Simply billed as Carating/Lindslee, the exhibit is not your predictable two-man show. Rather, it is remarkably a well-knit exhibit that the works may even be mistaken to come from a single artist’s studio.
I would rather call the exhibit a bookends show. Indeed, Carating and Lindslee stand like formidable bookends as they prop up a common concern for textural subtleties. The two artists, working in tandem for the first time, successfully circumscribes this artistic pursuit by focusing on the surprising and engaging possibilities of gaining textural affluence through the ingenious use of media and materials, both traditional and non-traditional. In such a case, Carating and Lindslee are like bookends compressing an artistic concern to make it stand upright in all its aesthetic integrity and technical craftsmanship.
At the Donada Art Gallery is a two-tiered gallery, where the two levels share a main exhibition wall. On this main wall hang the two giant works of Carating and Lindslee, one each. Carating is on the right and Lindslee is on the left. Carating has "Terra Firma," all of 5 x 10 feet executed in acrylic on canvas, while Lindslee has "Compilation," a 7 x 7 feet work in mixed media.
Upon walking into the gallery, the viewer immediately notices that the works are in harmonious agreement, one strengthening the other – very unlike many two-man shows where the natural tendency of featured artists is to outwit and outdo one another. The agreement results in a very quiet show. Quiet, not in the lackluster sense, but in the fact that the works are engaged in a sober artistic discourse bereft of unnecessary frills, nor resorting to any form of gimmickry just to call attention to the exhibit.
The works in exhibition are refreshingly distilled and essentialized so as to unveil two charming ways to nuance textures in painting.
Even the manner by which the works are installed at the gallery speaks of the same language of gifted sophistication and minimalism. The diamonded linear patterns on the gallery flooring even complement the starkness of the collection.
Carating sets the tone right on pitch. His paintings reflect an unwavering and mature art brought by the many years of tempering the artistic idea, yet yielding fresh results at every stage. As one goes up to the loft, one admires the other works of Carating lining up the wall where the steps rest. In his works, Carating provides not only physical but perceptual textures. In fact, it is in this latter that he achieves noteworthy strides in his art making. The textures are perceptively moving, even vibrating. When light – whether natural or artificial – falls on the works, the visual impact created is awesome. The works become multi-faceted, throbbing and pulsating in the glow of light. The metallic nature of the medium further adds sheen to the glow.
For the exhibit, Carating continues with his textural explorations through metallic acrylic pigments. While before he only limited his palette to gold, silver, copper and bronze, this time he integrates blues and pinks in the composition to fully ventilate the capabilities and possibilities of the lustrous medium. The process involves the multi-layering of metallic acrylic in an almost concrete fashion as masonry to serve as slates for his textural inscriptions and incisions and thereby achieve alternating antique, iridescent, dark or bright finishes.
"Terra Firma" is approached from a diptych point of view, the two square pieces joined together to create an imposing 5 x 10 pictorial plane of textured grooves of verticals and horizontals. Underpaintings in cobalt blue are exquisitely revealed along the edges of the pictorial space that is completely bathed in a combination of iridescent and rich bronzes.
The decision to work on smaller areas one at a time stems from both pragmatic and formalist interests. Like the fresco painters of the Italian Renaissance, Carating works on his pictorial field area by area, or appropriating the process of fresco painting, giornata after giornata, where the buono fresco technique is employed. This way, his lines, whether vertical or horizontal, are accomplished in one gestural sweep and without disruption. Working on smaller units also enables Carating to literally go around the canvas inasmuch as works on the floor, instead of resting his canvas on an easel. The activity affords Carating a very personal interaction with his works in progress.
On the second level are strewn the works of Lindslee in various diminutive sizes from 9 x 9 inches to 24 x 24 inches to 36 x 12 inches.
For his part, Lindslee incorporates an amalgam of materials – resin, wax, concrete, asphalt, acrylic, canvas, mesh wires, screens, ad infinitum – to bring about an engaging visual choreography of textural interests. Lindslee displays utmost passion for materials. The way he treats them is like believing that each of the materials he has chosen for this exhibit has its own uniqueness and capability.
The varied materials are ingeniously matched by his manipulation of scale as far as the dimension of his works are concerned. Working on modules, he arranges and juxtaposes them in coherent blockings to gain either textural similitudes or contrasts. In Lindslee’s works, one mirrors the palpable excitement of youth in constant search for possibilities, unstoppable and maverick, yet focused and certain of what he wants to achieve. Like Carating, there is no dilly-dallying.
"Compilation" resorts to the principle of the grid in dividing the pictorial space. The 7x7-foot area is actually reducible to a series of multi-sized modules. The modules range from the smallest at 4x4-inch to the biggest at 62x54-inch. There are 36 pieces comprising this 84x84-inch work, approached in the tradition of a mosaic where each module is treated like a tile or a tessera. The feel for texture has always been present in mosaic art since the tesserae are never laid absolutely flat or level, thus allowing them to glitter and flash when viewed either from one end to the other, or from top to bottom.
In assembling together several pieces of various sizes in one composition, Lindslee achieves a rich ground to invest his frenzied interest on tactile textures. The ensuing textural contrast in his work equips it with a sculptural relief sensibility, that when one runs his fingers across the textured plane, the experience at once borders on the sensuous on the one hand, and the sensual on the other.
Carating obtained his bachelor of fine arts from the UP College of Fine Arts in 1970. A consistent winner in practically all the national art competitions, including the 13 Artists awards in 1990 from the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Carating time and again has represented the country in many international art events in China, Cuba and the United States. He has extensively exhibited from coast to coast in the United States and Canada, in Germany and most recently in Spain in Europe, as well as in Hong Kong and Singapore.
Lindslee obtained his bachelor of fine arts from the University of Santo Tomás in 2000, and then went to the United States to take more art courses at The Art Students League of New York. A consistent finalist in the various national art competitions when he was yet a student, he mounted his first solo exhibit at the Harrison Public Library in New York in 2002. Thereafter, upon coming back to the Philippines, he followed it up with another solo exhibit entitled Perception at the Avellana Art Gallery, also in 2002 and then, most recently, Cause and Effect at The Drawing Room in May 2003.