A life in art

Leon Hovsepian's ageless paintings and drawings

by Leon Nigrosh

LEON HOVSEPIAN: THE ARTIST AND HIS WORCESTER CONNECTION
at the ARTSWorcester Gallery at the Aurora, 660 Main Street, through February 28.

If you had been making art for as long as Leon Hovsepian has, you would have had plenty of time to try different techniques, different mediums, and different styles. His important retrospective, currently on display on two floors of the ARTSWorcester Gallery at the Aurora, contains more than 60 drawings and paintings that only hint at the vast array of artworks he has produced during the past 70 years.

This mild-mannered life-long resident of Worcester continues to explore new mediums as they come on the market (alkyd paints, for example), as well as delve into arcane painting methods, such as egg-oil emulsions. Never content with keeping his experiments to himself, Hovsepian taught at the Worcester Art Museum for 40 years. Generations of area artists owe their careers in part to his inquisitive mind and generous soul.

Even in the arrangement of this exhibition, the teacher comes through. For example, not only does he display his large egg tempera painting The Wedding, but he also shows how he got there by including four preliminary and detail drawings used to develop the final work. His silverpoint on toned paper Drawing of Landscape for The Wedding, from Belmont Hill to Lake Quinsigamond is so finely executed that it could stand alone on its own merits. The preparatory drawing of the vaulted groin arches used as the church ceiling in the painting shows the attention to detail that he brings to all of his art. And the grace of his bride translates easily from drawing to final canvas.

A spiritual man with deeply ingrained beliefs in moral concepts and family values, Hovsepian's works are always permeated with his personal take on a particular theme, whether it is a simple landscape, a mundane group activity, or a more mystical expression. Five pastels from his Grand Canyon series show several famous rock formations and mesas, but instead of producing a mere travelogue, he manages to create a sense of energy and timelessness in these unpretentious works -- as if these odd outcroppings are a sign of some higher force. The inspiration for his large, post-impressionist style oil on canvas Nest Hunt came from an incident when his granddaughter found a fallen bird and other family members attempted to find the nest and return the fledgling. And his dynamic color field, hard-edged, surrealist acrylic on canvas Kiss of Peace, Mystic Series at first appears to be a joyous scene of priests embracing. But it soon takes on a more ominous aspect when the cathedral wall becomes a bull's eye.

A number of the works in this show go beyond their artistic accomplishment because they contain a certain local historical value. His 4 by 6-foot oil, Great Brook Valley Before, brings back an earlier time when that bucolic dale provided a family of horseback riders a pleasant canter - with Hovsepian's own new house (which he designed himself) in the distant background. Today, of course, the meadow is paved over and planted with subsidized housing. Two painted versions of the Tumble Bug concession at the long-defunct White City Amusement Park, along with his Upper Burncoat Street and the watercolor Bell Hill, Overlooking Shrewsbury Street, are potent reminders of Worcester's earlier and less complicated days.

Many of Hovsepian's paintings contain veiled biblical references. In fact, his grandmother taught him to read as a child by having him quote from both the Old and New Testaments -- not necessarily for religious purposes, they were just handy books. He acquired his drawing skills simultaneously, because she made him illustrate each passage to be sure he understood what he had read. One more obvious work with religious overtones is his 3 by 4-foot egg-oil emulsion painting, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, that features the still-living trio engulfed in a many-fingered glowing inferno.

Ever sensitive to the times, Hovsepian often expresses his feelings through his art, as with his early egg tempera The Fifth Column. It is a play on words, with the fifth Acropolis caryatid revealed as a partisan preparing to aid the parachuting troops (which are oddly reminiscent of green plastic toy soldiers). A more recent mixed media work, with portions painted right from the tube, shows Three Mile Island merrily steaming away.

This exhibition is also a sort of homecoming for Hovsepian. Back in the late `40s, he was commissioned to paint two large murals for the posh Aurora Hotel. When the decrepit building was threatened with demolition in 1980, the murals were removed and left to decay in a Cape Cod attic until their recent "re-discovery." Although they are in very poor condition, five 3-foot wide sections of the main restaurant mural are once again on a wall at the Aurora. Even though someone attempted to clean the lower left portion of one section, we can only imagine the visual impact the mythic creatures, dancing figures, and Worcester landmarks had on the fashionable patrons of those earlier times. Fortunately, Hovsepian still owns the original color sketches for the complete work and has mounted them alongside the canvas. And with a little effort, we can translate these scale drawings to the actual work and discern the import of the whole mural by visualizing the entire image stretched along the full length of the gallery.

It is indeed rare to have the opportunity to see so many fine examples of work produced by a still-living artist. Although Hovsepian purposely leaves his paintings undated, we can recognize the changes he went through and the maturity he gained over the years as he experimented with various art mediums and styles -- which he continues to do to this day. His artworks have always been, and continue to be, open, easily accessible, and engaging -- just like the artist himself.

ARTSWorcester Gallery at the Aurora is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Call 508-755-5142.