Mardi Gras to Vietnam Pinkney Herbert draws the line, plus other reviews. by DAVID HALL Pinkney Herbert’s Mayan (detail), oil on canvas Pinkney Herbert’s show of abstract paintings and drawings at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro is largely influenced by a trip that he made last summer to Vietnam. Invited to participate in an international exhibit there, the artist saw the sights in and around Hanoi, describing the experience as “emotionally riveting.” Many know Herbert for his expressionistic paintings utilizing a frenetic web of sinuous marks. While a few of the drawings in charcoal and pastel included in the present exhibit seem to rely on those old conquests, a series of smaller drawings and paintings in oil is less brash and finds the artist taking risks with subtler compositions and more solid forms. Transfiguration is trademark Herbert. The surface of the drawing is a churning tempest of vibrating lines and cornucopias, and layers of scribbles and loop-the-loops are pulled and smeared with an eraser. Out of this chaos, velvety black silhouettes of fishtails and treble clefs swim in and out of the swirling morass. In the more subdued Coat of Arms, prickly forms in turquoise invade a field of thatched color from the edges of the painting. Red, silver, and black swaths of viscous paint bleed one into another, creating a texture akin to the sedimentary striations of rock or of marbleized paper. But this surface is best appreciated up close, as it becomes muddled and dull from afar. The show-stealer is without a doubt Mayan, perhaps because it seems less fussy about the surface texture, and its straightforward composition and triadic palette are refreshingly deliberate. Especially wonderful in this work is a saturated pink line that jumps over a navy blue field like a tossed pebble bouncing across the surface of a pond. ASU painting professor Tom Chaffee says Herbert’s exhibition and lecture really turned some of the students on to the possibilities of painting, adding that many of them had never seen work like his before. Herbert has been invited to conduct a drawing workshop coinciding with the conclusion of the exhibit. Through March 3rd at Arkansas State University. Although it is not commonly known, there is a long history of modernism in African-American art. Anyone who surveyed the Hewitt Collection last fall at the National Civil Rights Museum got a taste of this history in the work of John Biggers, Frank Wimberley, Hale Woodruff, and James Denmark, among others. Robert Gwathmey, whose paintings and prints are included in “American Narratives,” currently on view at Ledbetter Lusk Gallery, cited Picasso as an influence for his stylized cubism of stripped-down forms and shallow planes. To differing degrees, cubism is a defining element in the work of several local African-American artists, including Jerry and Terry Lynn, Frank D. Robinson, George Hunt, and Ephraim Urevbu. (It is well documented that Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, notably the spearhead of modernism, was influenced by the collection of African Art at the Musee d’Ethnographie du Trocadero and the Iberian statuary at the Louvre. How ironic.) The Black History month exhibit at Art Village Gallery features prominently the work of Hunt and Urevbu. Urevbu favors the palette knife as much as he does the brush: The faceted compositions are built up with layers of thickly applied paint. Hearts of Gold is a cubist interpretation of an African mask and is reminiscent of the abstract head paintings of Alexej von Jawlensky. Hunt seems to never tire of painting images of blues and jazz musicians, in vibrant Day-Glo colors, but after seeing the same themes repeated over and over, I have had my fill. Hunt’s characters have craftily dimensional attributes, such as the bulging eyes and furls of fabric in Harmonica Man. I find myself asking, “Golly, must every single painting include every primary and secondary color?” Anita Whatley is also fond of brightly saturated colors. Her batiks on silk glow with an inner luminosity that is truly mesmerizing. In Welcome to the Second Show, a field of cobalt blue in the lower portion of the work makes a transition up to a radiant yellow. The prism-like quality of Whatley’s work is due in part to allowing the white of the silk to emerge from the ground of textured color. I saw similar works by the artist at Marshall Arts a while back limply hanging off the wall by pushpins; the appreciation of these batiks is enhanced greatly by being mounted on stretchers. Festival Mardi Gras by Brenda Joysmith displays a sophisticated handling of pastels — very loose yet assured. There is a lightheartedness in her neo-impressionistic scenes and vibrant palette, and such a sense of atmosphere in these works that I found myself transported to New Orleans by her depictions of a parade. Other artists exhibiting include Thomas Nolan, Morris Sallie, and Mamadi Sidime. Through March 4th at the Art Village Gallery. After visiting the Second Floor Contemporary Gallery exhibit of works by Ed Rainey and Jed Jackson, I am reminded of a remark an old roommate made in regard to Arthur C. Clarke’s television series, Mysterious World. Of the program he whispered in a hushed tone, “I don’t know what this is about, but it’s important.” Jed Jackson is an artist of great technical facility, and one is immediately taken in by his luscious oil on panel paintings. Jackson’s figurative works are at once enigmatic and banally obvious. In Fragments of Greece, three ancient Greek statues peer out at the viewer, while strategically placed circular vignettes feature nightclub billboards with Americanized Greek women clad in bikinis and Greek men with pompadours. Similarly, Relaxer depicts various African-American women with relaxed-curl hairstyles as well as a couple of billboards for Dark and Lovely®. Practically every work makes some reference to uprooted or transmigrated culture, but rather than commentaries, they are merely superficial illustrations of it. It all seems like a laborious and calculated setup for such a groaner of a punchline. Ed Rainey’s “Horizontal Strip Drawing” series looks as though the works could be fold-out pages from one of Leonardo da Vinci’s manuscripts, if the master fancied drawing Indian motorcycles and motion studies of a golf swing. In #6 a row of knots drawn to different levels of completion reveals the stages in the process that the artist uses to take a raw, elemental form to one of greater complexity. Rainey’s scrawls are smeared or erased completely, leaving behind ghosted images. In other places, the same or similar images are superimposed one atop the other. These are raw, unpretentious works, seemingly done for the simple joy of making marks. It’s a joy for the viewer as well. Through March 3rd at Second Floor Contemporary Gallery. David Hall is a local artist. You can e-mail him at letters@memphisflyer.com.