by Len Lear

Renowned but controversial local artist Chuck Connelly’s latest show, “New Frequency,” kicked off with a public reception on Saturday Oct. 8, 6 to 8 p.m. at Borelli’s Chestnut Hill Gallery, 1 E. Gravers Lane. The exhibit will remain at the gallery through Oct. 31. Connelly, 61, is a resident of East Oak Lane.

No one has ever doubted Connelly's massive talent, but some critics have said his own at-times abrasive personality has kept him from reaching the highest rung of the art world’s ladder. Connelly’s career took off in the early 1980s while living in Germany. He had two famous patrons — Dr. Robert Atkins of diet fame and Michael Werner, a legendary German art dealer. Connelly was immortalized by director Martin Scorsese in the film “New York Stories” and sensationalized in an HBO documentary, “The Art of Failure, Chuck Connelly: Not for Sale.”

“Every time a big opportunity came his way, he (Connelly) made sure he was being right and pointing out wrongs into whatever relationship he had with everyone, telling the naked truth and disregarding the consequences,” one former colleague is quoted as saying in the documentary.

A drunk and irate Connelly screams into the camera in one scene, “I don’t need your f--- art world. I can sell this s--- myself.”

According to the Borelli Gallery, Connelly’s life “could be seen as a line that goes up and down from the highs of his fame in the decadent ‘80s to the lows of the deep and destructive alcoholism that followed.” Connelly sold more than $1 million worth of his work in the 1980s, including a purchase by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. But his career then took a nose-dive, which many observers attributed to his volcanic temper, alienating many of his former supporters.

After 17 years of concentrated and self-imposed isolation, the proud artist became sober in 2010 and has remained so. The work of Connelly, whose peers included Julian Schnabel and Jean-Michel Basquiat, has grown even more intense and personal after so many years of reevaluation, “and this show ushers in a new sense of redemption and forgiveness.”

Always a maverick, Connelly has lived by the quixotic belief that the art should be the star rather than the commercial value of the art. The exhibit at Borelli is dedicated to the memory of Connelly's friend, Dean Buck, whose fascination with optical illusions and the subconscious mind has guided Connelly's view of the unknown.

In an earlier interview, Connelly told us, “Art is almost like a recording of an exact moment of truth. The purer you are to letting it flow and the less involvement you actually have in it, the better you're gonna be. You're channeling. Maybe all an artist does is prepare little channels to channel, like little road signs.”

Art is a window through which we see our own reflection, he said. “It's faith at this point. It's not belief … I already jumped off the cliff. I just hope I don't land on a rock on the way down … There's no turning back … Making art is like jumping. You don't always want to jump because it's a series of pain afterwards.”

The current exhibition also showcases two long-time Connelly friends, Ted Victoria and Mark Glista. Much of Connelly's work focuses on images of waves or strokes across the canvas repeated horizontally. Connelly has also included new silhouette paintings, which represent people who have died and energies that have disappeared, and a collection of bird portraits meant to represent the spirits of another world.

Connelly's solo exhibitions have included The Andy Warhol Museum, Lennon/Weinberg and DFN Galleries in NYC, the Galerie L'Enfant in D.C., et al. His work is in the public collections of the Broad Family Foundation, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and others as well as in the private collections of celebrities including Nick Nolte and Kevin Dillon.

More information at 215-248-2549, ChestnutHillGallery.com and/or ChuckConnelly.net.