Horizons , 2013 Oil on Canvas, 12″ x 48″ by Elizabeth Palay
This afternoon I took a long postponed trip to visit an art exhibition of Madison artist Elizabeth Palay. I was glad I went. Palay paints vibrant abstract paintings which drew me. Since the show is a retrospective of work spanning decades from the 1970’s to the present, it made me wonder why I had never encountered her work before
The striking aspect of her work is the way she sets colors next to one another. In many of her pieces there is active movement across the entire surface, but the result is not unbroken uniformity. Instead there are often subtle variations that move the eyes across the image. I had many favorites, but I especially liked some of the horizontal works near the second floor entry. Palay’s is distributed on the first two floors of a medical building at 800 University Bay Dr. The show is open Mondays – Friday 9am – 6pm. If there was one disappointment it would be my desire to see more clearly the works that suffered unflattering light. Palay’s work can also be seen at www.elizabethpalay.com
I enjoyed your review of Elizabeth Palay’s work. I would add a footnote. Ms. Palay uses color as an active agent in her work. This is clearly displayed in her featured artwork, “Jubilation.” Each color is created by layering colors to produce what we see—they can be superimposed or reflected by colors next to each other. It is much more than preparing colors on a pallet, it is finding attitudes in colors and relating them to one another. She manages to bring the viewer to accept these attitudes. Thank you for your attention to her work. She is a brilliant artist.