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to the Eugene art scene is painter Dennis Hartley. You may have noticed his light-filled, oil on canvas Winter Barn at the Mayor's Art Show or when it was exhibited earlier at Robert Canaga Gallery. Hartley's luminous new paintings in his barn series will be shown at Canaga's, Jan. 5 - Feb. 17. "Barn Raising" shares the exhibit with Eugene artist Anne Tiegen's "Cat Show." Both artists will be present at the gallery for First Friday, Jan. 5, from 5:30 to 9 pm. An architect by training, Hartley said painting has helped him explore different aspects of composition, space and color. But until last spring he resisted putting buildings into his work because he said he didn't want his illustrative training to "creep into" his work. Not to worry. These oil paintings of Oregon barns in summer and in winter are not literal but imaginative barns. Hartley said they come out of what he sees when he looks at these structures in the landscape. Hartley says although a few barns have touched him emotionally, metal barns allowed to weather are not sentimental structures but "humble, unpretentious, simple and direct ... a neutral motif." His primary interest is in "the kind of invisible way that light plays with the surface" of the structure, he says. Sometimes surfaces disappear, acquire transparency and depth, and are unintentionally "deconstructed into different spheres and become abstractions." Hartley's interest in the quality of light in his paintings is not limited to the exterior surface of the buildings, where the light has absorbed something of the sky and earth. He's also inspired by the interior light created by such openings as windows, doors, cracks and the Plexiglas skylights common to many metallic barns. And although some paintings contain a "fairly literal" horizon line, many others have only a diffused area where the horizon might be, which Hartley admits is more challenging to the viewer. But he wants people to provide their own reference for the work, to spend some time with the paintings. Because he's interested in surfaces when he paints, Hartley says, "I like pieces. ... The whole doesn't appear until you study it awhile." Painting regularly only for the last two-and-a-half years, Hartley says barns are the first motif that has galvanized him. His paintings incorporate simple shapes -- a shed, a silo, a rusted metal beam, a long, low barn. "I'm always working with composition, looking for what is pleasing in balance," he says. But he also allows for serendipity when he paints, working with a variety of tools: knife, brush, putty knife, his fingers. "Some shapes happen on their own," he says. And the process is such that if you start with a concept, "surprises happen, and the painting takes off on its own." Because Hartley aims to express the feeling of the season through color, he uses different palettes and complementary pairs of colors for summer and winter. "There's something mysterious about complements that creates a balance, a feeling of well-being," Hartley says. "And if you mix complements, you get grays." To develop the mood of winter, his winter barns are painted in diffused light. He relies on complementary cool, bluish greens and dark reds, but he also uses "subtle tones, the somber grays that say something about the quality of life here in the Willamette Valley," he says. His summer barns are painted in bright light, and the palette is dominated by yellow and blue violet complements. The absence of green further expresses dryness and heat. To suggest the aging of the metal in all the barn paintings, Hartley uses a distinctive brown/orange/rust color. By being grounded in a visual space that expresses differing light qualities in Western Oregon's changing seasonal landscapes, Hartley's paintings reflect what in literature I would call a sense of place. "Barn Raising" makes me feel both right at home and guided to a place of greater clarity.
