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5 minute read
visuals
Liminal Spaces
Artist explores the concepts of thresholds and time in new series
By Sarah Robinson
Liminal Space 3
WITH A HISTORY spanning nearly 50 years of showing art, it’s only natural that contemporary artist Bernard Palchick would consider the idea of time in his artwork.
His current work – at Brandt-Roberts Galleries in the Short North, where he’s shown for eight years – finds him experimenting with new approaches and addressing both time and change.
“Right now, I’m working on a series that has to do with thresholds,” Palchick says. “The idea of moving from one dead space that we understood in the past into something that is yet unknown. That moment of movement from an environment that we understand to something that we wish for, or seek; not knowing what we’re seeking for, but knowing that we have to leave the past in a way.”
Often, when working on a series of pieces, Palchick will explore a specific idea or set of ideas across several works.
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“I label them Liminal Space No. 1, No. 2, No. 3 or 4, or Threshold Space No. 1, No. 2, No. 3,” he says. “The series is an idea where I will pursue it for several paintings. I don’t very often go beyond No. 4 or 5, but they’re all related in a way. They’re all part of the same family.”
In this threshold series, Palchick is exploring new techniques and different mediums.
Typically, he says, he prefers to paint with oils. Recent experimentations with alcohol inks – a medium that is fluid and free when wet, but dries quickly and permanently – have helped inspire his new work. Those explorations led him to new approaches to working with acrylic and oil paints.
“I’m taking acrylic paint on panel … and pouring it out like I did the alcohol ink, moving it about, letting it dry and then seeing what it’s suggesting in terms of a landscape environment on top of that,” he says. “A lot of the acrylic work becomes buried, but you can still see ghosts of it underneath the glazes of oil. And I like that idea of layering, of time passage, of this canvas going through changes.”
In Palchick’s artwork, those ideas often incorporate nature, though he draws inspiration for his art from a variety of sources.
“Public issues would come up and shake my awareness in such a way that I would try to take my concerns about the environment and turn it back into images that would have questions built into them, into the environment,” he says.
Palchick brings these questions to the viewer’s attention by using unusual juxtapositions, similar to those associated with surrealist art, as a way of grabbing the viewer’s attention and enticing them think more about the piece.
“Some of the paintings about to go over to Brandt-Roberts have floating stones and environments in them,” he says, “or geometric blocks floating in the sky, playing with surreal ideas, thinking about another kind of space.”
His inspiration for this new series draws both from his usual sources of inspiration in addition to events of the year past.
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“Part of it has been coming out of my concern for the environment, in ecology, global warming issues, things like that,” he says. “Then also, I’ve been painting in the studio now through the last year and a half, and COVID-19 has had a huge impact on my thinking and my work in many ways just because I’ve created odd environments of landscape for this. I’ve tried to discover ways of creating this notion of the environment being something that we are trying to move away from to something better, something more hopeful.”
Growing Spaces
Palchick always knew he was meant to be an artist.
“I discovered my passion for it as a child,” he says. “I think probably third grade is when I was most convinced that it was something magical for me, but, of course, it wasn’t terribly practical.”
So, Palchick declared a major in engineering when he began attending Purdue University. But fate had other plans – when his curriculum opened up for an elective class his sophomore year, Palchick signed up for a basic drawing course.
“That kind of cemented the deal for me,” he says. “From that point on, I continued to study art, painting at Purdue, and then I went on for a masters of fine arts degree from Rhode Island School of Design.”
Throughout his career, Palchick spent 25 years teaching at Kalamazoo College in Michigan.
“I taught sculpture, ceramics, watercolor, and then I became an administrator, which meant I had to sort of postpone some of my life activities,” he says. “I continued to work (on art), but not with the same intensity.”
After serving as interim president of the college, Palchick decided to pursue an early retirement to be able to focus on his art. Shortly after, he and his wife, Lisa, moved to Powell to be closer to their children and grandchildren.
Palchick found Brandt-Roberts Galleries and began showing his art there. Though no longer teaching art at the college level, Palchick still has teacherly advice.
“Being an art teacher, I always encourage people to pursue our passions, even though there seems to be jeopardy involved in that at times,” he says. “Those challenges are worth it, being able to follow through on what your passions are.” CS
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