83 Number: EightyThree an independent arts journal / summer 2015 / collaborations numberinc.org @numberinc facebook.com/numberinc
Welcome message from author
This document is posted to help you gain knowledge. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think about it! Share it to your friends and learn new things together.
Transcript
83Number: EightyThree an independent arts journal / summer 2015 / collaborations numberinc.org @numberinc facebook.com/numberinc
The restaurant whereSUBTLEisn’t on the menu.
9 6 4 S . C O O P E R • 5 P M - 3 A MG L O B A L S T R E E T F O O D • S P E C I A L T Y L I B AT I O N S
VINTAGE PHOTO BOOTH • MODERN MEMPHIS MUSIC
2 7 2 - 0 8 3 0 • B A R D K D C . C O M
Unidentified artist, Pair of Chalkware Cats, c.1820, polychrome chalk plaster
Wonder, Whimsy, Wild: Folk Art in America
An extraordinary exhibition highlighting American folk art made between 1800 and 1925. On view at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Tennessee’s only and oldest encyclopedic art museum, November 7 through February 28.
This exhibition is drawn from the Barbara L. Gordon Collection and is organized and circulated by Art Services International, Alexandria, Virginia.
Call 901-544-6200 or visit brooksmuseum.org
5
05 Editorial Sara Estes
06 electra eggleston Laura Hutson
08 Richard Lou, Stories on My Back Guisela LaTorre & Jody Stokes-Casey
10 Interview: The Packing Plant David King
12 Collaboration in Transitional Spaces Jared Butler
14 Regional Updates: Memphis, Nashville, Atlanta
15 30 Americans Arkansas Art Center Elle Perry
16 Land Report Collective The University of Tennessee Denise Stewart-Sanabria
17 Rising Up: Hale Woodruff’s Murals Birmingam Museum of Art Brett M Levine
18 The Silo Room Track One Erica Ciccarone
19 Revival in North Memphis Paint Memphis Madeline Faber
20 Eyes Open Slowly Whitespace Gallery Dorothy Joiner
21 The 57th Annual Delta Exhibition Arkansas Art Center Carolyn Furnish
Corrections to Number: 82 The review “Nothing is Forever Last” (p.17) was written by Jody Stokes-Casey.The review “Two Smoking Barrels” (p.18) was written by Angelica Holmes.Number: offers sincere apologies to both writers.
deityMary K. VanGieson
patronsDorothy Metzger Habel
numeratiLucienne AuzKimberly BradshawJason CurrySara EstesShaun GilesJennifer GonzalesNathaniel HeinJenny HornbySusan A. HugelJason N. MillerCarl E. MooreElizabeth MurphyJennifer SargentDr. & Mrs. Gerard J. StanleyMichael C. StanleyEmily Tschiffely
friends Matt DuckloAnnabelle MeachamDolph & Jessie Smith in honor of Carl Moore
board of directorsJennifer Sargent, ChairElizabeth Murphy, Vice ChairEmily Tschiffely, TreasurerKimberly Bradshaw, SecretaryLucienne AuzSara EstesShaun GilesJason N. MillerCarl E. MooreMichael C. Stanley
staff David Thompson, Designer
office po box 11008memphis, tn 38111-0008
All published material is protected under this copyright; however, all rights and ownership remain with the contributor. Published by Number: Incorporated, a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. The focus of Number: is on the contemporary visual arts in the tri-state region (TN, AR, MS). Opinions expressed herein are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect those of the publishers. Contents in whole or in part may not be reproduced without written permission.
Sara Estes is a writer and curator living in Nashville, TN.
Nu
mb
er:
83
Su
mm
er 2
015
VO
LU
ME
XX
VI,
NO
. 3
Nu
mb
er:
Sp
on
sors
© 2
015
Nu
mb
er:
Inco
rpo
rate
d
Jason S. Brown, Open Pit, Steel, Birch, Taconite (Iron Ore) Aluminum, 2015. Photo by Carri Jobe.
www.jasonsheridanbrown.com www.landreportcollective.com
Cov
er:
Though collaboration tends to be rarer in visual art than other academic disciplines, there exists a rich legacy of successful artistic partnerships throughout art history: Jeanne Claude and Christo, Robert Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith, Chuck Close and Phillip Glass, Gilbert Proesch and George Passmore, Ryan Trecartin and Lizzie Fitch to name a few. Moreover, influential collectives and groups like the Dadaists in the early twentieth century, Fluxus in the 1960s, and Guerilla Girls in the 1980s have changed the course of history on account of their like-mindedness and willingness to band together.
When I accepted the opportunity to guest edit Number: 83, the first task at hand was choosing a theme. I deliberated on what I wanted to read about and explore, and it didn’t take much time to strike an inquisitive nerve. As I’ve watched the art scene burgeoning throughout Nashville — galleries opening, artists building studios, public art projects launching — I’ve come to realize that it takes a village to make all this stuff happen.
Collaboration has been a major theme in this city over the last several years. I’ve seen partnerships flourish and flounder, but not once have I seen someone build something significant and lasting in our community with only one mind and two hands.
Collaboration is a fascinating part of the art world, especially now. We exist in a unique age where we are imbued with an ever-present notion — whether we like it or not — of being part of a vast interconnected web. We are always connected; and we know it. So how we choose to formalize those connections interests me a great deal.
While I love the solitary mind, and all the romanticism that goes along with the “lone creator,” I do think it get can get a bit too much attention when it comes to professions like art or writing. So much of what fuels artists and writers is the community they create around their passions — the real human connections made. Whether the community is three people or a thousand, it’s a very important part of keeping one’s head above water.
Collaboration is an innate pull; the motivation for
it often comes from wanting to do something bigger than us; and that desire can be a really beautiful thing. I’ve always liked the idea of acknowledging our own limits and asking for someone’s help or input — it’s a great act of humility and love and trust. The world can feel so insanely competitive, like a full-sprint rat race: each man for himself. So it’s nice to be reminded from time to time that our peers do not have to be our rivals; we can help to elevate each other if we work together.
This issue explores all of that. The points where our solitary lines intersect, or rather, the points at which we choose to have them intersect.
In Jared Butler’s “Collaboration in Traditional Spaces,” he argues that collaboration is central to meaningful art making in twenty first century social and economic contexts. He spotlights the efforts of Savannah-based collective Art Rise. “The evolution of Art Rise,” he writes, “demonstrates how collaborative strategies are becoming the principle means by which emerging creative thinkers and makers are not only locating themselves within their communities, but making strides to effect change in those communities in the long term.”
Nashville Scene arts editor Laura Hutson spotlights electra eggleston, the father-daughter collaboration of William and Andra Eggleston. Earlier this year, Andra debuted the luxury textile line based on her famous father’s abstract paintings. Hutson describes a pattern called Berlin as “a primary-colored graffiti-inspired pattern (that) looks like a tamed Vasily Kandinsky’s Composition VII (1913).” She continues, “the print is as bold and colorful as a tightly arranged Josef Frank design, but its Southern roots — not to mention William Eggleston’s storied career as the father of contemporary color photography — make it even more of a hit.”
David King’s interview with Zack Rafuls and Ann Catherine Carter, co-curators of Nashville-based artist- run gallery space The Packing Plant, delves into the ins and outs of partnership. Since its inception, the Packing Plant has been a team-effort. The interview touches on the history of the gallery, how the two current curators share the workload, and the broader visions
and goals to which the space aspires. As Carter explained, “When I first jumped on board I needed to find a roster of artists who I found myself sympa-thetic to, but it was all from the ground up. Once I got going it was hard to keep up with everything that went into putting together these pop-up exhibitions. Now that Zack and I are working together, we both have been able to reach out to artists in a few different networks, and again, taking on whichever roles seems fit for each of us for a particular show.”
Arkansas Art Center hosted 30 Americans, a touring exhibition that showcased work by the most important African American artists of the last 40 years, including Kara Walker, Nike Cave, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Kehinde Wiley. Memphis’s Elle Perry discusses specific works as well as the exhibition’s important socio-political punch. She writes “the exhibition is unmistakably and unapologetically Black, with pieces of sharp critique and commentary on the experience of being Black in the United States of America.”
Nashville’s Erica Ciccarone contributes a review of a Nashville group exhibition at Track One titled The Silo Room, curated by Courtney Adair Johnson. Ciccarone writes of the show, “It’s collaborations like these that provide energy and brew enthusiasm in Nashville’s art scene, and I can’t wait to see what Johnson does next.”
The largest collaboration featured in the issue includes over 70 graffiti artists and mural writers from across the country. Madeline Faber covers the ambitious Paint Memphis mural project, completed in just one day, which now stands as Memphis’s longest mural. It stretches westward from North Evergreen Street and Chelsea Avenue in the often-neglected North Midtown neighborhood.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg for what you’ll find inside Number: 83. So I hope you enjoy the issue, which in itself has been one big, amazing collaboration. So many hands and hearts went into getting these pages into your hands right now. I extend a very sincere and heartfelt thanks to everyone at Number: Inc for giving me the chance to be a part of the village that made it happen.
