Good company indeed

I was immediately struck by the Wayne Thiebaud painting of “The Campbells (portrait of Charlie and Esther).”

Thiebaud is known to most for his Pop Art era paintings of lunch counter pastries, gumball machines and other colorful renditions of ordinary objects. Others may recognize his pioneering cityscapes of San Francisco, bending space in provocative ways. No less his landscapes that are equally spatially distorted in an intriguing manner.

Yet Thiebaud was a master at painting people as well.

His characterizations of people are strikingly similar to his contemporary, David Hockney. The composition, the depiction of emotion and character, and the flatter yet colorful technical rendition all bear a resemblance.

In this one painting he captures emotion, expression and personality. This is a husband and wife whose faces betray feelings in a way that would leave you thinking you know them and their story. It’s akin to his better known “Two Seated Figures.” They’re seated together, but you can feel the gulf between them. The expressive lines Thiebaud used may seem sketchy, yet they are more than enough to carry the image. It’s not a sketch at all; you can see the actual sketch in the show.

It’s a keeper that I keep coming back to view.

Pierre Bonnard’s “Standing Nude Figure” drawing actually is a sketch, of his wife I’m quite sure, the same model and modeling that appears in so many of his finished paintings of her, in the bath or dressing. The staccato brush strokes, the vibrant color, and the full setting of his oil paintings are all missing here, but the woman is all there.

An expressive ink sketch, “Reclining Nude with Upstretched Arms” by Elmer Bischoff greets you from the bottom up. Not the more common nude view.

Nathan Olivera’s untitled watercolor reclining nude from the left side is a more classical pose, while Manuel Neri’s “Woman Bath” is shown as the viewer looks upward at her torso while she bends over.

There are figurative sculptures by three masters in patinated bronze: Auguste Rodin, Henry Moore and Manuel Neri.

Three Chagalls are different and all classically his own style. “La Grande Corniche” is a charming color lithograph of a dove flying over a Mediterranean coastal promenade where people are frolicking. “La Songe Du Capitaine Bryaxis” is a dark scene from the Ravel symphonic ballet.

My favorite is “La Fenêtre Entrouverte,” a color lithograph still life of a table in front of a windowsill. A vase is prominent, a standing nude couple embracing right in the middle of the flowers.

A head, “Doble Imagen” by Manolo Valdés strikes me like a Picasso of an earlier period. Her eyes and expression are as arresting as the classic head sculpture of Egyptian Queen Nefertiti, which it also resembles.

If you love the human form, you’re in luck with this show.

There are more than just nudes here. Milton Avery, James Weeks, Willem De Kooning, Max Ernst, Max Weber, Frank Auerbach, Hassel Smith – it’s quite a lineup. Varied media from graphite to wood and stone. A little something for every taste, and nothing small in the visual impact.

These terrific artists would have been great company, but sadly for us, you can’t meet them at the reception. They’re all gone now.

What remains is the mark they left on modern art. Go keep them company.

Pamela Walsh Gallery, 540 Ramona St., Palo Alto, Calif., (650) 300-6315, pamelawalshgallery.com.

Bart Charlow, author, artist and consultant blends over 50 years of painting and photography with narrative storytelling. Explore the intersection of observation and expression through his insights on the local art scene, find his books at bartcharlow.com and his art at bartsart.weebly.com.