Little Rock artist Katherine Strause takes viewers of her new solo exhibition, "New Rules," at Central Library's Cox Center, through myriad emotions -- the gleeful abandon of girls and women doing backbends, the exhaustion of marathon dancers, the nostalgic glow of the fair and friendship, and the fear and outrage that inhabit the powerful, charged Arrest.
Strause, chair of the Department of Art at Henderson State University, handles these situations with great skill, thanks to a keen eye for composition and creative use of color, allowing feelings and impressions to emerge and deepen as the viewer takes it in.
Her paintings often take on the aura and intimacy of a 1950s-era family photo album. Day Trip, a large oil on linen, depicts eight women in colorful print dresses, some holding their skirts out as though we've caught them clowning for the camera. The warmth of friendship/family also imbues the wonderful County Fair. In it, three smiling women face the viewer, while a pig nurses its piglets in the foreground.
Among the colorful backbending works, Yellow Dress is especially captivating with its orange background and the girl's yellow print dress. It and several other works suggest a Matisse-like palette. A high-spirited New Rules is the adult take on the backbend, reminding us not to be so rigid we can't have fun.
The retro view is not all rosy-colored. In Not What She Expected and Other Places She'd Rather Be, two women try to hold up their partners at a marathon dance. The women's faces reflect disappointment, resignation and more. A third work, Marathon, shows a woman passed out from exhaustion, held up by her partner. The three are also metaphorical; about men and women and relationships.
Coral Snake is embedded with telling, folkloric symbols and magical realism.
Strause explains. In the foreground, a black female servant has a snake under her foot. "The coral snake is an Arkansas native that's poisonous," she says. The snake also references the Virgin Mary, who is sometimes depicted as crushing the head of a snake. "The woman in the painting is a protector even if she is a servant." Standing next to her, a woman watches a baptism, unaware of the snake and the protector's handling the threat of danger.
The baptism and snake also symbolize "hope for new beginnings," Strause says. A line of people near the baptism "are all the witnesses. Those who watched and saw nothing ... who couldn't see the abuse of others because it was an accepted social norm."
And there's the stunning Arrest, a sobering work of a black female Freedom Rider being arrested at a Little Rock bus station. While it taps an event in history, the painting's message is chillingly contemporary.
"New Rules," paintings by Katherine Strause, through March 31, Cox Center (third floor), 120 River Market Ave., Little Rock, (501) 918-3093. Hours are 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday.
Weekend on 03/22/2018