As I see it, the bond shared by these two artists, other than the historical matrix, is their love of paint.  Neither are nonobjective, or expressionist painters, but both are completely involved in the act of painting.  The “act part” (a term we used back then) in both cases, is tied to the application of the paint.† There is something dependably fulfilling about putting on the paint.  These two learned to love t very early in their careers.  I remember Gunderson trying to explain it one day in the painting studio in Old Main, “I love painting! You get what you put!” In the painting she found the autonomy and immediacy that allowed her ebullient personality to soar.  Bushman share s a similar allegiance to the application of the paint as the primary “art part.” Take a close look at Bushman’s brushwork, just as you might with as expressionist painter.  The scale of the strokes is the micro but the expressive content is undiminished as they stand n dramatic contrast to the scale of imagery, provides cover for an almost surreptitious expressive feat at a micro scale.  It is precisely at this scale where Bushman achieves his most potent visual metaphor.  He provides not just the image of nature but also something of its process with his use of Whiteout (yes, the real stuff) as he partially obscures his own exuberant creation, just as Wisconsin winter obscures nature’s.

Gunderson’s black paintings use only black paint, she achieves an amazing range of value and color by varying the direction of the brush strokes and the glossiness of the paint, thus controlling the way light is reflected to the viewer.  She is able, with black alone, to model the royal figures in her paintings with astonishing chiaroscuro.  Such paint-handling skill led the philosopher/critic Donald Kuspit to describe her as a “contemporary master.”  It would be impossible to sustain her particular technical attach with out a true love for the medium, with all its smells and mess.  She gets what she puts!

Both Gunderson and Bushman are painter’s painters and both have pushed their craft to an idiosyncratic plane that confronts “the man” rather than ingratiates his wall.  The old gang can indeed be proud of this exhibition.