Jon Gilbert Fox: Red, White and Blue at AVA Gallery

Artist talk on July 15

Jon Gilbert Fox is exploring patriotism and more. His exhibition, “Compositions. In Red. White. Blue” at AVA Gallery and Art Center in Lebanon NH fills the Clifford B. West Gallery with colorful and literate work.

The timing of this exhibition to coincide with the July 4th holiday means that several of the photographs include the American flag, or holiday bunting, or some variation thereof. (See “Porch of July” below.) In his artist statement, Fox sees this exhibition as his attempt to “capture the flag” for a new, more inclusive view. Angered and anguished by what he regards as the recent appropriation of the flag by only one political party, Fox stated “It is time for that game of “Keep Away” to come to an end . . . The Red White and Blue I’ve come to know has no creed, credo, or dogma attached. It is simply freedom to see.”

Fox has been attracted to the tri-color combination in other, non-flag related contexts. The color-saturated “Cordon Bleu,”(top) for example, has no reference to the traditional Old Glory; rather, it was shot while Fox was a guest at a National Book Award gala at the tony Cipriani’s in New York City. (Perhaps Cipriani’s— a now fourth generation-owned fleet of upscale restaurants that began with Harry’s Bar in Venice, Italy in 1931— is “old glory”of an entirely different kind.) The photo is an outside-looking-in experience, the viewer restrained on the opposite side of the cordon from those very important shoes. In “Knee Sox,” (below) denim and and a striped iconic popcorn box supply the red, white and blue, the photo anchored by the near-perfect pale orbs of a child’s knobby knees.

My personal favorite in this show is a photo (below) that Fox used to call “Blue Window,” rechristened “Adam, Eve and the Serpent Fifty Years Out of Eden.” You can see why its new name suits it. In a gallery stroll-through, Fox pointed out that the figure on the right has a scar where perhaps a rib had been removed?

AVA Gallery is now open for in-person visits. This exhibition will remain on view through July 23. Jon Gilbert Fox will be giving an artist talk, The Camera as Appendage, at AVA Gallery on Thursday, July 15, 2021 from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. Limited attendance and live Zoom. Check AVA’s website for further information.

Besides mounting one-man and group shows throughout the U.S., Fox’s photographs have been published in such diverse venues as U.S. News Report, the New York Times, House and Garden, Playboy, Vogue, Der Stern, Scholastic Magazine, Mandate, Vermont Life Magazine, Scientific American, Rolling Stone, Der Spiegel, Focus Magazine, the Washington Post, Conde Nast Traveler, as well as many other U.S. and world-wide publications. His celebrity photographs include those of dancer Mikhaïl Baryshnikov. Click here and scroll for a fuller bio. (Photos and artist statement courtesy of Jon Gilbert Fox)

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And in case you are wondering . . . Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.