‘Paintings, Prints’

Press, 1 June 1989, Page 18

‘Paintings, Prints’

“Paintings, Prints” by Sam Mahon at the Bealey Gallery until June 9. Reviewed by Pat Unger.

Sam Mahon’s latest work at the Bealey Gallery vindicates his persistence. His style which has been out of step with both contemporary and academically approved art making, has now found greater depths. His Wyeth-Sydney method of meticulous tempera paint application and his images, with their Pre-Raphaelite-Klimt

charm and Vermeer-like stillness have, in the past, had a tendency towards

nostalgic triteness. By loosening his dependence on surface elegance for its own sake, and also loosening his brush stroke to allow for greater animation, Mahon permits his finely tuned feeling for the human condition to triumph. Neither distracting indulgence in decoration nor twisting human emotion into caricature are felt necessary. Paintings of the drought in Canterbury in 1988, 1989 takes on a universal quality that transcends their particularity. The farmer sitting on his rock

of despair, with the - ground a dry burntumber, carrys a sugges- , tion of Van Gogh’s potato5 eating peasant or Courr bet’s worker surrounded i by “realism.” 1 i The violinist in “Tuning Up” has his rhythm emphasised by baroque r brushmarks in the backi ground and a sleeping t child on a couch becomes a living still life. 1 By painting with referi ence to past styles, Mahon 3 has captured a contem- > porary social history, with ; skill and sensitivity.