Windjammer Gallery -- October 20 to November 5 Let's face it: how much more can a contemporary painter "say'' about Bermuda that hasn't already been said (both figuratively and literally) many times before? While unquestionably pretty, the view of Hamilton Harbour, the sailboats at full mast on Harrington Sound and the coral expanse of Bermuda's many pink-sand beaches have surely been exhausted as serious artistic subject matters. As with writers, who depleted the archetypal well almost as soon as people began writing, there are no more stories to tell in that sense, only ways in which to tell them. Unfortunately, many of the artists at work nowadays tend to overlook this, a fact which may explain why so much of the Island's commercial art is often repetitive and...well...dull.

The freshness of the telling, however, is precisely what stands out in the works of Mr. Michael Swan and Mr. David Coolidge, two very different painters whose variations on the same theme will be on display at the Windjammer Gallery's Reid Street showroom until the first week of November. It helps that these two artists have been hung together, as it gives observers -- particularly newcomers -- a complete and rather penetrating picture of Bermuda as it is today. While the young Mr. Swan's work is clearly the more profound of the two, Mr. Coolidge provides a bright and strangely unjaded portrait of the Island that makes his best work positively sing.

Although I have never met Mr. Coolidge, an American who resides in Florida and pays frequent visits to Bermuda, it is clear from his watercolours that he likes the Island a great deal. More striking, for example, than his masterful rendering of shrubbery and trees, the shadings and detail of which have been expertly captured, is the obvious sense of joy that defines his work, the party atmosphere that pervades many of his best paintings. Among the most celebratory of the 17 on show at Windjammer are the so-called Coral Beach paintings, with their festive greens and candy cane reds, and "Harbour View'', an inviting jumble of warm shadings and well-placed splashes of colour that breathes new life into that well-worn Bermudian scene.

Of course, not all of Mr. Coolidge's paintings are so patently inspired. Some, like "Darrell's Boat Slip'' and "Sailing from Newstead'', are entirely ho-hum, pedestrian stuff that has been done and seen in many of Island's galleries before. This is not to say, however, that the artist must necessarily do artistic cartwheels to be at his best. While the Coral Beach paintings do hold a wonderful and rarely seen vitality, Mr. Coolidge has also produced some beautifully muted works that are equally evocative and equally successful. Some examples: "St. George's Lane'', with its exquisite coffee tones and solitary air, and "Along the Wall'', a gorgeous pink-hued study of foliage and stone. In the latter, Mr. Coolidge's treatment of the wall is so effective as to seem almost photographic.

The works of both these artists, in fact, could be said to have photographic aspects to them. But while Mr. Coolidge's would best be described as being of the picture-postcard variety -- albeit wonderfully detailed postcards -- Mr.

Swan's strike the viewer as the type that he or she would see in a journal like Conde Nast Traveler, a gorgeously spartan travel picture that holds great insights into its subject.

Mr. Swan, a young local painter whose "Queen of the East'' has been chosen to represent Bermuda in a three-year UNESCO-sponsored Carribbean Art Exhibition, has a minimalist style that is both spare and vivid, a dichotomy that is best expressed in his reed-like palm trees against bare walls or sky. His is also a very rich oeuvre, dealing as it does with shadow, mood and the question of Bermuda's identity. Consequently, I was just as struck by the hidden visual language of the paintings as I was by the images themselves.

Many of Mr. Swan's images, for example, focus on doors and windows.

Interestingly, though, many of those portals do not seem to provide access to anything. In the otherwise inviting "House on the Sound'', for instance, the lone doorway is closed; in "White House'', the windows have bars on them.

"Shutters 2'', a beautiful study of the traditional Bermudian fixtures, the shutters are open but they reveal only black; inside, the house is dark and devoid of life.

Are these undeniably Bermudian paintings, the viewer finally asks, Mr. Swan's commentary on the Island's true nature? Is he saying that Bermudians are both welcoming and reserved? Inviting and distant? These meaty works offer a wealth of possibilities.

From a consumerist point of view, both Mr. Swan and Mr. Coolidge are proof positive that commercial art doesn't have to be either soulless or banal. Both of their best works are representative of Bermuda in the literal sense and also offer a great deal more, Mr. Coolidge's a sense of spirit and visual potency, Mr. Swan's an intelligent and multi-layered look at deeper issues. In fact, anyone who wants to understand the real Bermuda would do well to purchase one of each and hang them side by side.

DANNY SINOPOLI `BRITTANY'S ROOM': One of Bermudian painter Michael Swan's paintings on display at the Windjammer Gallery.