Reviewed: Kristine Moran, Sharon Switzer, Robyn McCallum

Today, the National Post published three of my brief reviews of shows currently on in the Distillery district: Kristine Moran @ Clark & Faria, Sharon Switzer @ Jane Corkin and Robyn McCallum @ Pikto. Here's an excerpt:

In her first Toronto solo show in four years, locally trained, New York-based painter Kristine Moran offers eight enjoyable paintings -- all so enjoyable, in fact, that the show has already sold out. Fortunately, they're still available for viewing. Moran's paintings are quietly dynamic -- though she has skill in balancing light and dark, line and form, curved and straight, flat and goopy, she doesn't shout it rudely in your face. Rather, she lets you discover it yourself through an intelligent visual conversation. Her wide-brush strokes, which would seem to span six inches or more in compressed sweeps, are particularly fun. Also interesting is the way that Moran's forms alternately evoke interior architecture, like lobby ceilings and kitchen floors, and exterior landscapes, such as rivers and fields glimpsed through the foggy window of a speeding train. This kind of shifting, prismatic effect adds conceptual heft to Moran's fashionable, sophisticated initial appearances -- important because, without this anchor, this kind of work could easily fall into vapid prettiness. To Jan. 10.

Image of Kristine Moran's Hidden in the Shore Maze from Clark & Faria