David Remfry at Neuhoff and P.S. 1 - New York - exhibition of paintings - Brief Article

Looking like a cross between Edgar Degas and cable television's Sex and the City, David Remfry's high-toned, high-fashion young women in gray, black and sepia whirl, twirl, stand, walk, dance and generally disport themselves with one another. Yet they seem only vaguely--perhaps covertly--aware of each other's presence, and certainly heedless of the presence of the British-born painter.

Whether in graphite and wash or watercolor (the latter is the preferred medium), Remfry's women are children of privilege, free time and not a little anomie. In the 60-by-80-inch Five Women--with a composition glancingly similar to Matisse's La Danse black-clad bodies sway slightly, with arms out and feet upturned, as if learning some new step that has its roots in childhood but its soul in heartache--or at least, to the extent they know it. Other poses strike a lighter note: Margo, seen from the back in red-feathered hat and red pumps, might have been caught in conversation with a friend, raising her right arm to sip her drink, a study in carefree party-animal behavior.

Here and there, a discreet realism enters the scene. Meryl, occupying a 60-by-40-inch canvas, is considerably overweight in her gauzy red cocktail dress, seen from the back for a devastating view of legs, buttocks and chunky white arms. But these are generally "beautiful people"; in a graphite-and-wash of Meryl and her friend Joelle ballroom dancing, the viewer is given no small hint of what Remfry might find beautiful--even statuesquely sexy--in the regal Meryl.

Along with more watercolors, the exhibition at P.S. 1 contained what seemed rare in the Neuhoff show: males. Alan Cumming is a tall, thin, full-length portrait of a tall, thin, young man. Torso and legs barely exist; arm scratching head and face are almost all we see, emerging merrily from the sketchiness below.

As for others who work this kind of sociable figurative vein, Billy Sullivan, Joseph Shannon and, to some extent, Sylvia Sleigh come to mind. But Remfry's world is really his own. This is nowhere more evident than in a 40-by-100-inch watercolor called, simply, Nightlife. The scene could be a downtown loft or a private club: couples are seen on the dance floor, arms flung about each other, colors an artificially lit, dull riot of yellows, whites, tans and some blue. For a brief, eternal moment we are here, and nowhere else, perfectly caught up in the churning privacy of these young "lunar creatures," as Remfry dubbed the show. Probably not since Toulouse-Lautrec have we known such an earnest, yet bedazzling, display of midnight lunacy.

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COPYRIGHT 2002 Gale Group