Review

A review of Larry Thomas's Ploys and Decoys

An installation view from the opening of "Ploys and Decoys" at the Epsten Gallery at the Kansas City Jewish Museum of Contemporary Art, January 17. Works pictured include "Vital Integration," "Faithful Mask" and "Immersion;" it should be noted that at least 370 people came to see the exhibition that day (despite the clear-room depiction here). Photo: Nancy K. Weant

Kansas City Jewish Museum of Contemporary Art, Epsten Gallery
Overland Park, Kansas
January 17 — February 28, 2010

Camouflage continues to be a vital component in recent works by Kansas-based artist and Johnson County Community College Professor and Art Department Chair, Larry Thomas. In his latest exhibition, Thomas seems to have synthesized his previous artworks containing elements of camouflage into works rich in texture and vivid in color combinations that seem capable of transmitting enormous spurts of energy, powerful emotions, and alternative thinking.

Larry Thomas, "Poser's Decoy," acrylic, ultra-chrome ink and collage on canvas, 72" x 70", 2009. Image: courtesy of the artist

It is as if Thomas is finally allowing viewers a peek into what lies beneath the surface of his own psyche. What is clearly evident to observers familiar with Thomas’s work is that we are experiencing the artwork of a mature artist who has arrived at a pinnacle of his artistic outpouring. Through the use of traditional painting and digital techniques, collage, and state-of-the art printing methods, he commits to giving audiences what they have been anticipating from his artwork for years — himself. Instead of camouflaging his views, feelings, concerns, and experiences, Thomas chooses to explore camouflage on the move, and in the process he exposes his true identity.

He accomplishes this through highly charged large-scale mixed-media paintings that absolutely “pop” on the gallery’s freshly painted walls. At a period in art history when curators are recognizing that white is not always right, the curators at the Espten Gallery wisely chose to treat its walls in a grayish putty color, while leaving the high vaulted ceilings white. This dramatic contrast serves to enhance Thomas’s paintings and smaller portfolio prints. At the opening reception, one could not help but overhear a number of those in attendance remarking how the paintings literally “pop” in that space.

Larry Thomas, "Consumed Magician," acrylic, ultra-chrome ink and collage on canvas, 70" x 60", 2008-2009. Image: courtesy of the artist

The paint seems to be flying right off the canvas in Consumed Magician. Amidst a splash of vibrant reds, yellows, blues, greens, and turquoises there rests a variety of symbols, signs, texts, lists, partial mathematical equations, and distorted heads. All the conflicting images encourage viewers to engage in multiple layers of meaning.  Finding meaning may seem allusive, but as one ponders the title and the vivid variety of colors spilling down the canvas, an overwhelming flood of ideas enter the mind. For instance, from the title one might question how reality has been hijacked by the media and in its place a “magician” has created the illusion that consuming goods is our primary role in society. However dark this suggestion, the painting offers viewers an escape through a wide swath of turquoise blue near the bottom of the canvas. The sea of turquoise beckons viewers to embrace reality rather than an illusion that holds no future.

Larry Thomas, "Faithful Mask," acrylic, ultra-chrome ink and collage on canvas, 72" x 70", 2009. Image: courtesy of the artist

Faithful Mask hangs diagonally across from Consumed Magician and hints at the mask we all put on to hide our true thoughts and emotions. Mostly white, brown, and black with occasional specks of color, Faithful Mask stands in strong contrast to the bright colors of Consumed Magician. Instead of dripping to the edges of the canvas, Faithful Mask encloses itself and keeps everything within, just like many of us who daily wear a mask in an effort to conceal our thoughts and emotions. A brownish triangular shape lingers in the lower right corner of the canvas and appears to be attempting either to gain entry into the snake-like form or else exit it. It is difficult to detect which it is doing, and so Thomas demonstrates how camouflage operates on the move. The snake-like shape of Faithful Mask wears a glaring black eye that makes most viewers apprehensive. In his lecture given during the opening, Thomas mentioned his own dislike of snakes and recalled a story from his youth involving a black snake that made quite an impression on him. He noted the way snakes are capable of camouflaging themselves for their survival. The snake-like form in Faithful Mask reveals our own fears and the lengths we go to engage camouflage in order to protect ourselves from what we perceive as harmful. This painting calls into question each of our own fears and how others are able to sometimes capitalize on them.

Larry Thomas, "Vital Integration," acrylic, ultra-chrome ink and collage on canvas, 72" x 70", 2009. Image: courtesy of the artist

Discovering a way to integrate his ideas about camouflage is most obvious in the work aptly titled Vital Integration. This large-scale painting contains a yellow-gold cocoon or beehive form whose seams are nearly bursting. Brightly colored confetti swirls around the cocoon form, and a periwinkle form shaped like a sort of bean appears to be attached to the cocoon’s lower left side. Whether this bean-shaped form is attempting to release itself from the cocoon or attach itself to it is part of the painting's visual tension. Below the cocoon-like shape is an oval of yellow containing many things that are unrecognizable — and some that are identifiable, such as distorted heads. In order for integration to occur one must let go and merge with something new, and perhaps the stretched out heads and the bean-shaped form are attempting to release themselves while simultaneously merging with something new. They must stretch beyond their comfort zones to succeed in integration.

Installation view of Larry Thomas's "Ploys and Decoys," showing "Under Cover" and "Vital Integration." Photo: Nancy K. Weant

Also during his lecture, Thomas remarked how camouflage most often is about not moving — but rather than making his most recent body of paintings about that, he chose to explore how camouflage works on the move in his paintings.  Vital Integration definitely reveals movement, as do Thomas’s other works in Ploys and Decoys. These meaningful paintings succeed in challenging our ideas of ourselves, the illusions we create for ourselves, and even the illusions created for us. It offers viewers a glimpse into the artist's concerns about society’s popular culture, the way we handle daily situations in everyday life, the effects of the way we manage our environment, and the connection between camouflage and the military industrial complex. All these things combine in Thomas’s recent works to lead us to question for ourselves how to integrate into the world of reality from one where illusions are cleverly designed to deceive us.

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