Jed Dunkerley’s new paintings at Vermillion look like they’re taken from future instruction manuals for the world. Nature is gone but things are more or less fine. Calmly and effectively, humans have created their own nature to replace what’s gone. Wind, rain, and autumn foliage created by machines turn out to be pretty much the same as the old wind, rain, and autumn foliage. Weren’t we looking for a WPA program? Here it is.
The bureaucratic tone of these little watercolors promises a different kind of environmental equilibrium, one that’s weirdly undramatic. Things just don’t seem much different than they are now—maybe because they’re not. The fantasy of untouched nature has never been very interesting, so this is just a proposal of the alternative idea that there is no nature without human-based systems to generate it. In Dunkerley’s view, the Columbia River still exists, but its headwaters come from enormous pipes, not the heaven-reaching tops of mountains. It is a godless idea; no wonder Dunkerley’s childhood in the Bible Belt comes up in his artist statement.
A striking feature of these envisioned human systems is that they are governed, according to their titles, as often by private enterprise as by public utilities. Public and private seem equal partners in the environmental future projected here—which more than a frightening prospect or a 90s-style parody (days sponsored by diapers in Infinite Jest, for instance) feels simply real. The old divisions—public versus private, real versus fake—no longer apply.
Jen, I wonder- do you even like paintings? After reading this review and a few of your other reviews of painting shows, I am left with the feeling that you enjoy concepts in art, but the actual painting itself is less than important.
Some things that tell me this/ unanswered questions that are important to someone who appreciates painting-
How big are these pieces?
Are they well executed?
And most importantly- did you like them? I know you liked the concept but your review tell me nothing that makes me want to see this show.
I tender these to you respectfully. I enjoy your writing but am wondering if you should review painting shows.
Scott: I do like these; I’m sorry if that was unclear. But are you serious about the rest? These are deliberately illustrational, which you can see by simply looking at them online. They’re not paintings about painting — they’re as much about drawing as about painting, and even more so about bureaucratic illustration. I describe the style of them in the first sentence.
I do very much like painting, and just wrote a review of the incredibly varying types of painting that appear in the Munich Secession show at the Frye (comparing them to Sean Scully, Wayne Thiebaud, and Balthus, among others) — but I tend to follow a show’s lead in what I write about it, and Dunkerley’s paintings aren’t really involved in issues about painting per se.
Jen