EditorialGreater Than the Sum of Our Parts
Memphis, TNArt Center1636 Union Avenue901.276.6321www.artcentermemphis.com
Art Museum of the University of Memphis Communications and Fine Arts Bldg. 901.678.2224www.amum.org
Beauty Shop Restaurant966 South Cooper Memphis, TN 38104901.272.7111http://thebeautyshoprestaurant.com
brg3s architects11 W Huling AveMemphis, TN 38103901.260.9600www.brg3s.com
Caritas Village2509 Harvard AvenueMemphis, TN 38112901.327.5246http://www.caritasvillage.org
Circuitous Succession Gallery500 S 2nd StMemphis, TN 38103901 229 [email protected]
Christian Brothers UniversityBeverly & Sam Ross Gallery50 E ParkwayMemphis, TN 38104901.321.3243www.cbu.edu/[email protected]
Crosstown Arts422-438 N. ClevelandMemphis, TN 38104Tuesday-Saturday, 10 am - 6 pm 901.507.8030http://crosstownarts.org
Tim Crowderhttp://timcrowderartblog.blogspot.com
David Lusk Gallery64 Flicker StreetMemphis, TN 38111901.767.3800www.davidluskgallery.com
John Harrison Jones Architects431 S Main #102Memphis TN [email protected]
L Ross Gallery5040 Sanderlin Ave, Suite 104Memphis, TN 38117901.767.2200www.lrossgallery.com
Memphis Brooks Museum of Art1934 Poplar Avenue901.544.6226www.brooksmuseum.org
Memphis College of Art1930 Poplar Avenue901.272.5100 www.mca.edu
Main Gallery, Rust Hall at Memphis College of ArtGallery hours: Monday-Friday 8:30 am to 5pm, Saturday 9am to 4pm and Sunday 12 to 4 pm.
Hyde Gallery at Memphis College of ArtNesin Graduate School477 South MainGallery Hours: Wednesday-Saturday 12-5pm477 Store Hours: Wednesday-Saturday 12-5pm
Memphis Flyer 901.521.9000www.MemphisFlyer.comwww.memphismagazine.com
National Ornamental Metal Museum374 Metal Museum DriveMemphis, TN 38106901.774.6380metalmuseum.org
Denise Stewart-Sanabriahttp://www.stewart-sanabria.com
TOPS400 South Front StMemphis, TN [email protected]
Nashville, TN5th Avenue of the Arts, Arts CompanyRymer Gallery, Tinney Contemporary215 Fifth Avenue of the Arts NNashville, TN 37219615.254.2010www.5thavenueofthearts.com
Andee RudloffchicNhairP.O. Box 68081Nashville, TN [email protected] www.amosnandee.com
David Lusk Gallery516 Hagan StreetNashville, TN 37203615.780.9990www.davidluskgallery.com
Seed Space1201 4th Avenue Southhttp://seedspace.org
Tennessee Arts Commission401 Charlotte Avenue615.741.1701www.arts.state.tn.us
Johnson City, TNSlocumb GalleriesEast Tennessee State Universitywww.etsu.edu/cas/art/slocumb
Clarksville, TNWatagua Arts Academy Austin Peay State UniversityClarksville, TN 37044931.221.7876www.aspu.edu/watagua
Cleveland, MSDelta State UniversityWright Art Center Gallery1003 W. Sunflower Rd.662.846.4720www.dsuart.com
Studio 230110 B South Court StreetCleveland, MS 38723Wednesday-Friday & Sunday, 1pm-6pmSaturday 9am-7pmwww.studio230ms.com
Oxford, MSThe University of MississippiDepartment of Art and Art HistoryMeek Hall , Gallery 130662.915.7193art.olemiss.edu
University of Mississippi Museum and Historic HousesUniversity Ave & 5th StOxford, MS662.915.7073www.museum.olemiss.edu
Batesville, ARBatesville Area Arts Council246 E. Main StreetBatesville, AR 72503www.batesvilleareaartscouncil.org
Little Rock, ARArkansas Arts Center9th & Commerce / MacArthur ParkLittle Rock, AR 72203501.372.4000www.arkarts.com
University of Arkansas at Little RockDepartment of Art / Galleries2801 S University AveLittle Rock, AR 72204501.569.3182www.ualr.edu/art
Fayetteville, ARBottle Rocket Gallery1495 S Finger RoadFayetteville, AR [email protected]/bottlerocketartgallery
Support those who Support the Arts: Listings for Artists, Galleries, Organizations, and Businesses that Make Art Happen
6 NUMBER:83 7
Nashville’s Germantown neighborhood, the print is as bold and colorful as a tightly arranged Josef Frank design, but its Southern roots — not to mention William Eggleston’s storied career as the father of contemporary color photography — make it even more of a hit. The same print also comes in three mono-chromatic colorways — one in deep indigos, one in hues of pink, one in muted violets.
They are the kinds of textiles that beg to be lived in. “I like to use things,” Andra says. That is some-thing she and her father have in common — if some-one handed him an original drawing by Picasso, Andra says she could imagine him taping it on the wall so he could see it all the time, or using a piece of chewing gum to make sure it stayed put. electra eggleston is a luxury textile line, to be sure, but it is also, by its very nature, a functional kind of art. And perhaps its greatest function was the relationship between William and Andra Eggleston — something it intensi-fied from the very start.
Laura Hutson is the arts editor of the Nashville Scene.
William Eggleston was a famous photographer since his daughter Andra was born, but a little more than two years ago, during a visit with her dad at his midtown Memphis apartment, she discovered something new about him. She began to look through drawings and doodles the photographer had been making throughout his career. She went through scraps of paper tucked away in notebooks, address books with doodles in the margins — anything she could find with something interesting in it. His drawings, while much lesser known than his photo-graphs and generally made with a Sharpie, watercol-ors or oil pastels, were profoundly beautiful in ways Andra had not expected: “I was trying to find him in something other than a photograph,” she explains. “I told my husband, ‘I’m going to go see my dad once a month. Is that cool?’”
Growing up with a famous — and famously eccentric — father was a catalyst for Andra’s own creative undertakings, and emboldened her to take risks in her own career. The Memphis-born, Nashville-
based designer and former actress studied textiles at the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in L.A., and saw promise in designing prints based on her father’s abstract, colorful drawings.
When she found something she liked, she played with the scale of the drawings and experimented with different colorways until she found a combination that was just right. Under the kind of close examination required to deconstruct and arrange the drawings in that fashion, Andra was surprised to discover all sorts of similarities between her father’s photographs and the drawings he was creating at the same time. He never intended for these drawings to be seen by anyone other than himself, so finding works with a location or even a date marked on it was extremely difficult. Andra eventually found a drawing that her father made with the word “Havana” scrawled on its back, and when she compared it to photographs she found in his archives from a recent visit to Havana, she saw that he shot photos with similar lines and color patterns on the same trip. It was like finding the
Rosetta Stone. At that point, Andra says, she called her husband again. “I’m going every week!” she told him.
Two years later, Andra and her partner Anja Lademann debuted the inaugural collection of electra eggleston — 15 prints based on five of William’s original drawings. Andra chose the tongue-in-cheek business name based on a story her mother told her about her birth. When she was born, William said he wanted to name her Electra, but Andra’s mother refused. The line of textiles, Andra says, is like a rebirth, and it definitely connected the father and daughter in ways Andra had not expected. The two bonded over the collaboration as if Andra had learned to speak in her father’s language.
The prints are digitally printed in North Carolina using nonsynthetic materials such as cotton and Belgian linen. In a print design titled Berlin, a primary-colored graffiti-inspired pattern looks like a tamed Vasily Kandinsky’s Composition VII (1913). Used to upholster a modernist chair at Wilder, a boutique in
electra eggleston
electra eggleston Berlin Mitte Upholstered Chairs. Photo by Mackenzie Marony for Wilder. Josh Elrod, Andra Eggleston, and Ivy Elrod at WILDER, 2015. Photo by Mackenzie Maroney for Wilder.
8 NUMBER:83 9Guisela LaTorre, Ohio State University. Jody Stokes-Casey, Memphis, TN.
telling in constructing bridges to understanding one another’s identity. As the reception moved back outside, visitors flowed in and out of the space, back and forth between the installation and the reception. The events spilled over to the gallery’s parking lot, almost as if Lou’s family histories had taken flight and broken out of the gallery walls. The reception activated audience participation in the process of the blessing ritual, fellowship, partaking of food, or singing along to cover songs played by Savannah Long and Los Cantadores’ Cuban and Latin folk tunes. Gloria Lou, the artist’s daughter was a featured singer in a few of the Los Cantadores numbers. Richard Lou, Crosstown Arts, and the community partners created a space in which viewers were active participants in the events. These events were not just mere inaugural festivities, they were part and parcel of the artwork itself.
Authorship:In many of his works, Lou allows flexibility in
authorship by opening his pieces to the process of collaboration. Stories on my Back exercised shared authorship through labor in constructing the piece. Many of Lou’s family members and friends came to the gallery space to glue individual cornhusks to the structure. Memphis artist Chere Doiron reconstructed the artist’s father’s chair, a Lou family heirloom included in the installation. In the same way Lou opened his artwork to co-authorship, Crosstown Arts created a space for community institutions to collabo-rate in art making and exhibitions. The ideas and hard work of Centro Cultural Latino de Memphis meaning-fully enriched Stories on my Back. The sponsorship of ArtsMemphis and the First Tennessee Foundation, ArtsFirst, allowed for citywide collaboration and for the means to best benefit the creative community of Memphis.
Stories on my Back was made more successful through its dynamic community participation, instilling
a sense of activist consciousness and shared author-ship in attendees and spectators. This artwork ultimately affirmed family and kinship are much more than our blood relations. The artist and Crosstown Arts operated under progressive, inclusive, and anti-colonial definitions of family. Richard Lou’s outreach to his community through the exhibition Stories on my Back demonstrated those who surround him are also part of his family history.
