Sam Karres Paintings Aaa Gallery

SAM KARRES

PAINTINGS

AAA Gallery

(photo - headshot) 

The aroma of the Wonder

Bread factory has been blanket-

ing the area around Grand River

and the Lodge freeway for eight-

een long years now. And that

slice of Detroit wouldn't be the

same without Jerry Cohen's AAA

Gallery and Frame Shop (2805

Grand River), where good stuff

is usually on display and a pool

table is set up in the corner just

in case the art gets a little foggy

and you need a break.

This time around, for the Sam

Karres exhibit (showing through

Oct. 30), the table stays covered.

Karres does oil paint-

ings and

(text positioned to fit space)

some incredible etchings that run

from postage stamp fantasy to

whip-face portraits of ladies

straight out of T. Lautrec.

Some portraits look like cent-

rifugally-exploded jars of paint

that were barely contained

on the canvas.

But I keep going back to the

little prints - a bunch are stacked

in a box- that seem to have an

homogenous fury in every detail.

Lips and chins are tough and wise.

A mouth smiles with a fine line

of sneer.

Karres is a Detroiter who got

his training at Wayne State during

the golden 50's. It's good to see

him hanging downtown and not

in the burbs.

As for Jerry Cohen, he's got a

lot of staying power and he runs

his gallery with gusto, unlike

those places which seem to appro-

ximate funeral parlors in sight

and sound.

--Harald Habinski