Julie McManus at Patricia Correia - Santa Monica - Brief Article

Art in America, March, 2002 by Michael Duncan

In her upbeat, jovial paintings, newcomer Julie McManus liberates polka dots from dresses and paisleys from tablecloths, restoring them to the organic world from whence they came. Flower and plant motifs emerge from fabric patterns to flourish again in gardens and backyard settings. Although her work builds on ideas originally explored by the feminist and Pattern and Decoration movements of the 1970s, she has quickly developed a recognizable style, dedicated to a playful, conceptually based deconstruction and animation of patterning. Sometimes employing mixed mediums--including nail polish, gold leaf, and found fabric and lace--the works address the ubiquity of decoration in everyday life.

In Swimming Lessons (1999), four smiling carp (freed, perhaps, from a Hawaiian shirt) seem to cruise across a field of layered patterns, buoyed by a sinuous, light blue vine motif whose leaves resemble cartoon ocean splashes. Incandescent Personality (1999) may be a nod to Sigmar Polke, with red, black and blue polka dots slipping off a pleated sun dress to rain all over the canvas. For festive accessories, McManus meticulously depicts a strand of illuminated Christmas-tree lights and a hand-bag featuring a bold needlepoint crown suitable for a queen.

Three recent paintings offer trompe-l'oeil depictions of green garden hoses coiled on painted fields that emulate variously patterned fabrics. Some of the patterns' flowers have seemingly come to life, blossoming through segments of the coils. Flora and garden implements alike are decorative ornaments. The double-helix hose of Seaview Street (2001) loosely suggests a large-scale, calligraphic embellishment. The ends of the coiled hose in Reunion (2001) are screwed into each other, suggesting less a snake biting its tail than a kind of upbeat emblem for the unified self.

In McManus's hyperornamented world, nature and decoration feed off each other--literally so in Morning Glory (1999), a depiction of a pollen-laden bumblebee in the act of invading the blossomlike skirt of a brilliant blue dress. Suspended midair amid similarly hued flowers, the full-figured party dress presents its taffeta cavity for the bee's delectation. As the dress seems almost happy to help disseminate glorious gorgeousness, so McManus uses her paintings to spread the word: decoration is both nature idealized and a transforming life force.