Judy Simonian: The Human Element, Huddled and Still

Greener Pastures, 2025, acrylic on canvas, 24 x 32 inches

By AMANDA CHURCH June 9, 2025

Judy Simonian’s 12 paintings — still lifes and landscapes in the exuberant vein of Soutine— in her show “The Human Element, Huddled and Still” at JJ Murphy gallery at times look like the imagery was tossed up in the air, landing to yield an impromptu potpourri of associations that only sometimes coalesce into recognizable scenes. The titles can either be funny, like “Bobby Pins of Manhattan” depicting the city’s skyline behind what looks like a giant glass of tomato juice and the eponymous tray of bobby pins, and “Air Traffic Control” with its tiny plane glimpsed in the distance, or deadpan, like “Cat in a Lamp,” showing a black cat’s silhouette under a glowing yellow lampshade. Part of what makes this work so intriguing is how disorienting and often mysterious it can be — some paintings have a palpable sense of place but it's still hard to figure out exactly what’s going on. Simonian has spoken of “recording the unevenness of perception” and accordingly, the paintings seem to challenge us to discern order and meaning. In “Resting on Her Side,” the figure floating in the still water at first appears peaceful, but wait, has she drowned? Or is it a boat or raft that’s on “her side”? “Inside Outside” recalls an urban roof party, but intimations of spattered blood and a smoggy beige sky threaten the festivities. The jittery fluidity of Simonian’s brushwork adds to this sort of ambiguity and can conjure a sense of barely contained chaos.

Enter Mountain Yellow, 2023, acrylic on canvas, 50 x 66 inches

The largest painting in the show, “Enter the Mountain Yellow,” is also the most active and abstract. It’s divided into three horizontal bands of color, two browns sandwiching a wider swath of modulated yellow in the middle. These are disrupted by three mound shapes (mountains?), the biggest one at the bottom populated by what looks like a group of people in hats. A Hoffman-esque brown square floats to the right, reverting to the more abstract, yet there’s a story here somewhere. Is the yellow section a river the people are trying to cross? Are they trying to escape something? Again as elsewhere, the scene remains somewhat obscure, allowing our imaginations fill in the narrative  blanks.

Obscurity is not always the case, however. Take the relatively straightforward “Bottle Symphony in Red,” a still life that compositionally conjures Giorgio Morandi, or the anthropomorphically titled “The Lonely Limoges Tankard,” a portrait of an over-the-top solitary pitcher. “Rough Water,” a more dramatic scenario, depicts pretty much what the title indicates – frothy waves threatening to capsize a small boat. The formally composed “Greener Pastures,” with its ship’s momentum through dappled waters and the glowing yellow beacon that resembles a lit-from-within Statue of Liberty,” optimistically charts a route to safer shores. WM