Afar Per Se

Amar from Afar and Diane Feught

 We look towards the far distant for a sense of something other than the hum-drum existence that often takes over our routine lives. Vacations, videos, reading, music – all become the escape routes to enrichment. Afar Per se fulfills the wanderlust and slakes the thirst for exoticism, transferring a National Geographic mind frame into the refined halls of high culture.

 Amar from Afar is actually residing and working quite close for his studio is in Lumby, BC – yet that fact could translate into a rather exotic imagining for a New Yorker. Headbones Gallery visited the artist’s studio in the fall and were rewarded with a revelation as expanding as that of visiting another country. Amar’s work is not static. It reaches backwards in time as it projects forward and seldom is there only a surface meaning. But this is not a plea for nostalgia or even a reinforcement of exotic otherness for Amar doesn’t let the image rest. He pokes at it, jabs at it with the dissonance of virtual life and in doing so pulls his visual story line into the theatrical realms. There is a taste of intrigue, plot, climax and even the potential for a narrative resolution. He gives us sufficient clues but doesn’t reveal the ending.

 Diane Feught’s actual past, present and future have rarefied beginnings. Feught grew up in an Anglican home. As an adult, she lived in a Buddhist priory in Edmonton for seven years where she experienced the lush overlap of philosophical, spiritual and cultural diversity while still living in the heart of a ‘typical’ Canadian milieu. Her oil paintings and gouaches leave room for study as well as speculation as to their narrative source. Often with a strong composition that supports the drama of the imagery, her technique – impeccable and practiced – supports the strangeness of her subjects by granting an immediate viability to the juxtaposition of elements. The overwhelming perfection and balance take over any doubt at the unusual imagery. Feught also backs her innuendos with information, detailing with a precision to provoke applause.

 Afar Per se - what does it mean? Per se does not only mean “intrinsically” but also, “by, of, for or in itself”. It seems a fitting description of the works of Amar from Afar and Diane Feught with all of the allusions to otherness that they inspire.

 The opening reception for Afar Per se is Friday, November 11, which is Remembrance Day and 11/11/11. Even the date is fittingly evocative yet cryptic.

 Trance and Nilt to cosmic Eastern sounds and melodies during the opening reception with Daniel Stark on sarode, Bill Boyd on cello and Gaz on guitar.