woocommerce-shipping-per-product domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /var/www/staging.esse.ca/htdocs/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131complianz-gdpr domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /var/www/staging.esse.ca/htdocs/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131\nEven from the sidewalk outside of Narwhal Art Projects\u2019 Queen Street West gallery, we can tell we are entering the fantastical, complex world of Stephen Appleby-Barr\u2019s The Invisible College<\/em>. Framed within the gallery\u2019s large picture window is an austere white plaster bust of a young boy, immaculately dressed in a breasted blazer, who has been draped in a swath of red velvet and out\ufb01tted with a mysterious black dunce cap and Appleby-Barr\u2019s trademark bandit mask. Frighteningly anonymous, yet strangely whimsical, the young boy seems the ideal \ufb01gurehead for the painter\u2019s \ufb01ctional guild of sixteenth-century European philosophers: an unnamed and esoteric society from which Appleby-Barr draws the cast of characters depicted in his highly detailed oil portraits.<\/pre>\n\n\n\nThough Appleby-Barr employs many of the now-clich\u00e9d representational strategies\u2014animal heads on human \ufb01gures being one of the most obvious\u2014which \ufb01rst came to prominence through the work of Marcel Dzama and the Royal Art Lodge, his use of seemingly outmoded tropes from oil -portraiture and his deft skill at photorealistic representation sets his work apart from other DIY-inspired, \u201coutsider\u201d artists. Earnestness and sincerity trump hipster irony in Appleby-Barr\u2019s practice, lending his portraits a refreshing playfulness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Comprised of eighteen paintings, each framed in identical darkly stained wood frames and hung at eye level in a continuous line, The Invisible College<\/em> marks Appleby-Barr\u2019s second solo exhibition with the gallery and only the second year the artist has worked in the medium. Despite being new to oil painting, Appleby-Barr\u2019s work is remarkably nuanced. His palette of smoldering burgundies, rich chocolates and deep indigoes draw the viewer in, compelling us to closely inspect his subjects\u2019 richly detailed, elaborate costumes. Whereas his previous work largely dealt with small-scale, full-length portraits of friends and anonymous \ufb01ctional characters, in The Invisible College<\/em> Appleby-Barr has begun to experiment with a larger format, including three-quarter length, close-up portraits of iconic art world \ufb01gures such as musician Owen Pallett (poised for high tea) and artist Shary Boyle (dressed as Governor General).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Appleby-Barr is at his best, however, when he probes the darker, surrealist underbelly of his secret society. The two most compelling images of the series hang side by side in a corner of the gallery. In Neon Rider<\/em>, a male \ufb01gure borrowed from the stable of the illustration collective Team Macho (of which Appleby-Barr is a member) sits calmly, facing the viewer, sporting an eerie leather mask out\ufb01tted with bullhorns. Next to him hangs The Trial<\/em>, a Kafkaesque history painting of a courtroom where a \ufb01gure in a white mask and top hat is being put on trial by a group of stern bureaucrats. Together, the images call up the isolating and exclusionary effects that are invariably linked to the constitution of intimate or secret communities, adding a rich complexity to Appleby-Barr\u2019s \ufb01ctional artistic legacy.<\/p>\n