1 Clare Bishop, “Introduction,” in Participation, ed. Clare Bishop (Cambridge, MIT Press, 2006), 12.
2 Read more from Nina Simon on her blog Museum 2.0. Quote from Nina Simon, “Using Social Bridging to be ‘For Everyone’ in a New Way,” Museum 2.0, May 8, 2013, Accessed July 4, 2015 at http://museumtwo.blogspot.com/2013/05/using-social-bridging-to-be-for.html
3 Lars Bang Larsen, “Social Aesthetics,” in Participation, ed. Claire Bishop (Cambridge, MIT Press, 2006), 172.
Stories on my Back, by Richard Lou; on view at Crosstown Arts Gallery in Memphis, Tennessee; June 5 – July 4, 2015; presented a multi-sensory installation, along with a community-led reception and art history talk at Caritas Village. Lou is best known for criticizing systems of power through politically engaged work that addresses anti-colonialism. In Stories on my Back, he turned the creative eye toward himself and his family — with intimacy that inspires others to do the same — and created an experience in which to engage with the work that’s exemplary of Crosstown Arts’ philosophy of creating space for collaboration.
Those who arrived early to the opening reception held the evening of June 5 were treated to empanadas from Havana’s Pilon, paletas by Michoachana, and elote (grilled corn) while they waited for gallery doors to open. Two members of Danza Azteca Quetzalcoatl soon arrived in ceremonial clothing and conducted a ceremonial blessing and cleansing of the space, the installation, the artist, and attendees. This involved copal, incense made from an aromatic tree resin that has been used in indigenous spiritual practices dating back to Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. The blessing symbolized a convergence between the past and present, recalling how everything we do is part of a historical continuum: the past and the present cannot be disentangled. Later, the artist would vocalize to attendees that during the ceremony he had been spiritually transported to San Diego—the city of his birth and also of his formative years as an artist, the place and period in his life that led directly to that present moment.
As notions of past and present intertwined, the performance challenged the commonly made distinc-tion between art and spirituality, and the everyday. The idea that artistic and spiritual practice exist high above the day-to-day is a Eurocentric viewpoint. Rejected in Lou’s work, is the elevation of certain activities over others, and the segregation of spaces in which they operate. Spiritual cleansing, viewing art, eating, dancing, singing, and socializing combined during the dedication of Stories on my Back to represent the artist’s desire to break down barriers between different cultural activities.
For the duration of the exhibition, the artist requested the windows be draped with heavy black cloth. The only light source would come from the installation itself, through a system of interconnected columns and beams that spanned the gallery. Recalling the feathered serpent Quetzalcoatl of Aztec mythology and the scales of the Chinese dragon, the columns and beams were completely covered in cornhusks; hidden inside the columns were lights, which filtered softly through the husks creating an ethereal quality
to the structure. Through hidden speakers, the artist’s children (Gloria, Magda, Maricela and Ming) narrated Lou family stories. On the far end of the gallery, a sculpture replicating a recliner that belonged to Lou’s father was positioned in front of a television monitor playing a video work titled On the Shore of the East China Sea on loop. In it, Lou’s children talked about their grandfather, a Chinese immigrant, and his wise response to a belligerent gun enthusiast who touted the military “superiority” of the U.S. over China.
Another story of Lou’s grandfather inspired the exhibition title. When the elder Lou was getting ready to leave his native China, he wished to write a goodbye letter to his mother before his undoubtedly permanent departure. Without the ability to read or write, he offered his back as a writing surface and elicited the help of a literate man. The act of having someone write directly on one’s back was deeply symbolic for the artist. Such an act represented the power the educated man had over Lou’s grandfather, but it also figuratively meant we carry our family narratives on our backs, affecting the relationships we build with others. “While this educated man was using my grandfather’s back,” Lou surmised, “it felt like one thousand years had passed.”
Lou designed Stories on my Back to communicate the history of a family that spanned the territories of the United States, Mexico, and China. The columns and beams zigzagging across the gallery evoked the movement of that lineage which viewers walking through the installation were charged to envisage. In stories, we learned the artist’s Chinese-American father served in the U.S. military during World War II, and that his Mexican mother’s feisty spirit could never be repressed despite being abandoned by her father when she was a child. The family history became epic, almost transcendent in its retelling.
Family histories often define our social identities. It can feel like the stories and experiences of our ancestors are imprinted on our bodies. These histories manifest themselves in our actions, and social identities affect broader movements. Thus, becoming aware of how our own family narrative shapes who we are is an important part of community building.
Artists, viewers, and institutions have increasingly come to expect some kind of social practice or shared authorship from art. There is a demand for a more holistic experience in which the viewer becomes invested, either through participation or a call to action, as a result of the work. According to Claire Bishop, participation is usually aligned with one or all of three facets: community, activation, or authorship.1
Community: According to their mission, Crosstown Arts is
dedicated to cultivating the creative community in Memphis through contemporary art as well as through multidisciplinary and collaborative projects. Recently, the organization has begun an eighteen-month partnership with Centro Cultural Latino de Memphis to showcase Memphis area Latino artists and their contributions to the larger creative commu-nity. Through this partnership, the two organizations are able to be inclusive of a variety of other institu-tions, creating a broad and accessible community of artists and patrons. Funding the collaboration is a grant from ArtsMemphis and from the First Tennes-see Foundation, ArtsFirst. The missions for both of these organizations are to foster and support the arts for the purpose of building community. Stories on my Back, resulting from this collaboration, stretched beyond the gallery space and into the community when in conjunction with the exhibit, Guisela LaTorre spoke at Caritas Village.
Cartitas Village and Centro Cultural Latino de Memphis have always been spaces for exhibiting artworks, but their primary focus has been the social needs of the community. Crosstown Arts is only three years old, but it is already establishing itself as a leading institution for visual art in Memphis, recogniz-ing that art can break down barriers between commu-nities. The mission and structure of Crosstown allow for an unbridled exploration of art making. For Stories on my Back, Lou needed a space for the work, which included not only the installation, but also all of the activities of the reception. Crosstown opened their gallery and parking lot to the community to accom-modate the entirety of Stories on my Back.
Activation:Crosstown Arts is a space dedicated to activating
relationships across all communities.2 They create what Nina Simon refers to as “social bridging,” scenarios aimed at bringing people together across difference with the purpose of building a more cohesive community. Crosstown Arts identifies the “creative community” in their mission. Through hosting Stories on my Back, Crosstown Arts collaborated with various community organizations to create a space for social bridging, activating relationships between viewers and participants.
The concept is similar to Lars Bang Larsen’s social aesthetics, interactions in art spaces without the demand of contemporary art’s conceptual rigidity.3 Both Lou’s Stories on my Back and Crosstown Arts’ partnership with Centro de Cultural Latino de Memphis requires viewers to be active. Through sharing his own experiences and family history, Lou creates a space encouraging viewers to consider and share their own stories. The piece demonstrates the power of story-
Richard Lou, Stories on My Back
Richard Lou, Stories on My Back, 2015, Installation view. Photo courtesy of the artist.
10 NUMBER:83 11
Interview: The Packing Plant
David King is an artist in Nashville, TN.
are: it feels incredibly inward and people are defiant in their localism/regionalism, or, on the other hand, instead of trying to establish a bridge or dialogue between what’s happening here and elsewhere, they seek to just be elsewhere. Instead of highlighting what’s important or special or relative about Nashville or New York, it’s like, “Nashville needs to be more like New York.” And I think both of those attitudes are prob-lematic...so The Packing Plant is kind of a balancing act between those two conditions, to find some middle ground there.
AC: Part of that is also not discriminating between emerging and established artists. That’s important to us. Through curation, we’re able to generate conversa-tion between works and artists, across those sorts of distinctions that inhibit dialogue.D: The space that The Packing Plant inhabits is also unusual. Could you speak about those characteristics?
AC: For a while it used to be low lit, concrete cinder block, blue walls. The lighting was dim and low, so it was really peculiar and dungeon-y. So to brighten it up, for work to stand out to some degree, it became important to at least to have the walls white and bring in some proper lighting.
Z: The shows that I feel have been most successful were the ones that owned up to that space, and instead of trying to show their work as they would in any other space, consciously sort of played off the peculiarities of it. That’s why I think Amy Pleasant’s show was so great. It felt like the product of excavation. The
Packing Plant feels like it has been excavated or recovered from an abandoned sort of space.D: And that’s changing. Drywall is going up, covering over some of the cinderblock walls that had defined that space’s character.
Z: It’s exciting to see change, but it’s also scary because it makes me feel nervous about losing what makes The Packing Plant different. As soon as it gets drywall it’s going to be one step closer to the white cube, which is not inherently bad, but I do think that the nature of the space being as raw as it is captures our attitudes about art making and our position in the community. It’s kind of renegade in a way.
AC: It’s interesting to work with the weird constraints that happen during the new construction that is being added to the building. We will work with whatever happens. That’s the nature of the space. The fact that, okay, so here we have these two new walls going up...so go with it. I like working with what I have, and these are the new parameters. It keeps us on our toes. The space activates the work in its own way and that’s exciting.D: A lot of the Nashville commercial galleries are playing to a market that isn’t as tuned-in. They haven’t seen a lot of art, and most of those rare individuals buying work aren’t going to the art crawl every month. Their ends might be finding an interior design piece for their home, instead of supporting an artist that they feel like they have a connection with. There’s also the blue chip market in bigger cities that you guys don’t
have to play to, so there’s two market forces that you are free from.
Z: The thing about commercial galleries is that they are in a position where they have to make the space commercially viable, and I think that’s constricting. We are in a position where we don’t have to concern ourselves with that at all. I guess that’s the nature of project spaces or artist run spaces, where they are able to give artists the opportunity to free themselves from the commercial restraints they may have had to navigate elsewhere. So in that way it’s great that we don’t have to answer to anybody like that, it really frees us up.
