The paintings in "Every Which Way," Jessica Scriver's current solo exhibition at Studio Place Arts in Barre, suggest spinning out of place. The titles are clues: "I Think I've Been Here Before," "I Thought I Knew," "Is This a Rabbit Hole?" Viewers navigate a blank space where their GPS has no signal, lost somewhere between the clouds and the map.
Scriver's larger paintings, in the broader part of the third-floor gallery, hew to a sunny blue or yellow palette. Their subjects can be misleading. At first glance, one might see skyscapes and swarms of starlings in the 18-by-24-inch "Looking for a Place to Land" — but the starlings are arrows, and the skies contain grids. The painting positions the viewer as a bird navigating through canyons of mirrored buildings. There's a fantastic sense of confused distance: Large and tiny arrows swirl, pointing in every direction; the ground appears stable in some places, obscured by yellow fog in others.
Aside from the paintings' enigmatic narratives, Scriver is skilled with surface treatments. The works are sanded, scraped and layered. She takes direction from the material, playing with it, yet remains in control. It's surprising to learn this is acrylic paint, as it achieves oil-like layering effects and the soft solidity of plaster.
Accordingly, viewers will notice different things about Scriver's work depending on their proximity. From a distance, the paintings present great depth and illusion; a closer look reveals more about surface and material.
Scriver's smaller paintings in the narrow part of the hallway contrast with her swirling skyscapes. In 8-by-10-inch pieces titled like tax forms — for example, "Schedule A" and "Schedule B" — she overlays blocky rectangles to build up dense, geometric compositions. Areas of deep, saturated blue, as if pulled from an old-fashioned stamp pad, draw the eye. While a few smaller experiments like these expand the artist's overall vision, the focus of the show is her luminous, airy works.
Scriver's dynamic compositions wonderfully evoke both dread and excitement in torrents of unknowable data. They are beautiful and enticing but risky, reminiscent of Julie Mehretu's giant, explosive murals. Viewers will want to look at all the details but won't be able to make sense of them. This could be seen as a metaphor for contemporary life: We are caught up in arrows and vectors, lost in murmurations, feeling ungrounded and sometimes plummeting.
Regardless of Scriver's intentions, her paintings are not didactic. She allows viewers to find their own way. We can drill down or just fly through.