Unlike Rhys JamesвЂ™ recent work with its sense of gothic foreboding and her unerring ability to transform the most ordinary objects into symbols of threat and horror whether it is a glove or a dollhouse, a cot or chandelier, here more of a sense of domestic harmony pervades. Touching is not allowed of course, but as so much art is experienced in reproduction, whether in print or online, when the real thing asserts itself as a physical object this can be the effect. The physical presence of paint when the picture is seen in the flesh is a visceral experience вЂ“ leading to the yearning temptation to touch, to feel those fat ridges of paint the frozen-in-time gestural marks left by the artist. The viewer then sees what she saw, but this is not about her. That creator, a woman, stands before a canvas and using a mirror she records what she sees. Rather, going back to the title of this exhibition, these are traces of their creator. But these are not attempts by the artist to create a slavish representation of the self. Nor is the subject the self portrait, though again, these are there too, in abundance. Not flowers, although clearly there are flowers. The subject, or rather the non-subjective subject is paint.

They are about the performance of paint and the action of the artist applying paint to the canvas. But to say those greens are not naturalistic is to miss the point, Rhys JamesвЂ™ paintings are not about representation. And acid green an almost unreal, alien green that shoots rocket-like from a glass vase, or curls in snake-like tendrils bearing up bright flower heads or bowing under their weight. Rhys James does indeed paint paint is primary, it is thick, luscious, pigment rich. Shani Rhys JamesвЂ™ new exhibition is called вЂI paint therefore I amвЂ™ вЂ“ a phrase which is an assertion of the artistвЂ™s existence in the world that also reflects the repeated use of her own face in her paintings.

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