In Chicago, Carl Baratta‘s latest solo show Light Up and Be Wonderful is now on view at Western Exhibitions until November 15. Carl Baratta drops the viewer into open-ended narratives, primarily landscapes, where winds swirl menacingly, plant tendrils rise up from subterranean depths, rivers bend violently and mutant figures do battle or find themselves in desperate isolation. In addition to Baratta’s paint and color handling, he utilizes glam rock looks from the Seventies and rubber suits from Japanese monster movies to undercut the heaviness. In regard to his paintings Baratta states: “My open-ended narratives never seem to settle down. When each work is looked at in its entirety, it adds up to a simple conclusion: something is wrong. That’s the feeling I want to start with. The clues that are given won’t yield a solution; they are too busy bouncing off each other and only show how far-reaching the wrongness is. As the scene unfolds, this unnerving feeling ensures that each element and its constituent parts add up to a sense of energetic wonder. I depict imaginative worlds in moments of constant transition, creating a tension between static images and dynamic narrative. If things do not become fixed, they cannot be dismissed or forgotten.”

Carl Baratta’s recent shows have included a solo at Vox Populi in Philadelphia and group shows at the Carl Berg Gallery in Los Angeles, Lump Gallery in North Carolina and Green Lantern in Chicago. Baratta received his MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2005 and currently lives and works in Chicago.