In her current show at the Ten In One Gallery, SARAH WHIPPLE, a native Philadelphian who studied at the University of Illinois at Chicago, shows that she has moved beyond the fiber fabric wall and floor pieces that mimicked liquids and which she referred to as “splats” and “spurts.” She now creates more rigid sculptures that veer in two directions, though each still reflects Whipple’s interest in formlessness and transitions. The first grouping consists of almost flat cutouts that she leans against the gallery’s white walls or places atop its tiled floor to suggest something slightly representational. Some viewers may read these as ghosts, which is how Whipple titles them. She says, “l’ve always been interested in liquids and residues of the body and see these as extensions of that.” Her small blue floor “Island,” with a cutout for a tree, hints at man’s smallness compared to nature and plays up the debate between positive and negative space. Of the two more three-dimensional pieces in the show, the bright red snake titled “Charmed” is stronger visually. The exhibit continues at 1542 N. Damen through Oct. 4.
Having won the German Art Prize last year, Michael Triegel is considered one of his country’s top young artists, and Worthington Gallery has mounted this country’s first major exhibition of his work. A talented realistic painter and a superb colorist, Triegel, who lives in Leipzig, is also a skilled printmaker, drawer and watercolorist. His figurative and still life mixed-media paintings on board are inspired by Italian Renaissance art, but he does not simply duplicate those subjects and themes. His “Madonna in the Workshop,” for example, showcases two paintings within a painting. The background painting depicts an idyllic landscape of blue sky, puffy white clouds and green hills. In the center, mother and child sit in front of a contemporary green screen framed in red — possibly a metaphor for blood and sacrifice. The Madonna stares at a pomegranate, a symbol for life, which she delicately holds in one hand while her other hand firmly grips a sharp knife. The child is blindfolded. In the foreground, the artist has scattered his tools. The exhibit continues through Oct. 31. A German Expressionism show can be also viewed through Oct. 11, at Worthington Gallery, 645 N. Michigan Ave.
Frances Myer’s small show of mixed media works, titled “In Good Taste,” will make viewers question the traditional symbols of good taste with which we surround ourselves — such as china, wallpaper, even artistic works. Myers alters many of her found objects with words and writings and arranges them in imaginative configurations. She wants viewers to realize how we often take beautiful objects and dress them — or ourselves — up, yet we can never totally hide the realities of defects and flaws. The exhibit continues at Perimeter Gallery, 210 W. Superior St., through Oct. 4.