AC: But there is a trade-off. For instance, having to consistently use our own personal resources to make these things happen. And I don’t think that we show work that couldn’t sell, but that also isn’t something that is of concern to us.D: If you want to use commercial terms I would say your product is different. Like Zack mentioned before, I think their goals are quite different from yours.
AC: We want to show what we feel should be seen by a larger community. Things that have visual weight, at least in our eyes. But once you start talking about what sells, I think that can muddy your vision. You can lose sight of your goals and your community.
Ann Catherine Carter and Zack Rafuls are artists and curators living in Nashville, TN. Together they operate The Packing Plant, an artist-run gallery space in the growing Wedgewood-Houston area. They are both recent graduates of Watkins College of Art, Design, & Film and have both interned for Zieher Smith & Horton, a gallery based in New York City. Rafuls has also studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago as part of the AICAD Mobility Program, and in Fall 2016 Carter will be pursuing her MFA at Pratt in NYC.
David King is an artist in Nashville, TN. He has studied at Watkins College of Art, Design, & Film and curated the group exhibition It’s Hot in a Dog’s Head at Ground Floor Gallery & Studios. A former classmate of Rafuls and Carter, he has worked collaboratively with them both on a variety of projects and shown alongside them in a number of group shows in Nashville. He holds a BA from the University of Tennessee.
D: Could you talk a little bit about the origins of The Packing Plant?
AC: Veronica Kavass, curator, art writer and former professor at Watkins College of Art, Design, & Film, wanted to see some more ambitious or strange work in town that wasn’t able to exist in the commercial galleries. And so she got the opportunity to be able to do pop-up projects during the art crawl in this space through Jon Sewell, her friend and the building owner, in April 2014. Veronica knew she was leaving pretty soon for graduate studies, but she wanted to see
these types of projects continue, so she offered the space to me in July 2014. I was in a spot where I was looking to take my practice more professionally, give opportunities to artists that might not have otherwise gotten opportunities, and attempt to bring the same sort of contemporary conversation that you would hear in larger art cities to Nashville.
Z: Ann Catherine did six months of shows before I joined on in January 2015 and became a partner in this curatorial project. AC and I have been friends, collabo-rators, and classmates for a couple years now, and she was struggling managing it all alone. After having some experience through curatorial projects in undergrad, including working as chair of student art collective Company H at Watkins, and various pop-ups with Zieher Smith & Horton, I felt ready to take on a project with more direct responsibility.
AC: With two of us, there’s communication, there’s collaboration, there’s a divvying up of responsibilities, and there are more people in your network. We both take on certain roles when needed. D: It sounds like there is a lot of time investment and responsibility that results from operating the space. I only have a vague idea of what’s involved. What are some of the duties that come with managing a small art space?
Z: The main sorts of things would be: establishing curatorial programming, so a schedule of monthly shows that coincide with the Wedgewood-Houston Art Crawl here in Nashville; all of the communication that comes with that; the correspondence with artists and the
organizing of each show; framing the shows concep-tually and thematically through curatorial statements we write together. I was an intern at Zeitgeist Gallery for a few months, and through that I picked up on how to go about planning and organizing shows.
AC: There were also the beginning stages of orchestrating all of that. When I first jumped on board I needed to find a roster of artists who I found myself sympathetic to, but it was all from the ground up. Once I got going it was hard to keep up with every-thing that went into putting together these pop-up exhibitions. Now that Zack and I are working together we both have been able to reach out to artists in a few different networks, and again, taking on whichever roles seems fit for each of us for a particular show.D: The shows at the Packing Plant typically feel more experimental in nature. How would you say that The Packing Plant defines itself? Is it through a relation to what is already present here, what seems to be missing, or by looking at what’s happening in bigger cities?
AC: I feel like it’s an attempt to look at the bigger picture, bring what we can here, and also find what is here that does respond to the bigger picture.
Z: But Nashville is part of the bigger picture. And maybe the problem is that Nashville feels isolated. We try to maintain a balance between national, regional, and local. There’s a level of integration that we seek to establish, an attempt to make conversation happen, because sometimes here it feels really incestuous or something like that. So I think the two weird states
Zach Rafuls and Ann Catherine Carter, curators of The Packing Plant. Photo courtesy of the author. Cody Tumblin, Bits and Pieces, dimensions variable, dyed fabric with cable, 2015. Photo by Ann Catherine Carter. Amy Pleasant, Cut Outs #40 - 57 on Plywood Platform, dimensions variable, oil on canvas, 2014. Photo by Ann Catherine Carter.
12 NUMBER:83 13
Fresh from completing my master’s degree in art history at the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2013, I pitched an art column to Connect Savannah, the local independent weekly newspaper. Donning my new art critic hat, green as the Hostess City’s sprawling live oaks, I ambled around Savannah’s transitional midtown neighborhoods, home to a generous share of abandoned properties, crack corners and, in distinct contrast, hundreds of upper-middle-class art students. On those Friday evenings, I would stroll down Bull Street, which divides the city into its east and west sides, well south of the sprawling, manicured Forsyth Park, the southern border of the historic district and its tightly choreographed performance of quaint southern charm. Small exhibition spaces peppered these streets, enough to guarantee at least one opening per week interesting enough to pen a critical response of a few hundred words.
On one such balmy, late spring evening, I set out toward Desotorow Gallery, Inc., a nonprofit exhibition space then undergoing a reconceptualization of the venue’s function, in order to interview Clinton Edminster, an Alaska native and former SCAD student set to take over as Desotorow’s new executive director. He and a set of typically ragtag twenty-somethings matriculating at or recently graduated from SCAD and Armstrong Atlantic University were forming sharp ideas and networking with the right people. Edminster expressed broad ambitions of community revitalization with
focus and eloquence as he acknowledged all the while the complex labor of nonprofit organization, the tedium of analytics and assessment, and the challenge of garnering public interest.
Two years later, Desotorow Gallery, Inc. has become Art Rise Savannah, an institution dedicated to developing a sustainable creative local economy “through a cycle of evaluation, action and results.” Employing what they articulate on their website to be an “action-oriented, forward thinking model” that features “a holistic system of observation and data collection together with assessment and integration,” the conceivers of Art Rise have codified those twenty-something ambitions and gilded them with professional gleam. More than effectively articulating abstract principles, the new institution has overseen the expansion of Savannah’s First Friday Art March and has offered numerous professional and creative opportunities to Savannah’s art makers and appreciators. Edminster, executive director of the new institution, additionally runs Starlandia, a creative supply shop where you can buy, sell or trade materials or take part in free weekly workshops led by local artists.
Rather than put up indulgent, obscure exhibitions week after week of manneristic, sloppily executed works, Art Rise situates itself within a specific economic and social context, and recognizes the futility of any notion of art making in Savannah ignorant of the complex interactions between neighborhoods, small businesses,
and residents. For Edminster, among Art Rise’s central values is “a belief in the potential of Savannah as well as the individuals and groups within it.” In this way, the evolution of Art Rise demonstrates how collaborative strategies are becoming the principle means by which emerging creative thinkers and makers are not only locating themselves within their communities, but making strides to effect change in those communities in the long term. Collaboration is part of the genetic structure of art making in the twenty-first century. In Edminster’s idiom, “collaboration is the step from single-celled to multi-cellular.”
Recalling key developments within the last decade clarifies why discussing the several hundred private university students living south of Forsyth Park in Savannah, Georgia is an appropriate example to demonstrate the function of collaborative artistic endeavors in the emerging economic and cultural landscape of the twenty-first century. The nearly twelve thousand students presently enrolled at SCAD’s four international campuses and online education program indicate the surge in the number of undergraduate and graduate degrees in art and design related disciplines in particular, and the swell in higher education in general. Curricula at SCAD and other U.S. universities offer, and require, theoretical courses featuring syllabi laden with contemporary critiques of originality, most notably in the vein of Roland Barthes. Even those students who only pretend
to do the assigned reading will come into contact with the notion of originality being an antiquated concept given the maelstrom of signs and symbols in combi-nation and competition. If the twenty-first century art school student is well aware of this contemporary literature, then for her originality has fallen from the esteemed status of closely held value. Not tempted into pursuing the mythologized hermitage of the artist-genius and art for its own sake, what might she accomplish with all that freed up time?
Since the Great Recession, the ten thousand undergraduate and graduate students in Savannah have found themselves in a city that plays out on a microcosmic scale the broader national social and economic conditions. Blocks in Savannah’s historic Victorian and Starland neighborhoods bought up in 2007 to be redeveloped as semi-luxurious apartments were dilapidated old Victorians owned by pitiable slumlords by 2010. This economic situation — and a subsequent rush of violent crime, gang-related violence, racial tension, and small business turnover — presented students pursuing leisurely studies a moment of cognitive dissonance. Rather than “I want to paint a masterpiece,” thoughtful young people aware of their own privilege and confronted with scenes of such economic blight would likely sooner say, “I want to open a creative business that plays a role in improving this community,” or “I want to design and establish a
networking app that puts people who want to learn particular skills in touch with relevant experts.”
These particular conditions, then, are convincing the next generation of art makers that art is most meaningful when it is understood as a highly organized locus of material: a site of realized connections between forms, peoples, places, ideas and times set into material existence — be that material bronze or the human body in performance. Art is most provocative when it engages the breadth of experience, that inevitable confluence of matter in motion abiding by the rules of physical, economic, political, and social systems.
