JOHN BUNKER: NEW DRAWINGS AND PAINTINGS
An Art Exhibition at St. John’s Cathedral
NOW extended through Palm Sunday, April 10, 2022
Times of enforced withdrawal from the ordinary, times of pandemic and plague, have often produced great works of art. Such times can be times “of tears and sorrows; courage and endurance” as Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway says. They can also be times of creative introspection and insight.
This exhibition JOHN BUNKER: NEW DRAWINGS AND PAINTINGS is a selection of 34 drawings from the 150 drawings of THE COVID SUITE by Jacksonville’s premier visual artist, John Bunker created during the pandemic.
These drawings have artistic depth and masterful facility in the less attention-demanding medium of drawing. In them, Bunker explores many themes familiar from his earlier work. There is a reflective intensity to these drawings, done on papers infused with color, and marked with intimate, personal strokes.
They are tender hymns to organic forms. They smolder, rather than blaze with the fire of Bunker’s imagination. They can provoke in the viewer, “thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears”, as William Wordsworth famously wrote. They are “intimations.”
These drawings can make their viewers imagine Bunker, the consummate artist, bent over his drawing board, pouring out the experience of his years as an artist increasingly spiritually awake. Conceived in the COVID pandemic, they transcend its narrow bounds with expansive joy and deep appreciation of life.
Also in the exhibition will be paintings related to the drawings in a variety of styles and sizes with a wide price range. And another special feature of the exhibition will be specially selected quotations from literary sources that set off this recent work of Bunker.
The exhibition is open from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Sundays. Visitors are welcome from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on weekdays. Visitors need to announce themselves to gain entry at the Church St. entrance. Or visitors may make a special appointment by calling (904) 356-5507.
Tags: Cathedral Art Exhibitions / News