October 19, 2025 · 3pm-5pm
The work on view in CONTRE-JOUR AND THE CORINTHIAN MAID at Wayne Art Center was chosen by exhibition curator Scott Noel for its distinguished and expressive depiction of the presence and power of light. Noel presents work by accomplished contemporary artists Jeffrey Carr, Chris Feiro, Frank Galuszka, Philip Geiger, Mark Green, Paul Raphaelson and Elaine S. Wilson in Wayne Art Center’s Davenport and Vidinghoff Galleries from October 13 thru November 15, 2025.
In Greek mythology, picture-making begins when a young woman traces her lover’s shadow on a lamp lit wall. The Corinthian Maid’s invention is suggestive of all the myriad ways image-making projects appearances onto surfaces and the degree to which a likeness can be distilled to a silhouette. The maid’s shadow-tracing reaches back to the caves’ depictions of sacred animals and forward to photography’s shimmering fields of light and shadow. Contre-jour, “against the day,” is a painting motif that studies the meetings of different fields of light. The classic example is an inside-outside picture in which a brilliant outdoor light, framed by a window, holds a figure in silhouette. The artists in this show, six painters and a photographer, each explore the possibilities of contre-jour to manifest places in the world, an abandoned factory in Brooklyn, a Michigan dairy barn, scenes of the Pacific coast and the unexpected strangeness of domestic interiors and suburban homes characterized by the interdependence of the profiles created by light. - Curator Scott Noel
An exhibition catalog for CONTRE-JOUR AND THE CORINTHIAN MAID is available for purchase at the Wayne Art Center Gallery Shop.
Contre-Jour Painting Workshop with Scott Noel
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