The 75-year-old Firestone building that now houses Conrad Wilde Gallery has a rich history that doesn’t necessarily reflect its background. Originally built to store goods related to the railroad, it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. During the heady days of rehabilitation and renovation in the mid 2000s, developers took advantage of the desire of upscale gallery owners to be part of the Tucson Warehouse Arts District that abuts the train tracks and is home to a variety of galleries, retail stores, cafes and businesses and purchased it. It’s near enough to 4th Ave for some of the bustle of that iconic destination to spill over into foot traffic and art “buzz.” At one time, 10 galleries existed within walking distance. The Museum of Contemporary Art was a few blocks away and MUSE was across 6th Street. Now, although some new ones have been launched, some others have disappeared (notoriously, note the big hole in the ground where MUSE once stood) and about a half dozen galleries still inhabit a two or three block stretch between 4th and 7th Avenues.
Now, the labyrinthine warren that was the Firestone Building sports a miscellany of enterprises, mostly based on something to do with art, whether exhibit space or studio, and certainly among the most sophisticated and refined is Conrad Wilde, gracefully settling into its new digs with aplomb and gentility. Per Square Foot, the inaugural offering, is comprised of the 12 inch by 12 inch exercises in varied media of nine artists, each of them flexing their artistic muscles in vivid, diverse, bold works.
Miles Conrad, co-owner of the gallery, chose to show what he termed “Lost Continents,” created by pouring latex paint in brown, green, mustard and white onto his squares – they are almost like bas-relief, very sculptural and subtle, suggesting a bird’s-eye view of mysterious landscapes.
Some of the students who take his encaustic classes display what they have learned from their teacher about this ancient art form, which has been demonstrated to be astonishingly stable – some Egyptian mummies that date from 100-300 A.D. have encaustic portraits adorning their sarcophagi.
Joanne Mattera, Beata Wehr, Eileen Goldenberg and Sherrie Posternak displayed a high level of brilliant expertise. Mattera describes her aesthetic as “lush minimalism” and goes on to talk about “improvisational geometry.” Plaid would be another way of saying it – but radiant and textured plaid, not mundane tartan. Wehr likes the colors of the desert and especially shades of yellow, interspersed with orange and brown – plantlike wisps and indeterminate abstracts combine for a lovely serenity.
Goldenberg offers rows of dots intermixed with layers of pigment in reds and whites, yellows and browns that she compares to human skin. Posternak goes purely abstract and revels in the sumptuous sensuality of her rich materials, with a strong, organic connection to nature and feminine/masculine, intuitive/intellectual themes.
The other four woman work primarily in oils or acrylic, although Daniella Woolf mixes it up by including paper and wood, a homage to the handwritten journals she values and the delight of found objects that cry out to be part of a composition. Arielle Sandler’s are primarily angular, monochromatic renderings, cerulean and periwinkle blue, with ivory, ebony; very moonlight in palette with thickly applied paint, but abstract in imagery.
Emilia Arana swirls the multi-colored oils she favors in fluid, supple curves and equates what she’s painting with music, her other love. Lastly, with Margaret Suchland’s series called “Signs & Symbols,” luminous jewels, glowing hypnotically with what she calls “smudges, random marks, specks” and “subtle traces of past human presence,” seemed to hang suspended in time on the gallery walls, restful and seemingly simple, with their hues of aqua, sage, viridian, ultramarine, turquoise and beryl communicating their maker’s joy of expression and experimentation.
The show lasts through December 26th – your holiday season gift to yourself could be a visit to this oasis of elegance and tranquility at 439 E. 6th Street, Tuesday to Saturday, 11am to 6pm.
