Slusser Gallery Holiday Show

Mark Slusser opened the gallery on 100 South that bears his name a little more than a year ago. The Salt Lake City native, who had also maintained a studio gallery in La Jolla, Calif., focuses on artists of the “contemporary realism” similar to his own work. The gallery’s holiday show is a landscape exhibition, and brings 11 of the premier plein air (working onsite rather than from a photograph) painters from the San Diego area, in addition to six accomplished local artists. If not for the time of year and title, you might think the show was simply a collective ode to the landscape, based on the paintings’ subject matter.

Several of the painters utilize impressionistic techniques in the works, and the show is really a testament to the power of the paintbrush as an expressive instrument. “Mr. Pink’s Truck” by Scott W. Prior (pictured), is a rustic compositional vehicle. Vincent Fitches’ “Red Portrait #2” is reminiscent of Monet’s crimson-hued work after cataract surgery. Randall Lake brings the refined brushstrokes of the true masters among local painters. Nathan Florence’s “A Star Is Born” adds a touch of the whimsically surreal.

The small-works format of the show draws the viewer into examining these pieces closer, even though some of them take in fairly wide vistas. The detail achieved in that amount of space is striking, and the vistas are a window into the possibilities of landscape painting. (Brian Staker)