Too hot to cool off

“Bacchanal with Picnic” (oil and collage on canvas), by Patty Adams, in her show “Bathers and Bacchanals, at Bromfield Gallery, Boston, Sept. 30-Nov. 1

She says:

“There are bodies and there is nature. They are profoundly connected.

““In this work I have drawn on the art historical imagery of the nude figure in nature both as bathers and revelers. I have tried to capture their joy and pleasure of being alive in the natural world.

“I was inspired by discovering Grace Hartigan and how she used Henri Matisse’s ‘Bathers by a River’ as an inspiration  for her own ‘River Bathers.’  Her painting  was strangely like and yet unlike Matisse’s. I wanted to have a similar experience.

“The above painting is based on a  similar but more general inspiration from Rubens and Poussin and their paintings of orgiastic dancers and satyrs worshipping Venus and Pan. This painting is oil on canvas but its surface has been enlivened by collaged elements of paper and theatrical gels.’’