A painterly picture

Chrysler products for foreign markets in the 1950s blended Dodge and Plymouth styling.

   The once bright, now soft shades of this 1954 Dodge or Plymouth sedan – it's a Chrysler export model, so it's probably a bit of both – remind me of the work of Montreal artist Susan Pepler.
   Cuba's old cars are a favourite subject of the "painterly realist," who brings to her canvases a careful attention to shape and detail, overlaid with impressionistic brush strokes that convey the movement of light and shadow under the Cuban sun.
   Several of Pepler's Cuba paintings are on display at Montreal's Le Meridien Versailles Hotel until June 30.