It's Not What You Think: Andrea Pawlisz @ Kahwa S.

Andrea Pawlisz, "Off the Beaten Path"

Abstracts often, but not always, have roots going back to realism. In Andrea Pawlisz' current one-woman show at Kahwa titled: It's Not What You Think deals with this apparent paradox, mixing the two up in a variety of combinations. Pawlisz is a graphic artist who has twenty-plus years of experience in the field. She also paints in a Pop Realist style that is strongly, but not totally abstract, with an occasional touch of Pop Art.

On the left is "Off the Beaten Path". The paint drips and nearly horizontally bisected field are tropes that repeat often in the work in this show. There is a main white angled line coming in on a diagonal from the right and down the middle, around a hub of sorts. Is the beaten path the upper, thicker part of the line? The lower gets narrower and vanishes, unless one read it as the start.

Andrea Pawlisz, "Hang 10"

"Hang 10" is a realistic and beautiful Floridian landscape, yet the title adds a conceptual tone to it, in the sense that while we do not clearly see waves, or anything related to surfing, they are implied by the title. Note how the composition retains a similar look in terms of the two fields to the one above.

Andrea Pawlisz, "X Marks the Spot"

 Pawlisz' "X Marks the Spot" is different from the others. She told me the red "X" is a Pop element. What is the "X" marking? For me, the fact that its two components cross on the high side is uplifting, playing formally against the drips.

Congratulations to Andrea Pawlisz for an interesting show and to Kahwa for contributing its walls for the arts community.

--- Luis


To see more of Andrea's work, see here