Idle Hands are the Devil's Play Things

I'm really proud to have a small piece in Crystal's catalog for her upcoming show "Idle Hands are the Devil's Play Things." This exhibition at Art for All (AFA) in Macao collects many of her paintings from her time in New York.

Idle Hands

What do you do with your hands. That’s the perennial question we learn before every school portrait and hastily cast school play. You can stick them in your pockets, hold them behind you or try let them dangle by your side. Whatever the choice, it all feels desperately unnatural, too self conscious and self aware. For the mischievous amongst us, their hands seem to always have an intent. In every moment, they find a new activity, from doodling to fidgeting and flirting.

Crystal moves like that, with a purpose all her own, her hands steady with some intent others of us can only mime. In “idle hands are the devil’s play things” she reaches out to lead us to places we don’t know. The paintings are made of things we should know, things like faces and landscapes, scenes that we think we may know. But she doesn’t pause to introduce them, she just takes us there, to memories and scenes like emotions spread out and felt more than understood.

And like a child at school we can find ourselves worrying what we are to make of it all. What do we have to stand up and say about it all? What should we do with our hands? But before these obscured visions we can gain a bit of comfort that we are in good hands, idle hands that are ready to paint, to play and take the lead.

Crystal’s painting is built of gestures and desires. You can see the traces of this in her brushwork. They are also built of memories and events that more momentum and tone than narrative. You know that something has happened, there are details and clues but you can’t quite make out what they confirm. I guess memories can be like this; they haunt more than they describe. They motivate more than they explain.