Paintings, Drawings,and Photographs artist
Home Page Reel Solo in the Cell exhibitback to Gallery

Greek Isle
Acrylic/Canvas (20"x20"/50x50)

This 2014 exhibit was inspired by a viewing of The Running Man, a 1963 British film about a man trying to right a perceived injustice by faking his own death for insurance money and taking on a new identity. This requires him to suspect acceptance of that new identity by others.









Glance
Acrylic/Board (18"x24"/45.7x60.9)

This idea echoes our 21c isolation 40 years later where we take on many identities and meanings, groomed to conform to media images of others deemed more important than our "reality" and in cyberspace, an illusion of identity is "real enough". Our own physicality transforms and becomes less important in forming our identity, cellular or cyber.


Doubt
Acrylic/Canvas (18"x24"/45.7x60.9)

What does it mean to be "real" or "reel" and how do we imagine, interpret and re-interpret our own identity and that of others, when given scant or presumed details of others online or even in a physical world faced with a pre-written script of expectations?



Dance
Acrylic/Canvas (18"x24"/45.7x60.9)

The exhibit narrative begins with the mythical promise of a Greek isle and a glance and is carried along with doubt forgotten in dance, ending with a wound, a guy and a running girl.






Wounded in a Series of Dreams
Acrylic/Canvas (10"x12"/25.4x30.4)

The images of Greek Isle, Glance, Dance, Doubt, Wound, Guy and Girl are "momentary" portraits of identities formed and dissolved.







Guy
Acrylic/Canvas (12"x12"/30.5x30.5)

A story is told but what is "reel" or "real" is never clear.









Girl
Acrylic on Board (12"x12"/30.5x30.5)

As with cinema, a viewer looking at a physical painting (or a stranger) will write the script, create his/her own narrative, filling in gaps, re-interpreting what is before him/her, working from another cell, another identity.





all works and images © ruth hartman
► back to top

Some images are available in archival limited edition pigment prints. Contact the artist directly for details.