In Justin Wiest’s “Dreams Waking,” the artist will present recent paintings which seek to elevate furniture to the role of a primary character. “I’m enjoying the freedom to experiment and search for the limits of painting by scrubbing at the film of familiarity,” says Wiest of his current work. While objects are traditionally used as props in portrait painting, here they become an active part of the narrative. People and their environment are involved in a complex story that invites us to look past, as the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote, “The mist of familiarity (which) obscures from us the wonder of our being.”