Park Row Gallery News

Painting the Invisible: Patterns in Nature, a solo exhibition of new work by Raffaele D’Onofrio will be on view at Park Row Gallery in Chatham, NY, from October 22nd through November 29th 2008. There will be a cocktail reception with the artist on Saturday, October 25th from 4-6pm, and the public is cordially invited to attend.

Painting the Invisible: Patterns in Nature, is an intriguing exhibition featuring nearly twenty oil and vinyl paintings on canvas and works on paper. D’Onofrio creates visionary paintings that are a synthesis of the empirical and the metaphysical, and bring to life the poetic mystery of Nature as exemplified in William Blake’s famous stanza from Auguries of Innocence: To see a world in a grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour….

It is this poetic elegance that the artist observes, intuits and expresses in layers of color and patterned markings that fluoresce with a shimming light, like the dance of wind through a stand of trembling aspen. As Mr. D’Onofrio states, “My sense of the spiritual in art comes out of my experience of nature. The melting solidity of light catching and releasing itself … or the feeling of being surrounded by energy systems ordering and reordering themselves in the overlapping necessities of their existence, like loops within loops.” This penetrating engagement with the natural world, which borders on prayer or reverie, is evident in these vibrant paintings, and even in the titles such as “River Walking,” “Enchanted Forest,” “The Song of the Trees is the Song of the Earth,” and “Tree Walking (Maine).”

Eleanor Heartney, a contributing editor of Art in America, has said, “In the hands of Raffaele D’Onofrio, nature regains its sense of mystery and primal power. His works explore not the surface of nature, but it’s underlying sense of movement and pattern.” And the prominent art historian and art critic Irving Sandler has concisely observed, “Raffaele D’Onofrio’s paintings conjure up lyrical visions of Nature and evoke its vitality and magic. Commingling what is seen and what is imagined, they emulate nature’s inexhaustible complexity.”

Mr. D’Onofrio received a scholarship to The New College at Hofstra University and completed his degree at Franconia College, majoring in Art and Biology with a minor in Philosophy. He continued studying painting at The New School in NYC until refining his unique vocabulary, which integrates his profound interests in music, biology, physics, philosophy and poetry. Raffaele D’Onofrio exhibits his work nationally and internationally, including recent exhibitions at The Museo de Arte Moderno in Bogota, Columbia, the Cantor Fitgerald Gallery at Haverford College, The Andrews Gallery in Williamsburg, VA, and The Painting Center in New York City.