Martin Weinstein: Looking Through Times
Cross Contemporary Art
Martin Weinstein’s art is time-sensitive. No, not the anxiety-producing, stressful, or expiring type. His art is more in the realm of the poetics of time—what we experience most often subconsciously when connecting with the time/space undercurrent encountered during times of heightened awareness.
Time, a human construct, was designed to give us organization and to present the concept of the past, present, and future, which some see as virtually nonexistent. Weinstein takes a very close look at that last part, dividing his paintings into separate, physical, overlapping transvisual layers. The resulting effect of his nontraditional approach precipitously changes the way we perceive two standard genres in painting: the landscape and the portrait, bringing renewed wonder and appreciation to these most familiar types.
Within his paintings, there is this shuffle between near and far, the time of day, and the changes throughout the seasons or years. Going beyond the preconceived, Weinstein changes the way we process visual information by breaking it down to selective details that jostle and float in space--real-time triggers that occur when one is immersed in the experience of life. And despite the fact that Weinstein works with acrylic paints and panels, his art puts forth a very organic and fluid vision well beyond the fixed and familiar. In the orchestration or the illustration of time, the artist pushes beyond the limits within the realm of the painted surface--a challenge that Weinstein solves by angling and overlapping the painted clear acrylic sheets.
Overall, Weinstein’s numerous works are Installed to hint at the sequential process of a graphic novel, moving the viewer through various vignettes that begin with an introduction to the lead characters in the form of portraits. From there, the installation moves us through individual, variously connected vistas where a windy and weightless thread begins in Italy with Venice, Stormy Evenings (2019) and Venice, Stormy Mornings (2021), soaring to a peak of intensity in mid-exhibition with Dogwoods and River, One afternoon Over another (2021), May Evening, One Over Another (2021) and Snowy Evenings, One Year Over Another (2021).
Weinstein’s loving embrace of seasonal change is most profound in the spring and summer when the fireworks of exploding blooms reach their various peaks in warmer weather. In these instances, the artist gives that distinctive airiness to his painting technique and places it in the petals of the flowers. Often painted at close range, this series of floral delights is a continuous celebration, clearly recorded in the stunningly alluring Roses and River, Late Evening over Early Evening (2020), Irises and River, Evening Under Afternoon (2021) and Peonies, Three afternoons (2021). In these works and others like it, we experience the endless cycle of the earth through its most brilliant and colorful stars.
Weinstein’s portraits have a similar mix of persistence versus impermanence as we see more than one view of the subject. One immediately gets the feeling that these paintings, whether it is Syd (2015-2015), Katie (2022), John (2022) or the artist’s partner Tereza, April (2020), are individuals that are close in heart, mind and spirit to the artist. And as subjects, they also become integral but less overbearing elements than your standard portrait type, as they are absorbed directly into the artist’s fluid process. As a result, these portraits maintain the aura of each person, the spirit of the individual, placing them in an altogether different realm than the usual portrait type, just like the artist has done in his interpretation of a landscape.
Lastly, there is the Inside Over Outside series, which consists of a number of captivating works that move the viewer right through solid spatial boundaries. Walls dissolve, near and far intermingle, and what we understand as here and there blend together in a dance of visual delights. Add to the mix timeless cities like Rome and Venice, and the outside under the inside takes on even more import, giving the entire materialization of the narrative a chilling vulnerability.
Take, for instance, Rome, Stormy Afternoon, Outside Under Inside (2023). Here we see the heavens intermingling seamlessly with the ceiling structure while landmarks encroach and interior furnishings hang in the balance. In Rome, Stormy Afternoon, Outside Under Inside, and the many works that take on that same challenge of traveling through tangible barriers that demarcate space, there is Weinstein’s unique take on the plotting of time, a vision with far more layers of meaning than the ones recorded in paint. What remains is a very tangible substance well beyond mere representation. Landscape and portrait painting has been thoroughly resuscitated, revived, and brought back to its once compelling place in the works of Martin Weinstein.