By:  Ian Swanson

“Erratic Tendencies”, curated by Cristin Richard (under the House of Raw moniker), is the first in a proposed series of exhibitions at Detroit’s Burton Theatre. Featuring the work of artists Wendy Ross and Frank Synowicz, this show stands as a strong statement on what are certain to be a number of excellent exhibitions in the future. Webster’s dictionary defines erratic as “having no fixed course” or as “deviating from what is ordinary or standard”. While both Ross and Synowicz seem to have followed a “fixed course” in the rules guiding the creation of this work, there is a decidely present deviation from the ordinary. Although with a significant nod to the history of abstract painting, illustration, fiber art, and fashion.

The flier

Ross limits herself to a minimum of materials with results that are refreshing and often surprising. Working with predominately canvas, wax, and thread she creates elaborate, moody, and beautiful sculptures and “drawings”. Her “Boat Coat” series, a set of six small stiched compositions on canvas, are an interesting and novel approach to drawing. They are reminiscent of Tracy Emin’s stitched drawings in her recent show “Only God Knows I’m Good”, though these are of a decidely less bombastic nature. While her choice of materials seem to arise from a feminine or domestic place, she contrasts such a simple read through sheer physicality and weight in her large wall sculptures. “Best Friend Force Fest”, a large slumped form with a set of organic canvas protusions extending from it’s center, recalls a deflated life raft populated with weary survivors. The reference to water and survival in these suspended forms and their titles lends the work an air of surrender and defeat. The diminuitive size of two of Ross’ other works, both small domestic objects (a chair, an ornately framed mirror) held still in blocks of cast wax, enforces this mood. In contrast to these are “George Washington Hair Helmet” and “My Favorite Girl Scout”. The hair helmet is a reconstructed wig of the sort associated with Judges. However, by emptying the wig of it’s contents (a human being and symbol of authority) the wigs historical power is stripped away, usurped by what many may consider the “women’s work” of garment making. “Girl Scout” borrows the form of an Ojo de Dios (or Eye of God), and keeps watch over the rest of the works from the top of the stairs. There is a certain comfort in the summer camp craft of this work, though Ross’ choice to wrap it with vinyl oxygen tubing gives it an uneasy nature. How can the Eye of God watch over us if we can see right through it?

The paintings of Frank Synowicz strike a similar balance between chaos and order. Created through an obsessive webbing of hatched brush strokes with meticulous attention to detail, they feel like what one might expect to see if you asked an engineer at NASA to interpret abstract expressionism…or perhaps Kandinksy in the age of Adderal. The monotone color in the paintings gives them a harmony with Ross’ sculpture that may otherwise not be present. While they are significantly more illustrative and traditionally conceived than Ross’ two dimensional work, the attention to craft and detail bonds the two. The hyperactive energy present in Synowicz’s small canvases is an interesting counterpoint to the solemnity of Ross. Just when you feel like you could be swept up and lulled away in her flowing sculptures, the static vibration of his paintings jars you back to the present time and place. It’s like the paranoiac and the prophet. Erratic, indeed.