Darrow: Junk Goes In, Art Comes Out

From life’s junk, Paul Darrow makes artfully jumbled harmony.

Introspective and occasionally off-kilter, his scrap-heaped collages and mixed-media pieces are on display through Dec. 1 at Huntington Beach Art Center in an inviting exhibition called “Rhapsody.”

There’s a crazy-quilt playfulness to Darrow’s vision that welcomes the eye immediately. Still, the 35 works on view walk the solemn side, forming a cerebral meditation on the meaning of life befitting Darrow’s long embrace of Tibetan Buddhism.

All these constructions mix shabby paper and cardboard, worn wood and plaster, paint, ink, metal and found objects in various teasing combinations. Most are petite--less than 20 inches by 20 inches--and consequently sometimes seem precious. All date from 1991 to 2000. As it happens, Darrow’s most powerful images are also his most reticent, his most inward-looking.

One of the show’s gems is “Grey Shoreline” (1996), an abstract, mixed-media piece whose muted tones and weathered wood exude a delicate, Japanese sensibility. There’s a contemplative quality to the work that seduces the mind.

“Mystic Moon” (1992), a simple confection of torn white paper on brown cardboard, is nearly as pensive. In “Rhapsody” (1997), for which the show is named, the word “rhapsody” printed on cardboard plays against a mystical, mandala-like circle.These works and many more deal in exaltation of the ordinary. With such humble materials Darrow shows his sheer delight in life. A Laguna Beach resident, Darrow has made art for more than five decades. He also taught for many years at Scripps College in Claremont and other Southern California art schools.

Clearly his vision is seasoned.

That doesn’t mean all his pieces are equally arresting, however. Darrow’s recent work is more literal in its use of objects and consequently less poetic.

“Message Board, Worn Path” (2000) features a well-trod shoe sole affixed to layers of jagged wood, old cardboard and a scrap of corrugated paper.

Other tattered bits of footwear, brought from El Salvador by a friend, figure in “Journey’s End,” “Shoe Box” and “Temple,” also made last year. Their textures are inviting. Yet their symbolism, their evocation of stoic trudging along the rutted path of life, feels heavy-handed and overly punny.

Still there’s a subtle humor in these pieces that bespeaks Zen acceptance of dharma, of fate. These constructions seem overly obvious--but their rough vitality appeals nonetheless.

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“Rhapsody,” mixed media and collage by Paul Darrow, at the Huntington Beach Art Center, 538 Main St., (714) 374-1650. Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, noon-6 p.m.; Thursdays, noon-8 p.m.; Sundays, noon-4 p.m. Through Dec. 1. Free.