Fox Jensen & Fox Jensen McCrory

Elisabeth Vary

Germany

D.O.B: 16/01/1945

Vary’s works shun the orthodox rectilinear formats common to painting. And though artists such as Frank Stella and Elsworth Kelly broke with the rectilinear in the 1960s, Vary’s approach to the painted object is distinctive- in every sense. Shaped, tilted, obtuse, faceted – her objects seem to appear like gemlike extrusions that have materialized through the wall rather than sitting on it. Their crystalline geometries encourage paint to misbehave, albeit it under the astute guidance of her hand.
Each aspect of the objects is painted with relative democracy despite fumes of structural anarchy in the air – and whilst some works have a “face”, Vary clearly shapes these forms fully aware of the pictorial disruption and animation they encourage through their torsion and wild dynamism. There is seldom, if ever a single viewpoint from which the work can be fully registered. Instead, they encourage the viewer to pry – to move, crane, duck and peer into their recesses.