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Clint Jukkala: See and be seen

Clint Jukkala is venturing away from the rectangular frames and window-like forms that he has been making for the past few years. In his new paintings on view at BravinLee Programs, Jukkala incorporates a goofy figurative element that I first saw in his work at Volta last year, fusing architecture, landscape, portraiture, and still life into one alien but still anthropomorphic form.

[Image at top: Clint Jukkala, Telepath, 2014, oil on canvas, 44 x 50 inches.]
Clint Jukkala, Seeing thinking, 2014, oil on canvas, 24 x 20 inches.
In Jukkala’s sharp imagination, the low-tech pay-per-view binoculars bolted onto railings at scenic overlooks become googly-eyed figures that seem to be staring at us–inviting us to look not at the landscape behind, but at the painted objects themselves. Thus, the lenses provided to help us see the world in greater detail are now both assessing us and circumscribing our field of vision.
 
Clint Jukkala, Please to Meet Me, 2013, oil on canvas, 14 x 12 inches.
Cropped, centered on the canvases,
and jauntily painted in bright colors, the cheery head-objects recall Facebook
profile images or Twitter avatars, as
if to suggest, in this age of online living, that while curious souls in an expanding virtual world may appear in
benign, even friendly, forms, make no mistake: Looking is a two-way proposition. If we are watching, we also are being watched–and controlled.
 Clint Jukkala, Reality Tunnel, 2014, oil on canvas, 52 x 62 inches

Clint Jukkala: Cosmic Trigger,” BravinLee Programs, Chelsea, New York, NY. Through June 7, 2014

Related posts:
Fall preview for painters (2011)
The square line: Jukkala and Rosenthal in Philadelphia (2010)

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Two Coats of Paint is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution – Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. For permission to use content beyond the scope of this license, permission is required.

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