`Close Up' is the current show at the Arts Centre at Dockyard. What qualifies as close up is definitely in the eyes of the artist in this juried member's show.

Diana Amos probably comes the closest with her mixed media piece, `Cool Rhythms'. It's so close it's hard to tell if these are petals or leaves. The veins are the focus here, this is truly close with a wonderful skewing of vision I wish I'd seen more of in this show. Veins are also prominent in Tonya Lee's archival digital close up photographs of roses. The detail is incredible, and some might think surprising, for digital technology.

Eric Amos' mixed media piece, `Up Close and Personal', is almost too personal, too close. It looks like an actual desk blotter with the usual doodles, phone numbers and lists including the intriguing "2 WB, 2 Bananas, 2 Somerset".

`Reflection' and `Meditation', mixed media works by Angela Gentleman are totally abstract but somehow hit on the close up. The muted colours - peaches, reds, turquoise - and metal-framed focal area with hanging shells draw viewers in to indeed reflect and meditate on them.

Another abstract, `New Year on the Roof', by Stella Vivian Stella-Phillips is puzzling and fun. The tiny ladder at least is recognisable, but it leads to a fanciful world with symbolism I couldn't interpret. A large gold circle with sand mixed in the paint is the focal point. There is a lovely blue background and purple blobs with eyes, it is expansive and seems a good new year to me anyway.

Strangely enough for a show called `Close up' there are two more "roof" pieces in the show. Kok Wan Lee's `The Roof' is so brightly coloured it's hard to believe it was done with watercolours. What it has to do with a roof is beyond me but it's fun and to me it looks like a brightly coloured boogie man. Almost hidden in a corner is a small and wonderful mixed media wall-mounted sculpture by Suzie Lowe. In it a silver figure is climbing a ladder to a skyscape above.

There are of course the traditional Bermuda scenes like Jon Mills' watercolours. `Long Shadow' has an intriguing shadow slanting from a window, the question is what is inside the darkened window? We have a glimpse of books and plants on the sill and the rest is a mystery. His `Back Gate' doesn't seem that close up but the warm brick before the gate is inviting and the white Bermudian house is awash with brilliant light.

For a totally different take on a window and a house there are Amy Evans' mixed media with acrylic `Walls & Windows' and `Red Door Pueblos'. The earth colours are soothing, muted reds and greens and under the window is an intriguing chalk line and above it disturbing coloured, spiky glass on a jagged wall. `Red Door Pueblos' entices the viewer to climb the stairs to an unknown and possibly maze-like place.

Bruce Stuart does not have any houses in this show but a wonderful oil landscape, `Milk Cans II'. There is a sense of isolation with milk cans waiting alongside a fence. It was executed with fantastic detail -this is grass to lay and dream on. Vaughn Evans fills the paper with his `Profile' a woodcut artist proof. Edges of the head are off the paper and the black and white is a nice contrast in this show with lots of colour. Also in black and white are Anthony Hellmers' charcoal tree trunks. They are indeed close up and seem to be wonderful places to sit and survey the world.

Lenore Leitch is the featured artist in this show with her wonderful close up archival digital photographs. She obviously had tremendous fun with her `Smoked' series. She used Photoshop to colour and enhance what she saw in many photographs of smoke. They have fanciful names like, `Aliens in love' and `Green Onions'. `Victim of Fashion', is a ghost-like waifish figure who appears to be posing on a fashion runway.

Ms. Leitch's photographs of San Miguel de Allende sidewalk stones Mexico are incredibly fascinating. They are composed of an amazing variety of colours in nature's own abstract designs, slightly enhanced with Photoshop.

`Close Up' continues at the Bermuda Arts Centre in Dockyard until April 11, 2003.

Denise DeMoura