and arbitrary barriers between artwork and objects. This theme of precarious abstraction and the questioning of boundaries within art also further relates to the near-constant onslaught of political and social unrest emblematic of the late 2010s, which accelerates into the new decade without any sign of relenting. Within the show, Russinof’s artwork acted as a keystone and a reference point from which all the other featured works could effectively communicate. Her paintings embody and act as a crux for the exhibition’s concept — abstract art as an ideal conduit for investigating, encapsulating, and synthesizing the aesthetics of tension and turmoil.
Anne Russinof, Fourfold, 53x35 in, oil on canvas, 2019
Perhaps the most distinctive, instantly recognizable visual element found in Russinof’s recent body of work are the series of gestural waves she imposes upon monochromatic planes. Through repetition, the viewer is conditioned to perceive these strokes of paint as recurring symbols, which verge on becoming figurative. Patterns and structures are emphasized through Russinof’s placement of the rippling bolts of paint within the center of the artworks. They lilt, oscillate, and ricochet in direct response to the shape of the painting’s canvas. She further illustrates her paintings’ internal environments by surrounding these figures with intersecting lattices of brushwork. The precise methodology evident in her handling of the paint imbues the paintings with nearly architectural features. Combined with what art writer Stephen Maine calls “a repertoire of glyphs” in his essay “Object and Subject,” Russinof’s paintings are informed with a physicality and format that likens them to tomes written on stone tablets. Indecipherable objects allude to potential legibility and interact with an implied system of transcription.
Anne Russinof, Loose Fit, 20x24 in, oil on canvas, 2018
Other techniques utilized by Russinof purposely defy this implication of symbolic signifiers, most notably through the use of wet-on-wet painting. This style of painting clearly reveals the painter’s motions while creating artwork through swaths of fluid brushwork. Layers of paint of differing opacity peek through the many coats slathered on, often converging, melding, and reflecting off of each other in unexpected ways. The thickness of the bristles and size of the paintbrushes are evident as she carves into the surface of the canvas, cutting through, pushing, and gathering paint. Her gestures emphasize the materials used to make the artwork as well as the process behind its creation, embedding the act of making art into the medium. This presentation fully displays the expressive, kinetic performance and craftsmanship that goes behind the formation of the finished artwork, as well as the elements used on the surface of the canvas. Action and material tangibly coalesce.
Anne Russinof, Flight Pattern, 20×20 in, 2019, Oil on canvas
In addition to the more physical expressions of the act of creation and painting-as-objects, Russinof explores a deceptively sophisticated visual aesthetic. At first glance, color appears to be employed sparingly in her paintings. Each painting only incorporates three or four different colors. However, through her varied brushwork and her practice of implementing thin, washy coats of layered paint, Russinof effortlessly coaxes out a multitude of tones and subtle color relationships from her seemingly minimalist palette. Gaps found in one broad brushstroke of color interlace with the hue behind it, forging an interaction between the involved colors which make them look radically different from anything else on their respective canvas. As the wet paint is diffused across the surface of the paintings, colors organically merge, allowing for them to fuse in a clear, unmuddied way. In other spots, color is left pure and intensely pigmented. Russinof’s utilization of color allows for such nuance that what initially appears to be a monochrome background will, upon closer inspection, actually be composed of a melange of distinct shades upon closer inspection.
The abstract paintings of Anne Russinof are microcosms of contradiction. She deftly takes disparate signifiers and aesthetics, combining them into a cohesive visual language that is all her own. Dynamic yet solid, cerebral yet instinctual, and immediately accessible yet densely complex, her paintings featured in Object Oriented were able to emphasize the boundary breaking qualities of each featured artist. Whether it is the maximalist, canvas-defying sensibilities of Gale, the irregular, sprawling collages of Saunders, or the hybrid sculptural paintings of Still Scott, Russinof’s paintings act as connective tissue between the diverse works, joining them in the exhibition’s central thesis. Now, nearly a year later, Russinof has compiled a second installment of the group show. Titled Object and Subject, the online only group show will feature extended, updated works by all participating artists.