Karin Davie

It's not surprising to read that Canadian-born artist Karin Davie has a background in experimental dance-the swooping lines that make up her paintings are both the record and expression of an exuberant physicality. Referencing abstract expressionism and the eye-popping mod verve of op art, Davie's bulgy stripes (in paintings with titles like ""Wow,"" ""Smother"" and ""Pushed, Pulled, Depleted & Duplicated #15"") undulate and drip around their big canvases with a swaggering command of effect and technique. The jargon-free essays by Schwabsky and Tillman are of unusual interest-Schwabsky's ""Karin Davie: In the Thick of Painting"" intelligently extends Davie's field of reference to include Ingres, Frank Stella, Robert Crumb, Looney Tunes, Edvard Munch and Kim Novak's provocative bun from Hitchcock's Vertigo. And Tillman's afterword, ""Portrait of a Young Painter Levitating,"" is less a formal essay than a lyrical evocation of personality. Though an incomplete substitute for an encounter with the paintings themselves, this book is a valuable record of an immensely talented artist.