According to Christopher Knight at the Los Angeles Times, Dan McCleary paints with,  “a clear-eyed sense of gravity that recalls the likes of Piero della Francesca.”  McCleary, however, applies his sense of classical composition to seemingly banal contemporary moments, such as a solitary figure sitting in a coffee shop with a foam cup and a red plastic stir stick, or a man in pajamas weighing himself on a bathroom scale.  He deals in restraint, and says, “I don’t like to show too much. It’s so much better when things are reserved.”  On February 26th, Craig Krull Gallery will present a new 6.5 x 13.5’ mural entitled Panel Discussion.  After having completed an even larger mural entitled American Jury, which was commissioned for the Las Cruces Federal Courthouse in New Mexico, McCleary felt empowered to attempt another large-scale work.  Panel Discussion depicts five seated panelists and one standing figure behind a long table draped in white linen, with a water pitcher, paper cups, notes, and a laptop.  The viewer is part of the audience that the panel has come to address.  The formal structure and Renaissance balance of this painting was inspired by Andrea del Sarto’s fresco, The Last Supper, which McCleary recently viewed in Florence. The exhibition will also include a number of preparatory drawings and paintings.

     Concurrently, the gallery will present an exhibition of new paintings by Robin Mitchell entitled, Treasure Maps.   These brightly colored, intricately worked gouache paintings are abstract, yet referential, explorations into symmetry and gesture.  As Christopher Miles observed in the L.A. Weekly, her work is “assembled of what one might call controlled gestures-casual yet deliberate marks…. Radiant shapes, often centered in the compositions, and usually among the largest of elements employed, read simultaneously as starbursts, sunspots, dahlia-like flowers….”

A reception for the artists will be held at the gallery on Saturday, February 26th, 4-6pm.