Houston ChronicleJuly 2, 2008

Last call for these area art exhibits

By DOUGLAS BRITT

As another round of exhibitions wraps up, here are three worth moving tothe top of your list of shows not to miss.

Ruth Pastine at Sonja Roesch

Something wonderful happens when you look at Ruth Pastine's not-quite-monochrome paintings, which are created with a 2-inch brush that layersthe subtlest shifts of color across her canvases.

She does it with complementary colors, mixing reds with greens or blueswith oranges in such a way that one slowly spreads out from the center ofthe canvas to its edges while the opposite color creeps inward. In otherpaintings, the shift occurs from left to right.

The more saturated canvases are the most obviously beautiful, but themuted ones, which appear dull and even a bit muddy at first glance, are theones that will haunt you, making you feel like you've detected a mysteriouspresence barely emerging through a fog.

They remind me of Philip Guston's shimmering, formless abstractions of theearly 1950s, except that his were built up with juicy brushstrokes, while theCalifornia-based Pastine's are invisible.

A revelation that artist Robert Irwin experienced while looking at one ofthose Gustons applies here.

"A good painting has a gathering, interactive buildup in it," Irwin told writerLawrence Weschler.

"It's a psychic buildup, but it's also a pure energy buildup. And the goodartists all knew it, too. That's what a good Vermeer has, or raku cup, orStonehenge."

Pastine's paintings have it, too.