Linda Ridgway
With or Without

Talley Dunn Gallery
April 1 – May 14, 2016

In With or Without, Linda Ridgway presents six bronze, wall-mounted sculptures and seven works with graphite on paper that convey her appreciation of poetry and the beauty of the natural world with detailed line and delicate form.  The sculpture Wonder offers a simple row of three bonsai trees that has been cast in bronze using the direct burnout method, a technique that captures nearly every texture and structure of the trees’ fragile leaves and gnarled roots.  The graduated wall installation creates a subtle rhythm which engages the viewer and encourages him/her to slow down and experience the forms more fully.

Other pieces, such as Frost’s First Line and The Sound of Trees, reveal the artist’s life-long regard of Robert Frost’s poetry, as she represents his line “I wonder about the trees” with a minimal text from a crocheted pattern as a way to celebrate the simplicity of form found in nature as well as in Frost’s words.  The role of memory and personal connection also play an important part in the exhibition.  The ghost-like traces embodied in Brother (II), Jeune Danseur, and Voile speak of loss and transformation, and as more than literal representations of everyday objects, Ridgway’s poetic images find a way to connect us with past experience, both with the artist’s and perhaps with our own.