Frank Schwaiger: Alchemy – A Brush With The Universal

Frank Schwaiger is showing Alchemy – A Brush With The Universal at Bruno David Gallery in downtown Clayton, and it's running through October 31. The show opened on September 4, so it's been up for a while now, and you've still got a few weeks left to catch it. This is Schwaiger's eighth solo exhibition with the gallery, and the work continues his long-running fascination with the geometries that construct and govern our world. He paints vivid realms of color and describes his approach to creation as a spiritual act meant to spark inner transformation, with the paintings themselves serving as a search for the universal essence of life.

There's a deep architectural thread running through the work. Schwaiger graduated from Washington University in St. Louis's School of Architecture—now the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts—and taught there for 11 years. He later earned his Master's from Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, where he worked alongside Buckminster Fuller, the visionary architect and designer known for his geodesic domes. That background in structure and geometry is a good lens to bring to the show, especially given how much he talks about the underlying patterns of the world.

Schwaiger lives and works right here in St. Louis and serves as director of the Columbia Foundation for the Arts. The Bruno David Gallery, which opened in 1984, represents a mix of innovative St. Louis artists and names with international reputations. To go along with the exhibition, the gallery is publishing a comprehensive catalogue of his work, which should be a useful thing to pick up if you want to see where this body of work fits into his larger career.

Alchemy – A Brush With The Universal is in Gallery 3 at the Bruno David Gallery in downtown Clayton, and it runs through October 31.