Nocturnes IV – Return to Elliott Bay
May 5 – 28, 2022
Gallery 110, Seattle, Washington
Nocturne – View from Magnolia Park VII, Acrylic on Multimedia Artboard, 2022. 11 x 30 inches, $2300 CND/ 1850 USD
Time and texture faded, ceased to exist –
day was gone, yet it was not night.
Water was not wet or deep, just smoothness spread with light.
— “Canoe”, Klee Wyck, Emily Carr
Twenty evocative paintings of the Seattle harbor by British Columbia artist David A. Haughton capture twilight and dawn with wide passages of color and ambiguous suggestions of form. Cranes on the horizon tilt like enormous religious objects, transcending realism. Ships, coddled by the tides, rotate slowly, their lights reflecting across the water like mysterious, incandescent monasteries.
Haughton writes: “I joined Gallery 110 in 2009, and thus began regular trips south to Seattle. I discovered a group of dedicated fellow-artists and friends as well as a favorite place to stay: Pensione Nichols with its spectacular view of the harbor and Elliott Bay; a favorite place to eat: Le Pichet with its fantastic Lyon-style caramelized onion soup; and several favorite viewpoints – each at a particular time of day. All were lost for almost two years, and the Pensione closed forever.
“While cut off from visiting in person, I explored, in paint, remembered water and mountains, evoking the light before dawn, at sunset, and in the gloaming – the times of night when there is still enough light to reveal shape and form – when the light’s glow provokes feelings of anticipation and longing.
With strong emotions I return, albeit masked, to offer these colored shards of the light on Elliott Bay, hoping to trigger such emotions in those who see them”.