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“Goodnightiloveyouillseeyouinthemorning” — quite purposely without capitalization, punctuation or traditional letter spacing — is the name of Mark Phelan’s latest exhibition at the Co-Creative Center.
It’s also the title of one of several large scale works and perhaps the best in the show, but more on that in a bit.
Thirdly, it’s also what he has titled a poem, left on a table in the gallery and that is the place to begin. I offer up the first few lines as it can be thought of as an introduction to Phelan’s imaginative thought process, with myriad twists and turns that may not seem uncommon to those ready to look beyond the literal and dig a bit deeper, to feel a bit deeper.
“They are crystals on a string hanging from a dimly lit chandelier,
casting broken light on the dining room walls.
Or they’re steppingstones across a river guiding your path to warm, dry shelter.
They are cave paintings of the origins of the earth,
Or they’re rosaries counting millennia.
They’re breathless utterances,
Or primal screams reaching far back and further forward…”
Phelan had previously displayed “The Cartography of Impossible Spaces” in 2018 at the Co-Creative. That powerful show was certainly a cathartic release of sorts, as he attempted to resolve the unresolvable: the long mourning of his beloved father a decade earlier.
Again in the same space, in 2022, he put up “Thresholding.” Much of it was a homage to his maternal grandfather, who had passed away in 1997. Beyond his prints and paintings, he put the actual threshold — the door and frame from his grandfather’s workshop — in the gallery, along with his tools, toy cars, coffee mugs and oil cans. It was a nostalgic exercise free of treacle, a heartening journey back to boyhood, before one’s innocence fades.
There are 17 paintings in the current exhibition. Some, at first glance or upon reading the title, suggest religious themes. “Jacob’s Ladder” clearly references the Genesis story of the promise of Heaven, but Phelan’s version is quite different.
There is a chartreuse tree before a fiery sky of red and orange. Two-by-four rungs have been nailed to the trunk. After all, without tagalong little brothers and nosy girls, and a stockpile of Coke, Twinkies and comic books, what could be more heavenly than a treehouse fort to a couple of 11-year old boys?
“Thin Place” and “Liquid Sunshine,” both painted in a primarily Day-Glo palette, feature figures out in nature, in either a canoe or on foot. In both, something appears to hover in the sky a short distance away. A funnel-like shape opens below. Is it the Rapture? An alien abduction? When I questioned Phelan, he assured me it was neither but rather a sudden and isolated downpour in the distance, witnessed by him and his friends when they were boys.
“The Struggle” features a tug of war between two men. The rope does not align properly at all. And both of the men are surely Phelan, down to the brown jacket and bright red sneakers. The philosopher king must continually challenge himself. Or perhaps the struggle is between his past and his present, with future-self in hiding and waiting to prove them both the weaker when the time is right?
In “Come Hither,” there is the merest suggestion of a phallus, the thought magnified by the title. Below there is an abstracted form which may or may not be a female figure in recline. Once again, the poet within the painter is revealed with the the delicate application of these painted words: “remember the weight of the world / it’s the sound we used to buy on cassette and 45”
It continues “i summon you to appear, my love.”
“goodnightiloveyouillseeyouinthemorning” is an astonishing painting that initially troubled me.
Phelan’s wife Becky appears multiple times on the expansive canvas. She is coming down a flight of mobile stairs, her brilliant magenta ponytail tied up. And over there she is ghostly, translucent. Or here she is reduced to a line drawing. There is a house too far in the distance. There is an empty white chair, maybe where she used to sit. There are vases and glass jars that have become mystical vessels.
And there is text: “when you say it’s gonna happen now what exactly do you mean? when? what does now mean?” And “thoughts not intact.”
For a moment, I feared it was a painting of a marriage that had unraveled. A marriage of two people I quite like. Phelan set me straight. The title of the painting referred to a time when his wife had to leave each night to tend an ailing relative and would come back every morning.
And Becky would say “goodnightiloveyouillseeyouinthemorning” No spaces, no punctuation, no worries. It’s rather beautiful.
The show will be up at the Co-Creative Center, 137 Union St. until May 31.
New Bedford Creative awards 31 grants
On the morning of Thursday, April 3, there was a tremendous downpour just as a press conference was about to be given in the downtown New Bedford Free Public Library. Needless to say, the rain shied no one away and the Event Room was packed in anticipation of New Bedford Creative’s public announcement of which projects would be receiving grants.
A total of 31 grants (including nine for individual artists) were awarded funding through the Art is Everywhere! and Wicked Cool Places programs. After an introduction by Tony Sapienza, president of the New Bedford Economic Development Council, and brief and supportive remarks by Mayor Jon Mitchell and City Council President Shane Burgo, the recipients were enthusiastically and proudly announced.
Wicked Cool Places grants, which support projects that enliven public spaces, celebrate cultural diversity and strengthen neighborhood connections were awarded to 22 applicants.
Nine of the 31 grants were administered through Art is Everywhere!, which works to integrate the arts in “everyday spaces” to foster neighborhood vitality and enhance equity, celebrate diversity and promote open access to the arts
You’ll find the projects listed here.
Don Wilkinson has been writing art reviews, artist profiles and cultural commentary on the South Coast for over a decade. He has been published in local newspapers and regional art magazines. He is a graduate of the Swain School of Design and the CVPA at UMass Dartmouth. Email him at dwilkinson@newbedfordlight.org
