The Skin of Reality
<p>When I visit Kari Gatzke’s studio, which I have done a couple of times now, there’s coffee waiting, very good coffee, and cookies. This is, outwardly, a reunion of friends.</p>
<p>Yet at the same time, this encounter features an underlying atmosphere of ritual observance, despite the warmth and familiarity among the four of us — Kari and her partner, me and mine. This is an effect of the devotional intensity of her paintings. The accumulated images which fill the space — many finished, a few in-progress —breathe out an air of total absorption in an unnameable pursuit.</p>
<p>Kari hasn’t much let these paintings out of the studio. If you search her name you’ll <a href="https://mim.gallery/artist/kari-gatzke/" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">barely</a> find <a href="https://fmward.com/tag/kari-gatzke/" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">evidence</a> of her <a href="http://bigredandshiny.org/15715/the-pioneers-the-victory-the-spoils/" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">practice</a>.</p>
<p>Reproductions do the work no justice. You’ll say, of course, that reproductions fail to do justice to the reality of any painting, and you’ll be right. But we typically go around looking at reproductions anyway. (Kari’s allowed me to use some here.)</p>
<p>In the case of these paintings, reproduction denies them justice to an unusual degree, and in unusual ways. Look here.</p>
<p><a href="https://medium.com/@jonathan.lethem/the-skin-of-reality-e20a39f6fda8"><strong>Click Here</strong></a></p>