“HEAD AND SHOULDERS ABOVE THE REST” RUNS TO AUG 19. THU-SAT 1-5PM. SPIN GALLERY, 1100 QUEEN W, 2ND FL. 416-530-7656. WWW.SPINGALLERY.CA.
As a portraiture show featuring some of Toronto's finest figurative
artists, SPIN Gallery's “Head and Shoulders Above the Rest” can seem a
bit slim: we only get one piece each by a few participants who are best
viewed in the wider context of their respective practices. One such
artist is Ben Pinkney, who was just selected as one of the
semi-finalists in the RBC Canadian Painting Competition; granted,
Pinkney is fabulously talented, and even one of his pieces is quite
enough to get that across. The piece is The Butcher at 461 King West,
and it's conservative in a good way (i.e., considered, simple in
subject matter, reverential towards tradition). The subject's face, as
in Pinkney's other paintings, is in close-up (and is, then, Close-ish);
the overall tone is magnificently subdued, the outwardly gruff butcher
appearing calm, his intimidating face (beard, pockmarks, wrinkles,
veins, etc.) totally restrained (or, indeed, respected) by a beautiful
grey-blue palette. Other artists here aren't after such technical
accuracy, but leave an impression even still: Balint Zsako, whose work,
in a career-making coup, recently graced the cover of The New York Times Magazine,
provides a bunch of his nice, messy faces on paper; Robert Weir, who
recently joined the SPIN stable, makes drawings of beautiful boys and
names them after Smiths lyrics; Lisa Iglesias proffers a slight, if
amusing, sketch of three famous ladies' mug shots: Paris Hilton's,
Tracey Gold's and, in what is surely one of her chicest career moments
(see Eyedentical Twins, March 1, 2007), Jane Fonda's.