In the knobby burls of the tree, bark-stripped and baring all, fantastical landscapes of worlds replicating our own unfold, telling strange stories of modern culture. In the bramble and briar, in the soil rich and dense, in the roots that must repeat themselves, Julie Heffernan's deeply figurative paintings address social issues with humor and mystery, laden in rich symbols and cryptic messages as well as blunt and literal representations.

The trees open up to reveal the cross-section of split-level condominium style living inside, the fourth wall in a complex dollhouse in which Heffernan's figures perform almost satirically for us. They codes of dandyism and its subculture as a means to define details in the sensuously delightful. Her expressive images are contemporaneous with the mastery of Renaissance illusionism and the staginess of classic theatre--a passionate kiss in one corner of the tree burl, a strangle leading to murder in the next. Child birth is as casual and obscene as an everyday bowel movement or a menagerie of lions, peacocks,  pheasants and dead things. Predatory seductions and melodramatic narratives, among other hidden things, inhabit the strange dreamlands of the trees.

What's so successful in Heffernan's work is the geometric control of the pictorial space. Large-scale and meticulously balanced, Heffernan perfectly understands the rules of perspective with a convincing volume of space and the bravura of colorism. Fantasy and reverie remain parallel to the storytelling of this world; she never ventures off the deep-end, keeping her work accessible and spelling-out the direction she wants to take us,  In one piece, Oh no, is scribbled in the sweeping vines., literally directing us to regard the subject matter with alam.

Using fantasy to tell her story, Heffernan takes a deliberately escapist route without leaving the real world completely behind. She merges the realm of humor with the real world; the stupid, the silly, the desperate, the masculine attempt to oppress the feminine, the fearful, the insular, and all the other little worlds are hidden in the details.

 *Images, from top to bottom: "Julie Heffernan: Broken Homes," August 30-September 27, 2008; Catherine Clark Gallery, "Self Portrait as Skyscraper, 2008," oil on canvas, 68"x 60." 'Self Portrait as Broken Home, 2008," oil on canvas, 67"x 57."  "Self Portrait as World,  2008," oil on canvas, 40"x 46.5." "Study for Self Portrait As Not Dead Yet, 2008," oil on canvas, 18"x18."

all works by Julie Heffernan; images courtesy of the artist and Catherine Clark Gallery.