Boston artist Candace Jans exhibits at Wheaton
October 5, 2000
Wheaton[base ']s Watson Gallery continues the 2000-2001 season with a one-woman exhibition of drawings and paintings by Boston realist painter and Wheaton alumna Candace Jans. The exhibition runs from October 12 through November 10, 2000. Curated by Ann Murray, Wheaton professor of art and director of the Watson Gallery, the exhibition will travel to New York[base ']s Fischbach Gallery after opening at Wheaton. Jans will give an artist[base ']s lecture at 7 p.m. on October 12 in the Watson Gallery, to be followed by a reception at 8 p.m.
An illustrated catalogue, funded by Wheaton and by the Fischbach Gallery, accompanies the exhibition, with an essay by Murray. ''A distinctly Italiante flavor permeates Candace Jans[base '] paintings of the last decade, regardless of whether they were done in Italy, where she has spent nearly every summer, or in Boston, where she resides for most of the year,'' Murray writes. ''The strength of her paintings lies in their ability to evoke rather than to describe. She likes to paint at twilight[~]the mysterious hour between night and day characterized by a particular quality of light that she conveys through the luminescence of saturates tones layered with glazes.''
Jans[base '] agrees with Murray[base ']s vivid description. ''Ideally, I seek to evoke a sense of mystery from the commonest of objects,'' Jans says. ''In isolating objects, interiors, or figures in interior settings, I feel I can detach myself from the ordinary world, and enter a controlled environment of my own making in which I can arrange forms or figures into uneasy relationships with one another.''
Jans graduated from Wheaton in 1974 with a major in art history. After studying art in Rome as an undergraduate, she returned to Italy and earned a master[base ']s degree at in Florence. In 1979 she earned an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and has been represented by the Fischbach Gallery in New York since 1981. Her paintings are in numerous private and corporate collections in New England and the New York metropolitan area. One painting in the show, a gift from the artist in 1992, is from the permanent art collection at Wheaton.
The Watson Gallery is located in Wheaton[base ']s Watson Fine Arts Center. Gallery hours are Monday through Saturday from 12:30 p.m. to 4: 30 p.m., and it is open to the public without charge. For further information about Candace Jan[base ']s exhibition at Wheaton College, please call 508-286-3578 or 508-286-3570. For directions to Wheaton College, log onto www.wheatoncollege.edu/about/directions.