Keith Crowley paintings at Bridgette Mayer Gallery

The play of light (or darkness) on water inspires this exhibit of Keith Crowley's paintings. This is landscape art of a particular kind. In a way it's a direct descendant of Impressionism in its preference for fleeting atmospheric effect, as opposed to the emotional transformation of landscape into soul-scape (Ó la Van Gogh, Burchfield and others) or the intellectual transformation of the landscape into a symbol of larger concepts at play.

Crowley's large-scale oils are pleasing to the eye. He knows how to capture atmospheric effects, and he injects just enough of a sense of mystery into paintings like Nocturne Tailrace to keep things interesting.

Promenade shows Crowley's most prosaic side. As much a "document" as an Atget photograph of Paris, this painting, with its "Panavision" format, works as an interesting deployment of color-and-line.

At the other extreme, Scholar's Rock shows Crowley at his most atmospherically beguiling, with the light all but dancing over the surface of the running water.

In terms of technique, "Basin" is an old-fashioned show. It's a display of landscape art, but a type of landscape art that could only exist post-photography. The images have the instantaneous feel of snapshots taken on the fly, rather than celebrations of a land that has always been and always will be.