A tight three at Field of Play

Contributed by Michael Brennan / “A creative economy is the fuel of magnificence,” said Ralph Waldo Emerson in another context. As much as I respect institutional Minimalism, economy in painting excites me more, and what could be more economical than a three-person, three-painting exhibition presented in a 135-square-foot space with one empty wall? Artist Mark Sengbusch has scrupulously curated “3 Painters” at Field of Play in Gowanus in accord with his own personal Periodic Table, in which each artist represents a specific Element. Charlotte Hallberg is field, Clare Grill is air, and Victoria Roth is depth.

Hallberg’s painting is an oil pastel on paper, and it has all the gently abraded, powdery luminosity inexorably associated with that medium, reaching back to the eighteenth-century pastels of Rosalba Carriera. It’s unusual to see a direct, hands-on, yet smoothly softened touch brought to abstraction, which is more typically hard-edge. Halberg’s painting is something like an event, like drawn weather. She could just as well represent air as field, both elements being volumetrically related.

Abstraction, unlike figuration, doesn’t often emphasize detail or convey warmth and intimacy, but Clare Grill’s close attention to every surface incident transmits both. In Bit, reportedly inspired by antique embroidery, brown brushwork is dragged over a clear-coated linen surface, creating a cascade of faux woodgrain. Grill is an ambitious artist in that she asks abstraction to realize its potential for communication. Her work is “homier” than most abstraction, to use Tom Nozkowski’s personal descriptor. Like Nozkowski, Grill cultivates a playfully open vocabulary.

Although decidedly abstract, Victoria Roth’s painting Slither has a muscular funkiness resonant of the form versus figure and plant versus animal contrasts, indecisive yet beguiling, in Jedd Garet’s paintings from the 1980s. There’s a fun, wonky, science-fiction tussle happening, with abundant subtext. Think, for instance, Alien vs. Predator.

It is well worth trekking to Gowanus to see just these three paintings because they compose an uncommonly succinct and still expansive show. Selecting so few works is a gutsy move and displays considerable – and justified – faith in the clarity and coherence of each piece. 

“3 Painters: Clare Grill, Charlotte Hallberg, and Victoria Roth,” Field of Play, 56 2nd Avenue, #21, Brooklyn, NY. Curated by Mark Sengbusch. Through May 18, 2025.

About the author: Michael Brennan is a Brooklyn-based abstract painter who writes on art.