Michele Liebler

Ms. Liebler practices a painterly representation that honors historical traditions while it focuses on the objects and obsessions marking the creative life of a contemporary woman. Her subject matter revolves around mirrored images, pictures-within-pictures and, most incisively, her own straight forward image glimpsed in an uncompromising glass.

William Zimmer, writing in The New York Times, characterized her work by remarking that "looking outward is something of a leitmotif." He described her tense, frontal Self-Portrait in the Studio as "compelling." Eileen Watkins, writing in Star Ledger, called Liebler a "soulful" painter who "has a particular gift for giving inanimate objects personalities."

Nothing is neutralized or treated decoratively. Shoes on the floor, recalling Van Gogh’s clogs, transcend the particular, becoming emblems of a faceted personality requiring different guises. Views of the body parts–the partial figure a form of abstraction emphasizing the modern compulsion to invent new images of man–culminate in references to the art historical influences that engage Liebler’s attention. Fragments of anatomy become stand-ins for a fragmented culture that seeks its center in the works of the masters.

See also: artincontext.org