Sometimes living down here in the deep south of the Willamette Valley can be irksome. As I write, skies are a clear baby-blanket blue and a bright sun warms the ground. Red and purple anemones are blooming. Yesterday, I harvested a half-dozen heads of broccoli. Tulips and irises are sending up their first pale shoots. Call this winter? They have rougher winters in Bali. It's colder in Miami. Global warming starts here; we're responsible for melting the polar ice caps. Meanwhile, folks in New England are measuring family values in units of heat, stoking pot-belly stoves and hunkering down under thick down comforters as an Arctic steamroller drops snowflakes big as pancakes and blows them up into dense mounds and deep drifts. Tomorrow morning, Vermonters and Mainites will wake in white palaces, silent as the ocean floor. Sugar maples and birches will stand like ghostly sentinels in spectral shrouds. Kids, of course, will rejoice and don layers of wool, fleece and Kapok, stuff their tootsers in high-top boots, wrap necks in thick scarves, pull on mittens and caps, then gleefully tunnel through drifts to romp and sled and build snowpersons while parents prepare hearty soups or caribou stew -- or whatever Ice World people eat -- and open a bottle of rich, dark, spicy fermented ... maple syrup. Not much wine up there in Glacierland. So while I felt twinges of envy for their adventures in winter wonder, I'm going to settle for pretending it's winter here in subtropical Bluegene and rejoice in the crystalline knowledge that there's an ice floe's worth of great wine for cockle-warming consumption while gales howl and blizzards blast (somewhere). Note for first-time readers: You won't find many Cabernet Sauvignons mentioned here, mainly because I find most of them -- the affordable ones -- pretty boring compared to other wines. Plus I'm just generally ticked off at the way Caliphonia marketeers have pushed the variety down our gullets and then asked us to pay through our noses. But I try to keep an open winemind, so if you find a noteworthy label, let me know here at EW. Meanwhile, try these for hibernal hosting. Bogle Vineyards 1999 Petite Sirah ($10.50): Soft, ripe, round and friendly, with rich flavors of black cherries and woodsmoke; suitable for a nine-bean soup on an icy eve. Kiona 1998 Lemberger ($8.95): Sounds like a stinky cheese, right? Nah, but sure'd taste good with some aged cheddar or Stilton. This is dark, mouth-filling and food-friendly wine with flavors of black fruit and oaky woodsmoke, easy to quaff. Domaine des Blageurs 1998 Syrah ($9): Randall Grahm is owner/operator of Bonny Doon and is recognized as wildman of California wine. I love this guy and his wines, especially this Syrah -- deep color, almost black, loads of aromas and flavors of peppery cassis/black currants, touch of licorice. Rustic power, suitable for roast of wild boar or just sipping while the snow piles up against the window. Jade Mountain 1998 Napa Valley Syrah ($20): This might seem pricey for domestic Syrah, but we're talkin' masterblaster here -- huge whiffs of cigarbox sandlewood, flavors of smoky dark fruit, ripe black currants, juicy blackberries, hints even of blueberry, enough black pepper to satisfy the cook Alice met in Wonderland. Domaine "La Garrigue" 1998 Cotes du Rhone ($10.50): The Rhone Valley has had two superb vintages, and loads of super Rhones are riding store shelves, many of them bargains. This is home-country Syrah, riding the knife-edge between rusticity and refinement, but packing tons of aromas and flavors in its full, unfiltered body; got all the cassis-and-pepper of classic Rhone, enough firm tannins to promise graceful aging. Rancho Zabaco 1998 Zinfandel, Sonoma Heritage Vines ($10.50): Icy nights were created to complement Zinfandel, or that's how my universe works. Lately, though, this distinctively American wine has mostly fallen victim to market-mobsters who have jacked up prices to felonious levels. Even worse have been the winelab tinkerers who have tried to tame Zinfandel's rough-rider character into something called "Bordeaux-style," meaning wimpy and weak. We can even find a zin in "Beaujolais-style" which makes about as much sense as cowpokes in tutus. Zabaco Zinfandel is old-style, rowdy and ripe, lots of blackberry and black cherry flavor with heaps of spice. Briggs Hill Vineyard 1998 Pinot Noir ($23): Ordinarily, Pinot Noir, especially from Oregon, would not show up on a list of big reds. Pinots are usually more "feminine," subtle and supple, nuanced in flavors, soft in the mouth, complex and delicate. Of course, some California winemakers have tried hard recently to make Pinots more like Cabernets, big, dark, heavily juiced, about as subtle and refined as an NFL linebacker; same folks as put Zinfandels in toe-shoes. Oregon winemakers have generally done lovely work with our signature varietal, especially for the last three vintages, but many of our best Pinots have been priced out of range of middle-income citizens, and some have soared to strictly Republican heights, often hitting the $50/bottle mark usually reserved for top-shelf burgundies. Comes now Ron Kuhn's Briggs Hill 1998, as good as any Pinot selling at twice the price. The wine is unfiltered/unfined, so has not been stripped of its deep color and has retained rich texture, but isn't at all over -- extracted or awkward. In a good glass (round, rimless), the wine yields up pretty aromas and flavors of black cherries, dried roses, the vanilla of toasty oak (product of 18 months in French barrels). A sip fills the mouth, round flavors all over the palate, hints of spice, nearly perfect balance of alcohol, acidity to complement many foods, fine tannins enough to ensure years of development. I'd suggest opening and decanting this wine about six hours before serving it; let it relax and get some oxygen to release its full store of flavors and character. Available by the glass at Broadway New Frontier. Enjoy, friends, while the gales howl through March. Or not. And happy New Year. Back to Top
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