| Music of Silence: Metalpoint Paintings and Drawings |
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| "The series’ title, the Music of Silence, adapted from a poem by Stéphane Mallarmé, refers to another source of inspiration for the artist. The gentle rhythms of her modulated silverpoint bands, and evocation of sound waves in her wavering colored lines, suggest an affinity with music, as does the language she chooses to describe the “echoes” or “reverberations” of her work...Like the best abstract painting, Schwalb’s work transcends technique and materials and aspires to the sublime. It is easy to lose oneself in her contemplative, quietly expressive work, and emerge richer for the experience." Excerpt from essay by Helaine Posner, Independent Curator & Writer |
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| Susan Schwalb: Recent Metalpoint Paintings and Drawings |
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| "Though elegant and spare, the subtle waving of line belies the minimalist ideal of mechanical precision. Schwalb’s medium is antithetical to the minimalist aesthetic, which would favor industrial materials. Her repetitions offer too much modulation; the lines fluctuate and waver. There is shading and movement and even the suggestion of receding space. The depth in her marks opens up the flat surface of the picture plane. From a distance, there is even the suggestion of an image—anathema to minimalists! When compared, say, to Malevich’s Suprematist work, Schwalb’s appears positively Baroque. It is precisely this, her eloquent expression of subtle variation and delicate divergence within the framework of precision, which is so seductive." Excerpt from essay by Joanne Stuhr, Independent Curator |
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| Atmospheric Disturbances |
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| "Her idiom is reductive, concentrated on horizontal lines to create fields of fluctuating color. While her vocabulary is restricted, these lines can vary infinitely, of course, and recall the paintings of Agnes Martin and many of the 1970s minimalists. However, Schwalb's use of line is distinctively her own, veering from the reticent to the more expressive, especially in the suite that is the nucleus of this show, 'Atmospheric Disturbances,' where the colors are richer and more apparent, the bands broader, the lines sometimes curved and otherwise more obviously irregular and the imagery even more reminiscent of landscapes and natural phenomena, invoking abstract expressionst moods." Excerpt from "Point to Line to Plane," by Lilly Wei |
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| AFTERIMAGE: Recent Metalpoint Paintings and Drawings |
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| "...Schwalb creates works of astonishing complexity, as the different tones and colors of the metals gently meld and slip into one another. Far from confining or restricting the line, in Schwalb's hands the exquisite facture of the metalpoint is reminiscent of the fluidly rendered and lumious transparency obtained from that most instinctive and spontaneous of techniques, watercolor. It is a remarkable visual effect, one that not only reveals a highly attuned sensibility to the beauty and sensuousness of delicately defined tonalities, but which also dispels any perceived limitations of the medium itself." Excerpt from essay by Edward Saywell |
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