Meridith Mc Neal “The View from Here”

FiveMyles

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Eleanor Clark, in Rome and a Villa (Doubleday, 1952), uses the term windowphilia to describe the enchanting quality windows have in the design of a villa. My work included in The View from Here is from a body of work that is indeed my own bit of windowphilia; large paintings—part window, part interior—that reference the historical and physical attributes of the places I have visited, as well as the generations that have passed through them and my own presence as a contemporary visitor.

These Windowphilia paintings request two kinds of action from the observer. Clearly beckoning, an invitation to peer through a series of life-sized windows that look out onto beguiling landscapes but also asking the viewer to stop, wait, and look more closely at what lies inside. In addition to their respective exterior landscapes, each window painting alludes to a rich interior, sometimes overtly but more often with just the hint of what lies beyond the frame.

Open, shut, ajar; curtained or naked; opaquely reflective or straightforwardly transparent—these windows all have their own ways of inviting the viewer in. And at the same time, each one begs you to wait just a moment.

Meridith McNeal is a Brooklyn-based artist, educator, curator, arts administrator and hula hooper. Meridith has been a Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome several times. Her work has been exhibited internationally and nationally and is represented by Figureworks Gallery in Brooklyn.