And the youth today, even those raised to be suspicious of American capitalism and the globalized market, are witnessing instances where the market seems to right itself. Major corporations played a hand in deterring state legislators from enacting potentially prejudicial religious freedom laws. Businesses head-quartered in metropolitan areas are spurring the development of more efficient public transportation and more strategically designed urban tapestries in order to attract young professionals. Donald Trump saw his share of economic backlash as his brand lost tens of millions of dollars in the wake of his controver-sial comments on immigration. Small moments like these, fleeting and few in number, when economic karma seems a measurable phenomenon, make it easier to forget the ways that our present economic
configuration favors inequality as a rule.A wave of young creative makers, artists, and
social entrepreneurs — that fashionable new category — are opening businesses, publishing media in forms running the gamut, starting art marches, playing at house shows and other pop-up venues, and repurposing ruined spaces. In one form or another, they inject themselves into their local community, and they are optimistic despite their acknowledgment of the Sisyphean struggle before them. Art Rise Savannah, Starlandia, and similar Savannah-based efforts offer examples of how a constellation of indistinct ideas can lead to an organized group of people running a nonprofit agency, gallery, art supply store, or strategic urban renewal movement. These examples abound in Atlanta, Nashville, Charlotte, and beyond; one can be sure that the people and ideas are present even if a lack of funding makes them hard to see. Perhaps especially because of that fact, we find ourselves in a place and at a time in which cooperation between people and entities with access to varying resources is more vital than ever to the production of meaningful works of art. Forming artist collectives and residences, organizations, integrating for-profit and nonprofit strategies, programming multifaceted art-related events that mindfully benefit local small businesses, and other collaborative endeavors, then, are precisely the means of making art matter in the twenty-first century.
Jared Butler is a writer and critic based in Atlanta, GA.
Collaboration in Transitional Spaces
Abandoned spaces adjacent to the Art Rise gallery space on Desoto Avenue now serve as music venues and sculpture gardens. Photograph by Colin Czerwinski, February 2015. Image courtesy of Clinton Edminster. Art Rise Savannah, Inc. led the expansion of Savannah’s Starland District First Friday Art March. Photograph by Lauren Flotte, March 2015. Image courtesy of Clinton Edminster.
14 NUMBER:83 15Elle Perry is a lover of art, film, live music, and eating at tasty local restaurants.
30 AmericansArkansas Art CenterLittle Rock, ArkansasApril 10 through June 21, 2015
From April 10 through June 21 the Arkansas Art Center housed an exhibition of 41 paintings, drawings, sculptures, installations, digital videos, and photographs from some of the 30 most significant Black American visual artists from the past 40 years.
The name of the exhibit is subtle, yet statement-making: 30 Americans. It is not 30 African Americans or 30 Black Americans or 30 Americans Doing African American Art. All of the artists included hail from the United States. And the exhibition is unmistakably and unapologetically Black, with pieces of sharp critique and commentary on the experience of being Black in the United States of America.
Miami’s (Mera and Don) Rubell Family Collection organized 30 Americans; variations of which have been shown in other cities with significant black populations: Nashville, at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts; Raleigh, at the North Carolina Museum of Art; the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, V.A.; and the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
Arkansas Art Center displayed the work in two areas separated by the entrance hall. Attendees walking into either side of the exhibition were greeted with work that demanded their attention.
On one side, it was Gary Simmons’ installation Duck, Duck, Noose: A noose hanging from the ceiling was surrounded by a circle of white Ku Klux Klan masks, each atop a wooden stool, with eye holes that peered toward the center of the room. On the other side was a piece of blinding white neon by Glenn Ligon: “America” spelled out in capital letters. Nearby, more neon: Ligon’s yellow, lowercase “negro sunshine.”
The work spans from 1970 to 2010 — almost a half century of art, and the exhibition succeeds in establishing a timeline of contemporary Black visual art. Older, well- established artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat and Carrie Mae Weems were included alongside younger artists such as Kehinde Wiley. There was the fantastical, Nick Cave’s colorful and imposing Soundsuits; the sardonic, Robert Colescott’s Untitled; and the gender-based, such
as Wangechi Mutu’s interpretation of the female body in her collage Non je ne regrette rien. Iona Rozeal Brown’s Untitled (after Kikugawa Eizan’s “Furyu nana komachi” [The Modern Seven Komashi]) takes a woman painted in Japanese tradition but adds cornrows, brown hands, and a partially brown face. Mickalene Thomas’ Baby I’m Ready Now collage inserts glittery rhinestones into a portrait of a black woman in a scene plucked straight from the 1970s. Kara Walker tackles American historic racism with Camptown Walkers. The piece, which takes up an entire wall, is composed of childlike illustrations of monstrous stereotypes of slavery. Another large, social- examining piece is Leonardo Drew’s Untitled#25, a 102 x 158 x 33 inch sculpture of cotton pressed together into large blocks with wax. Xaviera Simmons’ slightly askew photo Appear, Appease, Applaud (Also, Perhaps, Maybe) features a young Black girl, clad in a black dress, tights, and short boots skipping past a heavily blighted two story Victorian house in the direction of the more modern home next door that has been obviously cared for.
Black art often includes biting social commentary and several more of the pieces included in 30 Americans are examples of this.
Kerry James Marshall’s Souvenir: Composition in Three Parts, 1998-2000 sculpture references the 1963 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama with a replica of the cross from the historic church. Hank Willis Thomas depicts how advertising profits from the body of Black males. Branded Head is a side profile photograph of a man with a keloid scar shaped like a Nike Swoosh. Thomas riffs on a popular Mastercard campaign in Priceless “3-piece suit: $250, new socks: $2, 9 mm: $80, gold chain: $400, Bullet: ¢60, Picking the perfect casket for you son: Priceless.” This text is superimposed on a photograph he took at his murdered cousin’s funeral.
The last few works in the exhibition proved to be some of the most popular among attendees, and some of the most relevant to today’s hip hop generation. In Equestrian Portrait of the Count Duke Olivares and Triple Portrait of Charles I, oil painter Kehinde Wiley has taken classical paintings and inserted young, Black men plucked from the streets of New York City. With ornate gold frames, the life-size paintings include men who do not ordinarily find themselves in art museums.
Not all of the contributions are angst-ridden. Some of what is included in 30 Americans documents shared Black culture or history. Henry Taylor’s The Long Jump by Carl Lewis immortalizes the Olympian jumping into prosperity and history books. Jeff Soundhouse’s Exhibit A: Cardinal Francis Arinze is a stylized, multimedia portrait of the Nigerian Catholic cardinal. The man in Barkley L. Hendricks’s Noir is a retro embodiment of the epitome of cool Black male fashion. He dons a three-piece blue pinstriped suit with lighter blue wide collared shirt, short afro, gold aviator sunglasses, and a long pinky nail on his left hand holding a cigarette. Rashid Johnson’s I Who Have Nothing is a mixed media slice of life: A waxed-coated diorama recalling the living room of your favorite auntie, complete with balls of yellow shea butter, gold candela-bras, and vinyl records by Al Green and Bob Guillaume.
30 Americans accomplished a major feat, chronicling contemporary Black art and traveling to several cities. But more of this is needed, with access to those whose lives and experiences are portrayed in the works. Black cultural institutions are important, but it is equally important for those living outside of major cities to experience art that reflects the world in which they in.
With Wiley’s paintings shown in the record-breaking hip hop soap Empire, his recognition has increased outside of the New York art world. This is similar to what happened when Brenda Joysmith, Ellis Willis, Varnette Honeywood were featured on the set and in the plotlines of The Cosby Show in the 1980s. More television shows targeting African American audiences should use their platforms to expose the masses to fine art created by African Americans.
There is more evidence these black culture collisions will increase in media such as television, music, film, and literature. In June, R&B singer Bilal released the album In Another Life with Black artist Angelbert Metoyer’s painting God’s Orchestra as the cover art. With musicians such as Bilal, Kendrick Lamar, and D’Angelo commenting on current social injustices in their music, those interested in the artists of 30 Americans, and other African American artists of today, await a fresh visual response to each turn of events in society today.
Black art in America is not simply Black, it is American at the same time. It deserves to be appreciated by a larger body of its citizenry.
Regional Update: Memphis
An artist friend of mine of 30 years, who lives and paints in Santa Rosa, California, asks me every six months, “what’s the art scene like in Memphis?” I often answer in a general way, because unless you’re in Memphis, it’s hard to really grasp how varied and changing the art scene really is. Art is embraced in every form, with an abundance of art galleries, museums, colleges, universities, and public art programs that promote and support the arts. The last and first Friday of each month you can find a minimum of 50 exhibitions, performances, presentations, or art-sponsored events open to the general public. Here are a few highlights, and some of the recent changes:
The 2015 Art of the South exhibition, presented by Number: Inc., was at the Memphis College of Art Hyde Gallery May 20 through July 31. In its second year, this exhibition proved yet again that amazing artists are working in the Mid-South. This year’s exhibition was juried by artist Wayne White, and included 40 regional artists.
After several years at the flagship location, Memphis’ David Lusk Gallery relocated to 64 Flicker Street this summer, in time for Mash Up: artists do cardboard, on view July 14 through August 1. Gallery Fifty Six relocated as well, and is now serving artists and clients across the street from its old location as part of the Palladio Group (2169 Central Avenue). L. Ross Gallery filled their summer schedule with group exhibitions, including It’s Good to be the King, a variety of Elvis-inspired work, on view August 4 through 29. Crosstown Arts had an ongoing schedule of exhibitions, lectures, and open critiques throughout the summer, and debuted a studio residency program that will rotate artists every four months. Jay Etkin’s new gallery is located in the center of the Cooper Young community, and has a colorful collection of contemporary art. Circuitous Succession Gallery recently opened downtown, off Second Street, with a collection of installation, abstract, and contemporary art. Caritas Village Hope Gallery came to the Centro Cultural, Latino Cultural Community Center for two months during the summer, bringing South American flavor to the community through artwork, dance, music, and their annual Tamale Festival.
