Fire and Ice

The paintings of Cynnie Gaasch take the palette of the cosmetic and beauty industry, now ubiquitous in advertising and movies, and use its pastel and seductive tints to engage the viewer in a subtle drama with psychological and sensual implications. Focusing on hands as a motif, she suggests a range of contemporary associations, from manicures to signage, from prosthetics to amputation. We bring to these familiar images of the hand that has created these works and is at the same time included in it our own personal interpretations. Seen from different points of view the way the camera can view objects from multiple perspectives, the hands are deployed over lush or vaporous color field backgrounds in way that makes us feel a bodily involvement in moving through these illusionistic spaces. The simultaneous presentation of multiple viewpoints at the same time turns Cubist simultaneity inside out in a reversal.