"Overlooked Objects and West Coast Landscapes," Tony Smith's exhibit of new paintings at Phillips Gallery, is an exquisite yet subtle example of what an artist can do when he has complete mastery of his medium.

The paintings are not indicative of a new direction for Smith, but the show is solid, with works that are at one moment intimate and the next vast.

"There's little stories about each piece," says Meri Ploetz, director of Phillips Gallery. A small painting of a Christmas light — one of his overlooked objects — is from his son Willie's room. "All the objects are in his home, things that surround him on a daily basis that he just decided to paint."

His landscapes, especially "Passing Storm, La Sal" (oil on canvas, 34 by 66 inches), are perfection, enticing viewers with color and craftsmanship.

And yet only recently has Smith ventured to paint from life.

"My training," he says, "wasn't to look at something and paint it. My way of working was to imagine it. If I was going to paint a landscape, I wanted to invent it in my mind and then paint it or invent it as I painted it."

Fortunately, there is still much of his invention in the landscapes, even though they were painted from life in southern Utah and Southern California while doing a workshop in an artist colony.

Other excellent paintings in the show are "The Moon" (oil on canvas, 24 by 30 inches) and "The Sun" (oil on canvas, 30 by 40 inches), both of which incorporate a ball, one of Smith's other overlooked objects.

In the downstairs Dibble Gallery, there are two more exhibits worth seeing. The first is "Letters From the Dead," featuring monotypes by Tom Pettin.

Pettin, for many years, had been curious about the festival, Los Dias de Muertos (The Days of the Dead), a Hispanic celebration.

The monotypes are so vibrant and whimsical it is a visual pleasure to stand in front of them and try to decipher their meaning.

And Pettin is very much the craftsman. He studied printmaking at the University of Utah with Bob Kleinschmidt. He also studied with Nathan Oliviera, taking a master class in painting at the Santa Fe Institute of Art.

Two impressive prints in the show are "Mail Order Tomatoes and One Pepper" and "The Shooting Gallery."

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The second exhibit downstairs displays the black-and-white photography of Tillman Crane and his Waterford School students.

Crane's "Brooms, Baron Woolen Mills" (toned silver gelatin print) is reason enough to see this exhibit. But there are also student pieces that are very good, like Madeline Bromley's "Bending Zell" (toned silver gelatin print).

All three exhibits run through June 9.


E-mail: gag@desnews.com

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