The South Main and Broad Street Art Districts both celebrated art throughout the year with exhibitions, art events, concerts, and crafts festivals. The Urban Arts Commission has a variety of ongoing projects around Memphis that focus on the history of Memphis and neighborhoods in which public art is being developed. The Memphis Brooks Museum of Art hosted The Art of Video Games, a Smithsonian American Art Museum exhibition, with a round of public programming that included a Minecraft competition to build “the world’s coolest art museum”. Large-scale ceramic sculptures by Jun Kaneko are installed on the grounds of Dixon Gallery and Gardens through November 22, and the museum has begun indoor gallery renovations.
Murals have become a major part of the Memphis landscape in the last few years. After having gone from “graffiti”, to “street art”, to “commissioned work” on a national scale, Memphis has embraced this development as well, with murals on the side of buildings, railroad underpasses, blank walls, paper boxes, and parking meters.
The Memphis art scene is constantly growing; it’s a living and breathing machine maintained by artist, designers, curators, art lovers, and art supporters.
Carl Moore is the reincarnation of Pable Picasso.
Regional Update: Nashville
Internationally renowned Spanish artist Jaume Plensa made his Nashville debut this summer with a blockbuster cross-city exhibition at Cheekwood Botanical Gardens and Museum of Art and the Frist Center for the Visual Arts. On view through the fall, Jaume Plensa: Human Landscape is the artist’s largest exhibition to date in the United States.
The newest addition to Nashville’s public art was completed early this summer. Commissioned by Metro Arts Commission, Seattle-based artist team Laura Haddad and Tom Drugan finished their 45-foot-high sculpture Light Meander at the new West Riverfront Park, an 11-acre civic park on the site of the former Thermal Transfer Plant in downtown Nashville. Made of guitar picks, LED lights, stainless steel and ipe wood, the ribbon-shaped sculpture is based on the curves of the Cumberland River as it passes through Davidson County.
In June, Sherrick & Paul opened a remarkable exhibition of photographs by one of the most eccentric and enigmatic artists of the 20th century, Vivian Maier. A prolific photographer and noted recluse, Maier worked for 40 years as a nanny and died in anonymity in 2009. In recent years she has gained significant notoriety for her stunning street portraits of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles. It was the first solo exhibition of Maier’s work to appear in this region of the country.
February saw the grand opening of CG2, Cumberland Gallery’s new satellite location in the Track One building of Wedgewood-Houston. With Jason Lascu as director, the space aims to represent emerging to mid-career artists from across the country specializing in challenging, cutting-edge work. Their current roster features 12 artists from across the country including Jen Uman, Mark Hosford, Andrea Heimer, Fred Stonehouse, and Nathalie Thibault.
The newest pop-up gallery space in East Nashville, DADU, hosted its inaugural group exhibition in early June titled Conversations. DADU, short for Detached Accessory Dwelling Unit, which is the city code name for tiny homes on one’s property, is set to host quarterly exhibitions in conjunction with the East Side Art Stumble, an art crawl held on the second Saturday of each month. DADU’s first pop-up was a brick-and-mortar realization of a series of online exhibitions curated by galleryELL founder John Ros (NYC/London) in collaboration with director and artist Jodi Hays (Nashville). Artists included Maria Christoforatou, Anna Freeman Bentley, Kariann Fuqua, Jodi Hays, Nancy Hubbard, Kei Imai, Kirsten Nash, Jaimini Patel, and John Ros. Notions of home, place, and space are contemplated and examined in each artist’s practice.
In honor of Flag Day, local artist and designer Elizabeth Williams of Isle of Printing curated a commemorative exhibition dedicated to flags and flag-inspired art. Aptly titled Flag Show, the lineup presented an impressive roster of 22 artists that includes Jen Uman, Richard Swift, Alex Lockwood, Bryce McCloud, Rachel Briggs, Shelby Rothenhöfer, Julian Baker, Will Morgan Holland, Elle Long, Kelly Williams, and Elizabeth Williams herself. The one-night-only exhibition was at Club Roar, a private studio/warehouse space in Berry Hill.
East Side Story, Nashville’s only all-local bookstore, recently celebrated the release of a new book anthology titled Based On: Words, Notes, and Art from Nashville to benefit the Arts & Business Council of Greater Nashville. Featuring over 30 authors, musicians, and artists, Based On is a collection of short stories, songs, and visual art prints arranged in a book that includes a 12-song CD. Contributors include Chuck Beard, Tony Earley, and Betsy Phillips, David Mead, Tristen, Brooke Waggoner, and Cory Basil.
Sara Estes is a writer and curator based in Nashville, TN.
Regional Update: Atlanta
The art scene in Atlanta for the past few months offered exhibitions that were stimulating, informative, contemplative, experimental, and downright “out there.”
In the “out there” category, Flux Projects, Atlanta’s leading agency for experimental art projects, introduced Nick Cave: Up Right to a huge audience at Ponce City Market in April. Best known for his Soundsuits — wearable sculptures that come to life through movement — Cave collaborated with choreographer T. Lang, a Spelman College assistant dance professor and artistic director of T. Lang Dance, in a spectacular performance that was a highlight of the spring season. Looking forward, Flux Night, Atlanta’s famous night of art and experimentation returns on Saturday, October 3. Get this on your calendars now.
The Hambidge Center for Creative Arts & Sciences and the Goat Farm Arts Center launched FIELD EXPERIMENT, a competition to design a project that would be interactive, community-driven, collaborative, and accessible to the public. Of the five finalists, Mel Chin working with Severn Eaton won with Jam-D-Jam, a radio-based intervention that will invite participants to use their traffic-choked commute to contribute to an ever-changing soundscape. The project debuts publicly in the fall.
The Atlanta gallery scene has continued to percolate with work by national and local artists. Jackson Fine Art Gallery backed up Atlanta’s reputation as a national photography center with Sally Mann: At Twelve. Man spoke at the Atlanta History Center in May to introduce her new book HoldStill, a photo and text narrative that explores family, race, mortality, and the landscape of the American South.
At Dashboard, Martha Whittington’s Exchange tackled the unfair trade practices and processes of assimilation that nearly erased indigenous cultures. Through videos and eight impeccably crafted sculptures, Whittington presented a thoughtful and contemplative approach to our history with Native Americans.
The Marcia Wood Gallery, Castleberry location, took a new direction in April toward more experimental work with the collaborative exhibition Triple Play. Artists Ron Saunders, Stacie Rose, and Angus Galloway worked to undermine solo authorship in a playful collection of abstract mixed-media paintings. At the new Marcia Wood mid-town location, Lucinda Bunnen: Weathered Chromes presented photographs of slides that had been manipu-lated by the weather, proving a savvy eye does not bend to age in this octogenarian’s work.
At the High Museum of Art through September 6, the exhibition Alex Katz, This is Now, curated by Michael Rooks, focused on the artist’s large-scale landscape paintings. Best known for paintings of ordinary people, Katz translated his “present moment” plein air sketches into crazy-big paintings, some of which are 30 feet long. In these works, subjects of roses, trees, fields, and a brook are treated to Katz’s flat wet-on-wet painterly approach, and an undertow of abstraction emerges, revealing structure and fluidity in representational imagery. Katz’s cool paintings offered a refreshing break from Atlanta’s steamy summer.
Maggie Davis is an artist and writer living in Roswell, Georgia.
Laura Haddad & Tom Drugan, Light Meander, 45’ tall, 3’ wide, 12” thick; Stainless steel plate & tube, hardwood, color-changing LED strip lights, and Acrylic rod, 2015, located at Riverfront Park.
Nick Cave, Rafterman, 2015, mixed media Soundsuit. Courtesy of Flux Projects. 30 Americans, installation view, 2015, Arkansas Arts Center.
16 NUMBER:83 17
Land Report CollectiveThe University of Tennessee Downtown GalleryKnoxville, TNJuly 3 – 32, 2015
The Land Report Collective is a group of five artists working with ideas that focus on the landscape as a foundational reference point. With Jason S. Brown and Brian R. Jobe located in Knoxville, Tennessee and David L. Jones, Patrick Kinkut, and Shelby Shadwell located in Laramie, Wyoming, the vast geographic contrast and distance between these two locations would seem to be a challenge for a collective, but in actuality it is a bonus.
All five artists met through their academic networks, whether it being graduate school, a new job, or visiting artist programs. The shared passions of their ideas developed into a desire to exhibit together. Although their work is cohesive, they only occasionally engage in individual collaborations. The land is the stage for their collaboration and the goal is to see how each voice plays with the other. Once installed in a gallery setting, the interior itself becomes a geographic landscape all on its own. Tall three-dimensional work anchors the corners and center of the space, with both walls covered with two-dimensional linear visions.
