By
Mark Jenkins
Washington Post, May 20, 2019
Catherine Levinson
The landscapes and still lifes in Catherine Levinson's “Color in May” are stylized yet essentially realistic. The fanciful element in the Gallery B show is the use of color. Red trees, maroon shadows and yellow skies are among the phenomena in these paintings, rendered in gouache on paper, that are seldom seen in nature.
The Bethesda artist acknowledges her affinity for the work of Henri Matisse, whose bright Mediterranean palette and simple, hard-edge shapes are an evident influence. Matisse is known for his arrangements of paper cutouts, and Levinson’s forms are as if they had been defined by scissors rather than a brush.
Levinson’s streamlined vistas include barns that appear American and tree-lined roads that look rather French. The rustic thoroughfares seem to be her essential subject, and not just because they could be somewhere in Provence. The play of simple uprights vs. open sky provides an elegant geometric symmetry, while the roads lead the eye off the picture into infinity.
Catherine Levinson: Color in May
Through May 25, 2019 at Gallery B, 7700 Wisconsin Ave., Suite E, Bethesda, Maryland
Catherine Levinson
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