Review

"Topo 1," Glazed Fritware.

Cary Esser
Lay of the Land
(Group Exhibition)

11 a.m.-5 p.m.

Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art
2004 Baltimore
Kansas City, MO
816.221.2626

Hours: 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Tuesday-Saturday
Runs through: Sept. 30.

Artist's site: http://www.caryesser.com
Gallery site: http://www.sherryleedy.com

It's one thing not to be able to take one's eyes off a piece of art ... and that's certainly the case with Cary Esser's ceramics work at Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art.

But there's another dimension to Esser's portion of the Lay of the Land group exhibition at the Crossroads space. Check that. There are two more dimensions, for a total of three ... and that's the root of what makes Esser's work as tempting to the hands as it is attractive to the eyes.

(Don't worry. I didn't touch, and I know you won't either.)

It isn't just the solidity of Esser's pieces that gives them such a tactile quality. It's the way in which they resemble puzzles, or construction blocks ... or, perhaps, a combination of both. They rouse the little voice at the back of the mind that says, Hmmmmmm ... what could I make out of those? How does this fit in here, and how would it fit over there?

That's the idea, really, behind what the gallery release describes as glazed tactile modular "tiles" of mass and verticality that can be arranged and rearranged in infinite combinations creating the paradox of permanence and the possibility of change.

(In short, puzzle pieces and building blocks.)

So far, though, what keeps Esser's work from being merely a collection of toys (albeit attractive, painstakingly created ones)?

That distinction lies in her eye for assembling the separate components into attractive wholes, recalling everything from floral forms to landscapes to megalithic structures — and sometimes, as with Topo 1 (pictured above), blurring the lines between nature and construction.

And, the more one views, the quieter that little inner But I wanna touch it ... voice gets. It might never quite go away ... but the more you look, the more it's apparent that we don't need to move things around, because Esser has done it right the first time.

-re-

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