R A I N E B E D S O L Er e c e p t i o n m a y 2 n d 6 – 9 p m

RAINE BEDSOLE Recent Work

Evocative, haunting, and serene, Raine Bedsole’s assemblages,paintings, and sculptures whisper in the timeless language of mythologyand symbolism. With their imagery of boats, oars, and the human figure,her newest works are based in part on Homer’s epic, The Odyssey, the storyof a hero’s long voyage home after the Trojan War. Bedsole sees this clas-sic text as a metaphor for New Orleanians’ journey back to normalcy in theaftermath of Hurricane Katrina. “I think it is a universal longing to return towherever home is,” she remarks. “After Katrina, it was as if we were blownto the seven winds, and ever since then we’ve been trying, like Odysseussearching for the way back to Ithaca, to find our own ways back home.”

A graduate of Auburn University and the San Francisco Art Institute,Bedsole paints and sculpts in her studio in the French Quarter. She hasbeen active in the New Orleans art scene since the early 1990s. Her workhas been exhibited and collected throughout North America, Europe,Asia, and the Middle East. Honored with a grant from the Joan MitchellFoundation, she was also a prize-winner in the 2001 Florence Biennale.

The nautical imagery that informs the artist’s work harkens to the Egyptianbarques that carried pharoahs into the afterlife; the poignancy andromance of Norse longboats and Native American canoes; and the sym-bolism of the life raft, rescuing us from harm, delivering us to safety. Thenotches and grooves in Bedsole’s oar sculptures weave mysterious narra-tives about the hands that rowed them—their individual histories mixingwith the artist’s experience in intricate layers of paint, texture, fabric, foundpaper, and poetry. Other sculptures incorporate richly patinaed copper—alluding to treasures raised from ancient shipwrecks—and gold leaf, glint-ing like the play of sunlight on waves. The vessels imply water but float onair, inviting the viewer to fill the space around them with the currents andundercurrents of their own lives. Visually and metaphorically elegant, theyare vehicles for inner navigation, challenging the mind even as they soothethe soul.

May 2nd – June 30th, 2009

Reception Saturday May 2nd 6 – 9 pm

Front Cover: Oars, sizes variable, mixed media

Muse (“Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story...” Homer)7 3/4" x 2 1/2", 2009

Gulf24" x 80", plaster, copper, acrylic paint, 2009

Crying Tree, 44" x 83"ink watercolor, found papers, on okawara paper

Rhyming Tree, 42" x 80"Italian rimario text, ink, on okawara paper

518 julia street, new orleans, la 70130

504.525.0518 www.gallerybienvenu.com

Opposite Banks97" x 15" x 8", charred branches, powder,pigment, wire, steel rod structure, 2009

ARTWORK © RAINE BEDSOLE 2009CATALOG © GALLERY BIENVENU 2009