LIMITLESS MOTHERWELL: AMP’D UP VIBE IN PROVINCETOWN

AMP Gallery, or Art Market Provincetown, describes itself as a “live exhibition space” specializing in “cutting edge art.” It rotates art every two or three weeks during the summer months to accommodate an array of mediums that includes drawing, painting, photography, sculpture, installation, new forms, writing, music and film. AMP Gallery’s platform focuses on art discourse empowering the discovery process and providing the opportunity for artists to share their creative energy with audiences. The acronym AMP suggests the electricity of the moment and the energy Debbie Nadolney infuses into the space.

Artist Jeannie Motherwell approached Nadolney about showing at AMP because she liked its vibe. Nadolney says that her space is similar in character to Sun Gallery — which operated in Provincetown from 1955 to 1959 — in its ability to tap into a sense of joie de vivre, idealism and creative excitement. Provincetown as a summer location also has a terrific spirit of welcome and a climate of acceptance. The scenery has limitless potential to inspire. Curator, director and proprietor Nadolney presents Motherwell’s “Limitless” from July 27 through August 8.

“Limitless” will include Motherwell ’s paintings and drawings. Shown in the same time bracket at AMP will be artworks by Martin R. Anderson under the title “Refractions and Redemptions,” a selection of work by Midge Battelle called “Un-Fettered,” Carol Greenwood’s “Hanging Green,” Zammy Migdal’s “Levitation” and works by Judith Trepp titled “Quiet Confrontation.” Working in various mediums and approaches, these artists demonstrate a shared interest in new frontiers of abstraction and the process of materials.

Motherwell, the daughter of abstract expressionist painter Robert Motherwell, relates to freedom and vastness. In the 2012 PAAM catalog for her father’s show, “Robert Motherwell Beside the Sea,” Jeannie’s sister Lise describes the sisters’ morning ritual of retelling the content of their dreams to their father before he went to bed. Robert Motherwell painted at night and these morning talks were his time with the children. His wife of this period, the painter Helen Frankenthaler, was a morning person. Jeannie remembers days of dabbling with paint or drawing in Frankenthaler’s studio while Helen worked as an artist.

At a recent visit with Jeannie Motherwell at her Joy Street studio in Somerville, Massachusetts, we talked of her life and the characteristics of her work and about the process of becoming one’s own person and really understanding and making use of the roots of one’s experience, which for her includes richness of pedigree and the legacy of exposure to abstract expressionism.

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