Stephan extends his engagement with art history to the 17th century with his series of drawings of Vermeer's "Girl with a Pearl Earring." Small drawings of this figure are shown as if it were folded, bent, repeated, and falling. Stephan is treating the picture as a contemporary icon, which it has become since the popularity of Tracy Chevalier's unfortunate book of the same name.
This is a well-wrought show. Stephan has clearly acquired the technical ability to realize his current artistic ambitions. It will be interesting to see where he takes this ability and drive in the future.
Ken Greenleaf can be reached at ken.greenleaf@gmail.com.
"TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT" | sculpture by Aaron Stephan | through June 27 | at Whitney Art Works, 492 Congress St, Portland | 207.774.7011
Related:
Summer people, Found, and created, Conversation piece, More 
- Summer people
Ever wonder why there is so much professional-level art made and shown in Maine, a state with a total population less than that of many minor cities? One answer is that following the fame of people like Winslow Homer, creative types flocked to Maine, often to artists' colonies.
- Found, and created
While aesthetically there is little to compare between Rebecca FitzPatrick's "Thread" show and "Multiples" by Owen F. Smith, together on view at Whitney Art Works this month, both artists appropriate found materials, are impressively prolific, and identify with a post- or anti-war movement of the previous century.
- Conversation piece
Leon Johnson explains his trans-historical-post-colonial-dinner-wait-what?!
- Structural integrity
The five artists featured in "Stratum," now on view at Whitney Art Works, are diverse in background, medium, and scale, but they comfortably crowd the gallery's two rooms with sculptures, paintings, and drawings that respond to the relationships exposed by stripping back layers and how meaning and interpretation shift when new layers are presented.
- Easy on the eyes
"The Funnies" at Whitney Art Works is a sprawling show of upwards of 150 pieces by 25 artists, all of whom have been brought together by local artist — Jeff Badger.
- Groups + solos
First on the list of this year's points of interest is the anticipated Portland Museum of Art Biennial, which opens in early April.
- ...And the living is easy
Fellow Portlanders, we have about three months until we return to our caves for hibernation.
- Fact and friction
As it happened, at the end, the parrot wouldn’t say a word.
- The sad ghost of postmodernism
It sticks around, but doesn't always work.
- Letters to the Portland Editor: March 13, 2009
We are two Maine natives, who attended the True/False Film Festival in Missouri, couldn't agree more with Christopher Gray's account of the festival and the festival experience.
- Story telling
The three artists whose work is currently on view at Whitney Art Works in Portland have a taste for narratives, real or invented.
- Less
Topics:
Museum And Gallery
, Buckminster Fuller, Jasper Johns, Ken Greenleaf, More
, Buckminster Fuller, Jasper Johns, Ken Greenleaf, Aaron Stephan, Aaron Stephan, Aaron Stephan, Whitney Art, Whitney Art Works, Whitney Art Works, Less
