Linda Colsh: Men Gallery

Because the anonymous people I choose to portray are like blank pages, I search for his narrative from small visual hints and physical clues to flesh out a character and fill in blanks: a special gait or posture; a walking stick, tool or bag; a wrinkled face and maybe stooped shoulders that are more than signs of age. A man might be patiently waiting for someone, watching the bustle of the street or telling a tale to a friend. These traits are the evidence of experience and a life fully lived. What seems ordinary and unremarkable to those hurrying along busy sidewalks or down the big city boulevards or alleyways, to me is deserving a second thought and maybe more.

Ashes, Ashes
2021
H48 x W24 inches

Made in the year of the 700^th anniversary of Dante’s death, Ashes, Ashes includes circle imagery to recall Dante’s journey through the circles of Hell. Superimposed numbers refer to the levels & sins described by Dante. Traveling the circles is like walking a labyrinth that, like Dante’s Inferno, ventures deeper and deeper into Hell.

A Simpler Place In Time
2020
H48 x W12 inches

Thinking about the isolation where most artists create, alone in their studios, I remember an artist who I photographed while he sat quietly drawing Rome’s Turtle Fountain amidst the din of traffic and chattering passersby. To represent summer in a four season series, I imagined him sketching beside my creek, the noise of the city replaced by the quiet sounds of the stream and forest.

Pretend Pasha
2013
58 x 58 inches

He smiles to himself as he makes his way along the pavement in front of the mosque near Istanbul’s Golden Horn. Pigeons scatter as he saunters across the square. He has a secret. I can only imagine the notion that he finds so privately entertaining.