Charles Munch | Seeking a Way

Exhibition Highlights

Charles Munch’s new exhibition Seeking a Way explores the complex relationship between humans, animals, and the natural world through vividly imagined paintings of simplified forms, luminous landscapes, and brilliant color. For decades, Munch has worked within a set of self-imposed rules—broad lines, flat colors, no shadows, and no linear perspective—using these limitations to distill his subjects and express emotion through color, line, and shape.

In Seeking a Way, Munch loosens these restrictions, allowing greater freedom and spontaneity while maintaining the balance between representation and abstraction that has long defined his work. Inspired by the landscapes and wildlife surrounding his Driftless Region home, these new paintings reflect his enduring connection to nature, fascination with color, and growing concern for the fragile relationship between humans and the natural world.

Charles Munch has been represented by Tory Folliard Gallery since 1992.

 

DEER IN THE CORN

Oil on Canvas

52 x 37 1/2”

$8,500.00

In the past, as part of my attempt to escape realism, I set rules for myself and put limits on the artistic tools I was allowed to employ.  (Use only broad lines and flat colors!  No shadows!  No linear perspective!)  But for several years now I’ve begun to loosen up, thinking I’d learned enough from such restrictions.  I could relax my long discipline and allow myself to be more expressive and emotional while still keeping an eye on the abstract underpinnings of my representational images

-Charles Munch

 

HUNTING AT NIGHT

Oil on Canvas

15 1/2 x 22”

Previously, the progress of my work had been motivated mainly by formal issues.  Now I let myself choose my formal means, my style, the mediums I use, in the same way I’d always chosen my subject matter:  by inspiration, by opening myself to unknown influences in and outside of myself, by giving up control.  Surprising things happened!

-Charles Munch

 

DUSK NO. 21

Acrylic on Paper on Canvas

42 1/2 x 82 3/4” (Framed)

 
 

FULL MOON LOTUS # 16

Acrylic on Canvas

33 5/8 x 33 5/8” (Framed)

 
 

LATE RAIN

Acrylic on Paper

23 x 26” (Framed)

I was attracted to opacity (as in Horse Prairie), to darkness (Night Watch), to colors that touch without intervening lines (Tangled).  I found myself interested in bas-relief or low modeling (Rearing), ambiguous scale (Sailing), paintings as jewel-like objects (Cedars), and horses, of all things. 

-Charles Munch

 

FROEDERT MALT COMPLEX

Acrylic on Paper

16 1/2 x 25” (Framed)

 
 

  I had no desire to give up anything or to renounce my old ways, just to relax and see what happened -- to shake up the puzzle pieces and see where they fell -- to allow inconsistency.  This feels similar to some of what’s happening in the rest of my life and may be part of the larger group of changes that occur in old age.

-charles munch

 
 

To see more of Charles Munch’s available work, please click HERE