Artbeat

Brief sketches of what's happening in the Denver art scene.

Comments (0) By Michael Paglia Thursday, Apr 7 2005

Time flies, as the saying goes, but it's still hard to believe that Space Gallery (765 Santa Fe Drive, 720-904-1088) is already celebrating five years in business. Apparently, though, it's true: The current exhibit, Untold Riches, is being billed as the venue's fifth-anniversary show.

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Organized by Space owner Michael Burnett, Riches brings together three artists -- Hanne Linde, Mary Cay and Ryan Anderson -- each of whom work in a distinctively different style. Though Burnett obviously intended this to be a group show, it's actually three unrelated solos -- and that's just as well, because all three are up to the job of going it alone.

Linde is an established painter in her native Denmark and a veteran of scores of exhibits, but this marks her first appearance in Denver. Her richly hued organic abstracts, sometimes grouped together in lines or grids, look right at home here and are evidence of the fact that with the information explosion, all kinds of contemporary currents have gone international.

Cay, who lives in Denver, does conceptual ceramics, such as the gold-luster porcelain zeroes and commas on the wall that, although suggestive of large numbers, are still only zeroes. It's hard to tell what these pieces are trying to say, unlike those Cay displayed at Edge last year, which were obviously meant to promote illegal drug use.

Hung on facing walls in the front area, Linde and Cay's artwork is captivating, but the true star of the show is Ryan Anderson, whose spectacular paintings are installed in the center space. Anderson is all but unknown around town, though that's likely to change considering these out-of-this-world pieces. Apparently Anderson was trained as a ceramicist and even did a stint at the prestigious Archie Bray Foundation in Montana; maybe that's why his utterly luxurious post-minimal paintings look as though they've been glazed in a kiln, as in "Explorer" (above). To get these effects, Anderson pours metallic automotive finishes onto boards.

If you haven't seen Untold Riches yet, you should do so immediately. It closes on April 9, just a couple of days away.