Paul Gruhler—Harmonics: 60 years of Life in Art, The Chelsea Series 1963–1978
Highland Center for the Arts • Greensboro, VT • highlandartsvt.org • July 16–August 29, 2021
Color vibration appears to levitate the hard-edge geometry in the paintings and collages of Vermont artist Paul Gruhler. For over 60 years, Gruhler has been exploring endless compositional variations achievable within a powerfully focused set of three simple shapes, the square, the rectangle, and the line, all of varying sizes, sometimes tilted on their axis, held in a sort of suspended animation by color juxtapositions that sing when they abut. Blues, reds, and purples predominate. The tonal range is middle to dark. These paintings do not shout for attention. They hum.
At 7:00 a.m. every morning, Gruhler is in his Craftsbury studio quietly looking out at the ever-changing light on nearby Belvedere Mountain. He is meditating, preparing to start the day’s work which might include painting with acrylics on linen or assembling geometric cut paper forms into abstract collages. His methodology is intuitive rather than formulaic. Still active at the age of 80, this prolific artist has been tenacious in his dogged pursuit of the transcendent experience in art. Elements of his approach are reflected in color saturated works by Mark Rothko, or the analytic limited color geometry of the German abstractionist Josef Albers, yet Gruhler has developed a visual language all his own.
It is remarkable, given the consistency and mesmerizing quality of Gruhler’s richly colored jewel-like surfaces, that he is not better known outside a close-knit group of friends and admirers. Paul Gruhler—Harmonics: 60 years of Life in Art, The Chelsea Series 1963–1978 opening at the Highland Center for the Arts in July presents an opportunity to become familiar with his early work. Three additional satellite exhibitions, opening in September at The Vermont Supreme Court Gallery, The Vermont Arts Council: Spotlight Gallery, and The Gallery at Central Vermont Medical Center, cover different phases of Gruhler’s oeuvre. Extending until the end of 2021, they provide a comprehensive view of Gruhler’s career. A limited-edition book of the same title, Harmonics: 60 Years of Life in Art, accompanies the exhibition. Beautifully designed by Linda Mirabile, it includes a perceptive essay by Carolyn Bauer and provides a roadmap to perceiving this impressive body-of-work.
—Cynthia Close