Burchfield Penney Art Center
March 7 — May 23, 2010
“I like to think of myself—as an artist—as being in a nondescript swamp, alone, up to my knees in mire, painting the vital beauty I see there, in my own way, not caring a damn about tradition, or anyone’s opinion.”
—Charles Burchfield, Gardenville, February 8, 1938
The title of the exhibition, Heat Waves in a Swamp, came early, and it came from the title of a Burchfield watercolor. He loved swamps and bogs and marshes. He loved all of nature and was torn as a young man between being an artist and being a nature writer. He liked nothing more than to paint while literally standing in a swamp. Liked the mosquitoes and the rain and the decay of vegetation. I felt early on that this title had a metaphorical sweep that captured Burchfield’s enthusiasms at their deepest and best. By Robert Gober from Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield exhibition catalog
Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State College 1300 Elmwood Ave. Buffalo, NY 14222 www.BurchfieldPenney.org