Situated in the elegant street-front setting of the University of Tennessee’s Downtown Gallery, the works are bathed in both the changing natural light that streams through the large windows and the gallery spotlights. Centering the floor is Brian Jobe’s Hypostyle Section, an installation of full-scale wooden pillars rising from a rough, gravel bed. Reminiscent of ancient temple ruins, the pillars of this piece have lost their roof. The tops of them are painted aquamarine, bringing to mind the appearance of upside-down boat dock pylons. They are arranged with two of the diagonally placed corner pillars missing that invites an interactive dimension. The viewers are encouraged to walk through the pillars, to be surrounded by them,
and to feel the crunch of gravel under their feet.Flanking the entry doors are two of Jason Brown’s
three-dimensional works that are informed by the destruction caused by the mining industry. Seam addresses the horror of mountain top removal. An upside down plaster-cast mountain is impaled on steel table legs; its hollow shell filled with coal and shred-ded segments of artificial turf. Open Pit uses a stack of steel I-beams as a pedestal. A cache of round iron ore beads rest in a metal bowl on top and an ore pick leans against it with a handle made from the trunk of a paper birch tree, a victim of deforestation.
Patrick Kinkut is obsessed with the horizon. Learning about a club of individuals called the Highpointers who pursue the goal of ascending the highest elevation point of every state in the Union, Kinkut set off to create meticulously detailed drawings and paintings of not just these elevation points in the Midwest, but also of other random horizons. The result, High Points on the High Plains, is not just the predictable flat horizons, but also the domination of them by mostly human detritus and constructions. For example, the artist references the skylines of trees found in some states where part of an erosion prevention project was spearheaded by the Roosevelt Administration during the 1930s. The inclusion of other human constructions seem more random, as with the presence of what appear to be spare buildings that are in fact the locations of nuclear missile silos. Kinkut is partial to the idea of collaboration with viewers. He leaves “survival” boxes in areas where he has worked. These consist of handmade wooden ammunition boxes filled with an assortment of objects ranging from candles to jars of dried sunflower seeds and homemade beef jerky. He has no idea what happens to them, but enjoys the idea of an anonymous interaction between artist and stranger.
The waterproof digital cameras that highways use to check road conditions are set to take new images every few seconds. The fleeting images are often
ghostly and distorted from the action of the weather on the lenses. Shelby Shadwell has monitored feed emanating mainly from the Wyoming Department of Transportation and then selected the most compelling frames to illustrate in white chalk on black paper. Five drawings in his Low Pressure series are mounted, unframed, from office clips in a row resembling frames from the video feed. The quiet, yet dramatic renderings of roads and vehicles in snow with the slight blur of motion and blown snow appear sequential, though they are actually sourced from many different locations. The only recognizable image is from the Utah/Nevada border, where dark isolation meets a wall of gas stations and the iconic neon “Wendover Will” cowboy.
David L. Jones is interested in performing experi-mental interactions with arid environments. He documents them in various ways, both in drawings and meticulously realized maquettes. In Ditch Full of Kunst a slab of rock-like styrene foam and dirt is mounted to extend off a tall steel table. The jumbled pile of distorted bronze text deposited in the carved ravine memorializes a performance piece the artist gave in the desert. The bronze mass twists along in the arroyo as if it were slowly washing downstream. The attached sky painting on panel rises above it like a billboard.
Knoxville is only the second location for this travelling exhibit. One of the strengths of a cross-continent collective is having a wider network of venues, more delivery and installation options, and the opportunity to change the contents of the exhibit at each iteration. The larger pieces in the exhibit are always from the artists closest to the exhibition venue. When the exhibit travels east or west, the smaller modular pieces are the ones that are shipped. When an artist has a chance to travel and be at the other location, he soaks up the atmosphere of a very different climate. The artists check on what the other members are working on and are able to conceive whole new ideas and directions in which to develop their work.
Denise Stewart-Sanabria is a Knoxville based artist and writer.
Brian Jobe, Hypostyle Section, wood, steel, gravel, paint, 2015. Photo by Carri Jobe.
Brett M Levine is a writer, editor, curator and PhD candidate.
Hale Woodruff, The Trial of the Amistad Captives, 1939, Oil on canvas 71 x 242 ¼ in Collection of Talladega College, Talladega Alabama.
Rising Up: Hale Woodruff’s Murals at Talladega CollegeBirmingam Museum of ArtBirmingham, ALJune 13 – September 6, 2105
Brushing aside the French Romantic painter Paul Delaroche’s 1839 assertion that from that day painting was dead, a century later the African American artist Hale Woodruff was standing on the grounds of Talladega College creating six murals that would change the history of the institution. At a historically black college in rural Alabama, Woodruff used a visual language rooted in the revolutionary thinking and traditions of the Mexican muralist painters such as Diego Rivera, with whom he had studied in 1936, and the New Deal idealism of the WPA, for whom he had painted his first mural in 1935, to create a tale of African dignity and power.
The triptych, Amistad Murals, tells the story of a group of Africans who, after being kidnapped and sold into slavery, mutinied against their captors, were tried in court, and eventually found innocent. When repatri-ated, some returned to Africa as missionaries. Woodruff supplemented this three-part visual history with one even more closely linked to his location, painting three additional murals narrating the story of the founding of Talladega College.
These six works now form the core of the exhibition, Rising Up: Hale Woodruff’s Murals at Talladega College, currently on display at the Birmingham Museum of Art. Conserved by the Atlanta Art Conservation Center, and on a national tour before returning to a new,
purpose-built facility in Talladega, the works serve a variety of purposes. Some may argue that they should be returned to their original home in Savery Library. The fact that Woodruff’s murals refer specifically to that site does create intriguing theoretical opportunities, but the fact that a donor has contributed so significantly to a project that allows long-term conservation should be applauded.
The Birmingham Museum of Art’s installation suffers from one unusual decision. At times it is difficult to identify the works as the text panels that accompany the pieces are not installed in a uniform pattern, nor are they a uniform size. These small issues aside, the works themselves are masterful. Newly cleaned and vibrant, the paintings highlight both Woodruff’s strength as a colorist and how meticulously he approached what had the potential to be repetitive material. Woodruff excels in differentiating the fall of fabric, the ruff of a collar, the fold of a shirt, and the tone of skin. In these monumen-tal paintings, he meticulously depicts the straw of a hat, or the glint of light on a cane-cutting knife. What is so engaging about Rising Up is seeing Woodruff’s approach to narrative. The artist identifies key moments and compresses them, allowing multiple stories to unfold across each mural. The Mutiny on the Amistad emphasizes tension, movement and energy; The Trial of the Amistad Captives focuses on contemplation and accusation.
In addition to the Amistad Murals, the exhibition also features the three murals depicting the foundation of Talladega College. First Day of Registration at Swayne Hall highlights the post-war economy. Students offer every type of animal, livestock or chattel in exchange
for enrollment. What is incredible is that after having created a series of works depicting a loss of life and the horrors of physical abuse, Woodruff can still bring viewers to unease and tears at the sight of a pig strug-gling in a wooden cage. Building Savery Library depicts the construction of the library that began in 1937, only two years before Woodruff was commissioned to create his murals on this site.
Pairing the newly conserved murals with many of the expository sketches and preparatory images shows how incredibly close Woodruff worked to his original plan. This can be seen even more clearly on a smaller scale in the sketches and finished works, Results of Good Housing and Results of Poor Housing. In Results of Good Housing the foliage changes shape and the clothing changes color, but the overall composition has remained almost identical.
Exhibitions such as Rising Up provide the opportunity to reconsider Woodruff’s murals and the issues these works address. Rising Up created the conditions in which Woodruff’s murals could be conserved and offer education opportunities. Most importantly, the exhibition enables audiences to encounter these works in a new context outside of the library. By reframing the experi-ence of art, museums create opportunities for both education and engagement. Woodruff was well aware of this fact when he worked with the WPA, when he took his position at Atlanta College, when he traveled to learn from Diego Rivera, and when he said “yes” to painting murals for Talladega College. Take the opportu-nity to say “yes” too and see how transformational a work of art can actually be in and out of context.
18 NUMBER:83 19
The Silo RoomTrack OneNashville, TNJune 5 – 30, 2015
It is collaboration that kindles a feeling of commu-nity in Nashville’s local art scene, and the group show is collaboration in its simplest form. For The Silo Room, a recent group exhibition at Track One in Nashville’s Wedgewood-Houston neighborhood, artist and curator Courtney Adair Johnson borrowed the world “silo” from the business world. A department is referred to as a “Si” if it is self-feeding, and this often makes it unproductive. Johnson likens this to the often solitary practice of art making. She says that when working alone in the studio everyday, she craves community, but it’s easy and sometimes more comfortable to remain in solitude, despite the isolating costs. Johnson is self-taught. While this certainly doesn’t hurt her as an artist, she has had to create opportunities to be fed by other artists through informal peer critiques, mentorships, and basic camaraderie.
In thinking about this, she curated her second group show in June. When she first told me it would take place in the cavernous back room of the Track One warehouse, I was worried. The 4500 square-foot room is impossible to light well without spending a hefty sum. While the perimeter offers plenty of wall space, the interior becomes a hungry mass of space that swallows up everything it can. As has become the case with Johnson, who works completely in reused materials, my expectations were exceeded. Johnson kept the artwork close to the walls and spotlit it, allowing the
vast darkness of the room to sit in repose, while art goers prowled the perimeter. As a result, she drew the energy away from the voluminous room and pushed the viewer toward the artworks, while giving each plenty of room to breathe.
Johnson reached out to artists Kit Kite and Lauren Gregory first. Kite showed seven sculptural textile pieces, each inspired by a book her mother read to her when she was a child. Kite uses diverse materials. Mop fibers, wooden beads, animal quills, and bone make up these strange amalgamations that reference Kite’s childhood and imagination, making the work deeply personal but also relevant to viewers. This levity is found in Lauren Gregory’s stop motion oil paint animation For Dolly, projected on the far wall of the room. In it, we’re invited into Gregory’s subconscious, where she dreams of Dolly Parton being interviewed on a talk show, showing off her badass tattoos. Gregory often paints with her fingers, and the thick, wet dabs of oil paint create an animation that’s as funny as it is macabre.
