VISUAL ARTS REVIEW: Pleasant Journeys and Good Eats Along the Way: A Retrospective Exhibition of Paintings by John Baeder

Pleasant Journeys and Good Eats Along the Way: A Retrospective Exhibition of Paintings by John Baeder

On view through April 27

$5-$9

Gibbes Museum of Art

135 Meeting St.

(843) 722-2706www.gibbesmuseum.org

I imagine John Baeder as a large man. If he is, no disrespect, but he’s gotten what’s been coming to him. Nearly four decades have passed since his interest in roadside diners has inspired him to frequent and subsequently paint thousands of America’s classic, sometimes crumbling, always caloric, culinary institutions.

As seen in this new exhibition at the Gibbes Museum of Art, Baeder has been driving around this country for years, pulling over in Oklahoma, slowing down outside New York City, catching the last burger before closing up past the Redwood Forest. His is an invested interest we should appreciate given current fuel prices and the lack of time that often justifies our excuses for staying home.

But America was founded by explorers and adventurers, men and women with ambitious appetites whose personal philosophies generated a cultural revolution and helped to forge a country intent on filling its grumbling tummies. Consequently, centuries later and with the advent of automobiles and highways, these same devices, and vices, held true as Americans steamrolled the rural expanses of this vast land and laid the concrete that would ultimately satisfy our need for roadside nourishment by opening the doors to thousands of diners.

And Baeder seems to have visited them all. His realist paintings reveal the stains, burnt-out-butts and fissures that testify for a particular authenticity. As revealing as it is to look into the face of an old man, Baeder’s glimpses of diners represent the longevity, perseverance, and stubbornness that often define the American condition. Some of these places have lived long lives, others have not; almost all, though, seem to have lived through hardship, and that is a quality with which many Americans can identify.

Considered in these terms, diners, with their dramatic rise and now steady decline, have grown beyond the stereotypical trophies of American folklore into the more substantial and penetrating role of cultural ambassadors. Diners reflect the dreams and challenges, the motivation and optimism inherent in many Americans. They also express our homogenous nature, the need to recognize a safe place with comfortable settings and familiar food. By aptly capturing these characteristics, John Baeder shows himself to be as important a road-trip artist as his brethren Edward Hopper and Robert Frank.

I tried to count all of Baeder’s watercolors and oils hanging on the wall at the Gibbes. But I grew dizzy, as revolving around so many diners will do. I walked away with the number 39. That’s more than a painting per year for the prolific and capable artist’s career. But as impressive and dedicated as he is, Baeder operates like a telescope. Sure, it’s interesting to look at individual stars, to study their contours and specific charms, but before long you become captivated by empty darkness of space.

As my mind wandered, I remembered some of my own road trips. I remembered a diner in Oregon where a burly biker sucked down a chocolate milkshake while nursing a massive black eye. I remembered Mississippi, catching a teenager rifle through a woman’s purse in the restroom. I remember a girl’s dress caught in the door of her family’s station wagon. All these memories arrived from Baeder’s paintings, or rather from looking and then not looking at them.

Therein lies Baeder’s power and accomplishment. His work is part of the American instinct, its landscape; it triggers memories and sentiment, nostalgia for things gone and appreciation for places seen; it accumulates as slowly as a snowy morning and then rises with all the heat of a scorching afternoon. Like so much of America, Baeder’s work is two things at once. By representing our disparity Baeder represents our union, and through art, greasy burgers, and miles of highway, he magnifies the magic of the human heart.

Before he was a professional painter, Baeder was an ad man. His ability to deliver the appealing qualities of diners finds most resonance when he is flexing his nostalgic muscles. Alongside one painting a quote reads, “The journey took me. I didn’t take it. The diners found me. I didn’t find them.” With such wanderlust and destiny tucked behind his belt it’s no wonder Baeder has found himself hemmed into the fabric of American life.

Check out the CSO String Quartet’s homage to Baeder Sun. March 30 at 2:30 p.m. at the Gibbes Museum. For more, go to www.gibbesmuseum.com.