“The Shape of Color” at the Brickbottom Gallery, curator-artist Philip Gerstein juxtposes works such as his own “I Am What I Am,” right, with Jane Yudelman’s “The Measure of Light 4.” (Photo: Claire Ogden)

On view at Somerville’s Brickbottom Gallery through April 28, “The Shape of Color – 5 Abstract Artists” has a deceptively simple concept with mesmerizing and complex execution.

The term “love letter” gets thrown around left and right in arts criticism, but it’d be reductive to call this exhibition a love letter to color. Really, the show’s theme is something that curator-artist Philip Gerstein, a member of Brickbottom Artists Association, feels almost religiously about. Color is “somewhere between music and poetry,” he writes, “between vibrating with sound and declaiming with language.” In fact, color is “the only reason I’m still a painter,” he says. The top of the exhibition’s Web page even declares that “Color will set you free.”

As curator, Gerstein selected every piece, and he uses his own explorations in color abstraction as the curatorial anchors for the show. On each wall, his pairings echo forms, colors and techniques of the other artists to fascinating effect: In the case of Ellen Weider’s “L’Object d’Art” and Gerstein’s “In Clarity,” two trapezoid shapes are side by side. Weider uses mixed media on grayish linen, which mutes and adds texture to her colors. Gerstein’s wood panel soaks up the bright green paint, lending itself to a clarity of form that’s striking.

There’s a strong sense of movement throughout the show. Gordon Fearey’s watercolor tendrils weave themselves throughout, vibrating alongside the exhibition’s more static color blocking paintings. In “Permanent and Path,” these almost snakelike shapes are rendered in vivid detail. Fearey’s combinations of yellows, pinks and blues bring the walls to life. They feel right at home alongside Gerstein’s gestural forms in “What is a Man” and “Annunciation.”

A corner of “The Shape of Color” with juxtapositions between three of five artists in the show. (Photo: Claire Ogden)

Though there are bright colors throughout, it’s in the monochrome and muted moments that Gerstein’s curatorial vision comes into full view. Francie Lyshak’s “Water Soothes Rock” is totally gray; all you can do is get lost in the patterns they’ve carved into the paint. Likewise, Lyshak’s “RBG (In honor of Ruth Bader Ginsburg)” breaks the canvas up into several red squares, once again suggesting movement with curved lines carved into the acrylic.

Rich and memorable, “The Shape of Color – 5 Abstract Artists” shows color at its best: a medium for communication, an expression of raw emotion, a being unto itself.

“The Shape of Color – 5 Abstract Artists” at the Brickbottom Artists Building, 1 Fitchburg St., Inner Belt, Somerville. Up through April 28.

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