Art Review: Dynamic paintings celebrate abstraction

David Comstock, "Blue and Black VI," enamel on canvas.

There's no denying that David Comstock's abstract paintings are attractive, though to say that they're easy on the eyes would perhaps stray into the area of condescension.

The title of his exhibition, "It's Not All Black and White," at L Ross Gallery through Feb. 28, refers, first, to the artist's development away from the all-black-and-white paintings he produced a few years ago and, second, to the notion that most issues, art included, should not be seen strictly in terms of "black and white," as the saying goes, but as more nuanced propositions.

How nuanced Comstock's works are depends on how close one stands to them; at a distance, they resolve into flat patches that tilt and balance and cluster like refugees from the edges of the paintings, while up close they widen into more interesting aggregates that reveal the artist's deft hand at layering and scraping, exposing and concealing, though without the dynamism of a spontaneous gesture or frontal attack. I don't mean that his work is not spontaneous or improvisational, just that viewers don't get that sense because of what feels like a certain reticence in the execution.

Over the past several years, Comstock has honed his color sense, and in such pieces as "Untitled: Ochre III" and "Untitled: Grey II" -- at 71.5 inches by 63 inches, probably the largest work he has accomplished -- there are hints of juxtapositions of hue and shade capable of startling, drawing the eye, tilting the balance a bit and ultimately seeming completely appropriate.

It may be odd (or perverse) that in an exhibition in which an artist stretches his use of color, my sense of the best pieces falls upon three that are the most monochromatic, that employ mainly black, blue and white (actually various whites). These are three paintings -- all the works are enamel and mixed media on canvas -- in the "Black and Blue" series, Nos. I, VI and VII, the latter another imposing piece at 64 inches by 64 inches. These three pieces display a cohesiveness and quality of pent dynamism that set them apart from the other five works in the exhibition; they feel like the celebration of abstraction over representation that every work of abstract art should embody. And in these I am smitten by the small, broad streaks of white that shine like beacons and organize the other shapes and nervous lines around them.

Yet in this show, as in his previous efforts, I continue to be puzzled by Comstock's relentless clinging to the center of the picture-plane, a long-time trope that makes the work feel repressed and a little stingy. Many artists have a horror of the vacuum, obsessively packing their pictures with dizzy detail. Comstock, on the other hand, seems to have a horror of confronting that vacuum, of leaving the safety of the focal point.

One wants to send him some sort of license that says, "It's all right to fill and animate the whole canvas. You have permission to go to the edges of the picture. Courage! Onward!"

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David Comstock, 'It's Not All Black and White'

At L Ross Gallery, 5040 Sanderlin, through Feb. 28. Call (901) 767-2200.

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