Magdalena Shummer

About the Artist

Magdalena Shummer-Fangor was born in 1930 in Lubliniec. In the years 1957-1960 she studied at the Institute of Art History at the University of Warsaw. Since 1961, she lived outside Poland, initially in Vienna (1961-1962), then in Paris (1962-1964), West Berlin (1964-1965) and London (1965-1966). In 1966 she moved to the United States. In 1970, she established a permanent cooperation with the gallery Mabels 849 Madison Ave., NYC; There was showing her works until 1985. In the seventies exhibited in the United States (Fairleigh Dickinson University Gallery, Madison, NJ, 1978; Morris Gallery, Madison, NJ, 1978; Studio Gallery 96 Grand St., NYC, 1981); France (Galerie Naifs et Primitifs, Paris, 1990), Switzerland (Cora Atelier-Galerie La Vague, Hermance, 1990). In the years 1981-1996 worked with Mabels Gallery Folk Art, NYC; in 1995, the Adelante Gallery, Scottsdale, Arizona; in 1997, with Titos Gallery, Las Vegas, NM; in 1998 with Frank Miele Contemporary Folk Art Gallery, Madison Ave, NYC and Houshang Gallery, Santa Fe, NM. Magdalena Shummer- Fangor since 1999 has lived and worked in Poland.

The title of this exhibition of paintings by Magdalena Shummer-Fangor – Poetic Realism – derives from the artist's own description of her work. In her depictions of the natural world we can appreciate the eye of a careful observer. Flowers and plants are rendered with a botanist's attention to detail, and the animals that populate the paintings are at times presented with anatomical precision. A cow stands in a bed of summer flowers, staring placidly out at the viewer. Almost undetected amidst the colourful blooms, a hummingbird sips at nectar. The farm animal's solid bulk is contrasted humorously with the delicacy of the flowers, and its piebald hide is set off by petals of blue, yellow, orange and red. In other works, the beasts are represented in a style that acknowledges the artist's love of naïve painting. Above a grove of glossy green plants and ferns a large bat spreads its wings. From the Rousseau-like undergrowth a group of monkeys and lemurs stare wide-eyed and open-mouthed as if in awe of the creature hovering over them.

Working mostly with oil on board, Magdalena Shummer-Fangor creates images rich in form and colour. A large bowl of flowers of intricate and contrasting shapes is depicted in colours of neon-like brightness, the composition of the whole achieving a sense of balance and harmony. The artist draws on Biblical sources for some of her subjects, such as the representation of Jonah being swallowed by the whale in a deep green Mediterranean sea. She also taps into a more personal mythology: an eagle conversing with a fire-breathing crocodile in a rocky landscape with the skyline of New York almost floating on the horizon invites us to provide of our own interpretation. .