From artist Ellwood Howel, a different point of viewl

There’s something peaceful about paintings by Elwood Howell. Perhaps it’s the gentle wash of colors echoing one another throughout the landscape. Or maybe it’s the way the composition and subtle colors blend so the eye travels smoothly over the canvas.

Don’t be lulled into believing comfort is the only response evoked by Mr. Howell’s work: fun and surprises are also tucked inside the inviting compositions. And his landscapes are probably nothing like you’ve ever seen before.

The most obvious difference is the composition. It’s not the landscape view that stretches out to the vanishing point, but the foreground that gets all the focus and attention. What the field of color and texture represents seems to be up to the viewer to decide.

Some perceive it as a stretch of bucolic field that ends with a distant stretch of tree line, mountain range or water view. Others see the foreground as a cross section of earth or sea that plays closer to fantasy instead of a realistic separation of layers of earth or water.

Until September 20, viewers can decide for themselves: Mr. Howell’s landscapes are the subject of a solo show at Pamela Williams Gallery in Amagansett. The “Elwood Howell” exhibition presents 10 large paintings and a series of nine smaller ones. All of the artwork was made specifically for the show, Mr. Howell said. This is typical for the East Hampton artist: he doesn’t submit existing work for his exhibits.

The most common reaction gallery owner Pamela Williams has observed is complete relaxation. “People looking in the window are stopping and staring,” she said. “Everyone has the same reaction when walking into the gallery. I hear big sighs and comments about how relaxed and calm they feel being around his paintings.”

Mr. Howell is happy whatever the reaction or interpretation people bring to his artwork. He doesn’t set out to paint peaceful vistas. He does hope his paintings always strike viewers with something new. He describes this as a visual encounter—a relationship with his art that’s meant to last beyond a first glance or even a lingering look.

For starters, each painting looks distinctly different across the entire range of illumination: bright daylight, spotlight, waning twilight, soft daybreak or bathed in intimate lamplight. Shifts and changes don’t stop there, as each painting is an exercise in the imagination. As such, they contain surprises and incongruities not found in nature.

None of the landscapes are meant to represent an actual place. Like a fiction writer, Mr. Howell heads into his white-walled studio and lets ideas and visual snippets lead him to a fully-realized painting. If the view strikes a familiar chord, that’s fine with Mr. Howell. Like literature, his paintings are meant to resonate with a common experience but bring the viewer somewhere new.

The untried experience may be found in the foreground. As a fan of colorists and abstract painting, he combines both techniques in the sprawling areas occupying the largest area in most of his canvases. Each field is highly textured—usually subtly so—to infuse interest and movement.

The expansive foreground is Mr. Howell’s playground, the place where the reserved artist who hails originally from the Midwest cuts loose. Brush strokes roam. Unusual shapes pop up and remain distinctive. Colors combine to echo those in the slim landscape already running across the top of the canvas or paper or board. If the colors don’t flow from the visually articulated top to the sweeping field below it, the painting changes until the distinctive portions mirror and connect, Mr. Howell said.

In this image field, emotions swirl and pop and humorous touches are added, providing the answers to titles that riddle. “Four Blue Stones,” for example, refers to four blue shapes the viewer must search for in the foreground. “Red Bird, Blue Bird” is also explained by two shapes hinted at in the color field foreground of that painting.

The play on words and what can pass as an inside joke brings a smile to Mr. Howell. “I like to have fun,” he said. “This is how I do it.”

Mr. Howell has exhibited at invitationals at the Parrish Art Museum, Heckscher Museum of Art, Guild Hall, the Ventura Museum in California and others. His work is in collections held by museums, individuals and corporations. Mr. Howell has exhibited in galleries in Manhattan and across the country. His work can be viewed at www.elwoodhowell.com.

The solo show of paintings by Elwood Howell remains on view through September 20 at the Pamela Williams Gallery, 167 Main Street, Amagansett. The gallery is open 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. from Thursday to Monday. For information, call 267-7817 or visit www.pamelawilliamsgallery.com.