“The Flood 1 & 2” Ryan Molenkamp Oil and graphite, 48” x 54” (these are terrible photos that don’t do them justice.)

Nick and I were both stopped in our tracks by Ryan Molenkamp’s “The Flood” last night. Walking through the tripartite show at Vermillion, these two panels ate up the space and the light, making everything go hushed. Like the skeletal ruins of some town, the burnt remains of a grove, or the spreading tendrils of a topographic black hole, “The Flood” was the gem of the show. They were also already sold, along with 85% of all Molenkamp’s other pieces, which is a relief and a triumph in this age.

Molenkamp’s work can be seen in two contexts, either one just as equally and completely. His skeletal framework laid over monochrome or muted color might be the sprawl of man-made industry, a latticework gone rusted and bare with neglect or catastrophe. Or, it might connote a nature gone rogue and rampant, with lance-like trees spearing the sky and tangles of roots forming dense networks along the landscape. And, of course, it might be a combination of both: an intermingling of city and nature, and not all of it harmonious.

Either way, the ominous and sometimes spectral work Molenkamp paints is thunderingly quiet and wonderfully engaging. This small piece pictured below begged to come home with us, but alas, had already been scooped up by some luckier passerby.

“57 Place” Oil on canvas 13” x 30”