{"id":4160,"date":"2026-02-16T15:54:49","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T15:54:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dartmagazine.com\/?p=4160"},"modified":"2026-02-16T21:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T21:56:08","slug":"jeffery-bishop-mason-dowling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dartmagazine.com\/?p=4160","title":{"rendered":"Jeffery Bishop Mason Dowling"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by John Mendelsohn<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jeffrey
Jeffrey Bishop, Fathom Compression #18<\/strong>, 2020, acrylic and ink on synthetic substrate, 60 x 44 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

What is painting magic? How do we recognize it? What is it good for?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These questions arise from thinking about the work of Jeffery Bishop and Mason Dowling in their current two-person exhibition. Both artists employ painterly processes of their own invention, creating personal genres of image making that move us beyond wondering \u201cHow did they do that?\u201d. Part of the fascination engendered by both artists is the slight-of-hand of seductive effects, misdirecting us while something else is transpiring, just beyond our conscious awareness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Bishop\u2019s case, a silkscreened or collaged image often become a central motif, with a seemingly generative power to create a confounding visual field in turmoil around it. In the artist\u2019s two large Fathom Compression<\/em> pieces, a complex, symmetrical, silkscreened form anchors the billowing of diluted ink, a mysterious grisaille realm of liquid of pools and crevasses. The innermost form can be read as a kind of holy monster, or wizard behind the screen, whose identity is subsumed by the tempest he creates. Both the ink\u2019s unpredictable flow, and the work\u2019s title alert us that we have entered a realm of consciousness where sinking into its depths carries both wonders and perils.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jeffrey
Jeffrey Bishop, Sidewinder #6<\/strong>,\u00a02026, acrylic and collage on wood panel, 17 1\/2 x 13 1\/2 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In Bishop\u2019s Sidewinder<\/em> series, a writhing, nubile form, applied to the painting\u2019s surface as a chine coll\u00e9, moves like a spill of mercury or a dancing, cybernetic demon. This avatar rules over a small kingdom whose landscape is comprised of an archive of the artist\u2019s favored graphic motifs. In Sidewinder #6<\/em> a snaky cadmium red shape overlays Bishop\u2019s spears, streamings, and distressed surfaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jeffrey
Jeffrey Bishop, Interval #8<\/strong>, 2026, acrylic and collage on cotton on wood panel, 24 x 18 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Bishop\u2019s Interval<\/em> pieces are perhaps the most intimate and personal works here. In these paintings, cotton on panel act as a kind of private diary, carrying a gritty atmosphere of grayed tendrils acrylic, fragments of vibratory waves, and trapezoids with peaked studs of silver paint. In Interval #8<\/em>, shards of white wings float high above the miasma that they have escaped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mason
Mason Dowling, Barnacle Candy<\/strong>, 2026, acrylic and paper on wood panel with artist-made wood frame, 11 x 9 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Mason Dowling creates hallucinatory paintings with a deceptively simple method \u2013 cut paper affixed to a panel, squeegeed with passes of color. The result is a gorgeous field of flaring hues that appear and fade away unpredictably. Complicating matters, the cutaway shapes catch darkness within them, spilling shadows onto the surrounding surface. The effect is a kind of solarization, with negative and positive trading places within a single painting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all their beauty, there is a sublimated fierceness at work here, with the sharp forms cut into the surface, and the charred shadows that threatens the streaks of cerise, scarlet, and gold. There is, as well, a kind of temptation at work: we are asked against our better judgement to trade the pleasure of looking, only to find the risk that lurks as the price of the bargain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mason
Mason Dowling, Ptarmigan<\/strong>, 2024, acrylic and paper on wood panel with artist-made wood frame, 11 x 9 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A number of the painting feature a softened, almost blurred appearance that seems to allude to the natural world, specifically to the high desert of New Mexico, where the artist was raised. We can see in these and other paintings the weathered geology, the powerful light, and scorching heat of this environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two of Dowling\u2019s largest works are structured by an all-over field of vertical lines, perhaps off-printed from corrugated cardboard. Cutt (Trucha)<\/em> combines cut forms with these deep striations, and a shimmering, almost iridescent sunset light, an evocation of the cutthroat trout, native to the American West.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both Bishop and Dowling share a version of painting magic that allows them to conjure, through abstract, material means their own psychic dominions, into which we are induced to enter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mason
Mason Dowling, Cutt (Trucha)<\/strong>, 2025, acrylic and paper on polyester, 60 x 48 inches<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Jeffery Bishop Mason Dowling <\/strong>at McKenzie Fine Art, New York, January 28 – March 8, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by John Mendelsohn What is painting magic? How do we recognize it? What is it good for? These questions arise from thinking about the work of Jeffery Bishop and Mason Dowling in their current two-person exhibition. Both artists employ painterly processes of their own invention, creating personal genres of image making that move us beyond … <\/p>\n

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