John Motley reviews the exhibition Judy Cooke: Subtext at Elizabeth Leach Gallery, Portland, Oregon, on view through March 2, 2013.

Motley writes: "Taken together, the works echo the studio's rhythm of action, assessment and reaction. But there's also a significant historical synthesis occurring in the work, in which the geometric vocabulary of modernism passes through kitsch, ready-mades and the trend of conceptual anti-craft that critic Raphael Rubinstein termed 'provisional painting'… But where so many young artists strain to amalgamate the last century's schools and movements to unfeeling effect, Cooke's negotiation of those developments is relaxed and honest. Her works do not scan as statements disguised as paintings; they are simply paintings, which can't help but stoke reflection."