I’ve seen Nance Cooley’s “sculpted haikus” in the past, but always within display cases. In The Silo Room, however, Cooley invites us to approach and wind three of her automaton sculptures. She uses studio discards like mat board, plaster strips, and paint chips to make multi-level mechanical automatons that are intricate and exact while maintaining a levity that speaks to her dedication to experimentation and penchant for whimsy.
All this levity is balanced out by the work of Andy Harding, Justin Gill, and Myles Bennett. Harding’s Ghost Structure 3 is the only piece placed toward the center of the room, and for good reason: the reclaimed pine sculpture is four-by-seven-by-four feet of obsessive
geometry. Squared lengths of pine meet at two dozen different angles, creating a single contorting loop and casting an abstract shadow on the floor. Gill showed dozens of tracing paper drawings and watercolors taped in a collage. A tattoo artist, Gill collaborates with customers every day, so Johnson thought him a natural addition to the show. Myles Bennett’s Antlers Found was made specifically for this exhibition. In this work, the Brooklyn artist unwove a canvas, painted and dyed its individual threads, and rewove it with aluminum in a gorgeous mutation. The piece itself is a meditation on process and originality, a surface exploration of materials that stands out as the finest in the exhibition.
Finally, Johnson’s own piece is true to her oeuvre with a deepened connection to her audience. Interested in objecthood and our habits as consumers, Johnson starts dialogue about reuse and recycling with an effective emotional element in Collection/Connection. Johnson offered her collection of jewelry to visitors in return for the connections they felt with the objects. She invited viewers to take a necklace and write her a note describing why they wanted it. Some recalled memories of family members; others described the strength they found in her beads and amulets. Johnson was left with a collection of personal messages, instead of objects, which she’ll make into a book.
The diversity of the works in The Silo Room speaks to Johnson’s curatorial talent. She possesses an open-ness to experimentation and materials, a respect for singular artistic voices, and a keen balance of irrever-ence and solemnity. It’s collaborations like these that provide energy and brew enthusiasm in Nashville’s art scene, and I can’t wait to see what Johnson does next.
Erica Ciccarone is an independent writer living in Nashville, TN.
Andy Harding, Ghost Structure 3, 2015; 49 by 84 by 48 inches, reclaimed pine. Photo by the author.Myles Bennett, Antlers Found, 2015; 18 by 18 inches, ink on canvas, acrylic, aluminum. Photo by the author.
Revival in North MemphisPaint MemphisWolf River Floodwall at Chelsea & N. EvergreenMemphis, TNJuly 18, 2015
Street artists are known for making their galleries out of warehouse walls and passing train cars, but a sanctioned canvas has the power to unite and uplift entire communities. Through the efforts of nonprofits like the Urban Arts Commission, sites of public art are now beloved by many Memphians, but there hasn’t yet been a grassroots effort to bridge the graffiti world and the greater community in a meaningful way.
On July 18, a transformation occurred. A 0.3-mile long stretch of a Wolf River floodwall in a blighted community hosted over 70 graffiti artists and mural writers from around the country. Artists traveled from as far as Los Angeles and as near as Midtown Memphis to paint shoulder-to-shoulder art incorporating the theme of revival. Memphis’ longest mural now stretches westward from North Evergreen Street and Chelsea Avenue in the often neglected North Midtown neigh-borhood. The mural faces an abandoned railroad line that will be incorporated into the Greater Memphis Greenline. When the path is completed in 2017, pedestrians can travel from Downtown to East Memphis with an eye turned towards the city’s more marginal neighborhoods.
The landmark event was organized by Paint Memphis, a collection of graffiti advocates and artists. “It seems that this neighborhood, situated between New Chicago and Springdale/Hyde Park, hasn’t seen much new development but has some vital residents and businesses that have persevered,” said event
coordinator Karen Golightly. “We hope that this mural, along with the Chelsea Greenline, will bring some much-needed attention to North Midtown.”
Golightly, a local professor, organized the event with partners Greater Memphis Greenline, curator Wallace Joiner and artist Brandon Marshall. Community groups including Livable Memphis, Our Grass Our Roots and the University of Memphis Design Collaborative were on hand at the day-long event to keep up momen-tum for the neighborhood’s development. Far from a wine-and-cheese reception, residents and other community members toted barbecue and snow cones while wandering up and down the horizontal festival.
The concrete wall is made up of 76 panels, each 20 feet wide and 7 feet tall. Some artists worked on single panels by themselves, while others created sprawling murals with crews. The Nashville-based MFK crew stretched their graffiti names across four panels. The panel closest to the corner of Evergreen and Chelsea was put up by the U of M city outreach group and set the theme for the rest of the wall. The 3D lettering of the phrase “Revival” jumps out into the environment, expressing the intention to bring about physical change through the power of art.
Raven, a Memphis artist originally from Romania, looked to a mythological revival. Her texture-driven mural features a woman with vine-like hair twisting throughout the frame. Lotus flowers sprout from the ends, suggesting that ancient ways of thinking will continue to manifest in the present. With intention, one can free herself from the past’s entanglement and grow outwards.
Jamond Bullock took a literal interpretation. The focal point of his panel are the street signs of the Evergreen and Chelsea intersection. Beneath these signs, a
cheerful figure holds up his thumb, the gesture that represents North Memphis. The neighborhood’s past is illustrated on the left. Lining the historic skyline is Gino’s, the area’s first African-American-owned business, along with an early synagogue from the neighborhood’s beginnings as a Jewish enclave. Neighbors line the mural with arms stretched to the sky. For Bullock, every revival is built on foundations of community and entrepreneurship.
Other artists let the space speak for itself. “It seems redundant to make a concept that’s about revival. It’s redundant considering the process and why we’re all here,” said Memphis artist Michael Roy, known as Birdcap. His instantly-recognizable figures with tubular bodies and saucer eyes can be seen all over the city, and his colorful collaboration with artist Lance Turner marks his first introduction to North Memphis.
Five artists from the North Memphis community made their impressions on the wall. Mexican artist Somy created a haunting portrait of a girl in Dia de los Muertos garb. Her intense gaze insists that Mexican heritage and history be fully recognized.
The murals will stay up for long time, and the day’s collaboration increased the potential for long-term change. In a neighborhood that lacks a unifying community association, residents had the opportunity to interact at a rare area-wide event. Paint Memphis is also endeavoring to turn the north side of the wall, which faces Chelsea, into a permission wall for free art-making.
“I’ve never seen anything at all going on down here,” said a passing community member. “From what I can tell, it looks pretty good from here.”
Madeline Faber is a Memphis writer.
Audie Adams, mural panel detail, 2015, 20 feet wide and 7 feet tall, spray paint. Photo by Karen Golightly.Somy, mural detail, 2015, 20 feet wide and 7 feet tall, spray paint. Photo by Karen Golightly.
20 NUMBER:83Dorothy Joiner is the Lovick P. Corn Professor of Art History at Lagrange College.
Constance Thalken: Eyes Open SlowlyWhitespace GalleryAtlanta, GeorgiaMay 15-June 20, 2015
With delicious wit, Elwyn Brooks White wrote, “I have occasionally had the thrill of putting my finger on a little capsule of truth, and heard it give the faint squeak of mortality under my pressure.” White’s wry humor serves as a welcome leaven to that underlying and very pressing constant in human existence: Death. Offering an echo of White’s “faint squeak of mortality,” Constance Thalken’s exhibition of photographs taken in a taxidermy shop explores transience — not only that of animals — but, by implication, that of us all.
When organizing field trips for a university class titled, “The Animal,” an investigation of human-animal relationships, Thalken discovered Bud Jones’ state-of-the-art taxidermy shop, including a small museum filled with dioramas, in rural Tallapoosa, Georgia. Visiting this establishment founded by Jones over six decades ago, and still managed by him and his wife Jackie, was for Thalken “jaw- dropping.” Experiencing the curious interplay of life-in-death/ death-in-life in images of realistically restored animals served to echo her own recent struggle with breast cancer.
Skillful cropping lends many of Thalken’s shots their dramatic edge. Taken in the shop’s museum, Eyes Open
Slowly #3 (2013) shows the belly, crouching leg, and front paw of a black wolf, set against a green patch of artificial turf — simulating landscape. The animal’s hair gleams in the light, and the limbs — bent as though running, intimate the mobility of life. Also shot in the museum, Eyes Open Slowly #8 (2013) reveals only the head of a baby bear, snuggling up to its mother and nuzzling its chin against her dark body with an aching tenderness. Similarly cropped, Eyes Open Slowly #10 (2013) shows the hair of an Indian black buck: dark wavy strands that revert to white below. One sees the painterly markings akin to those of a raccoon on this antelope-like creature.
The impact of other photos derives from their uncanny interplay of life and death. A black coyote stands in front of a stack of empty picture frames in Eyes Open Slowly #13 (2013). Turning his head slightly, the animal seems to squint his eyes while lifting his right paw; all indications of life, but without animation, symbolizes the animal’s now hollowness. Although he looks alive, the coyote is only a Styrofoam shell covered with skin.
Taken during the process of restoration, the blue heron in Eyes Open Slowly #1 (2013) is suspended by a wire and “bandaged” like an injured patient: a rectangle of thick cardboard is over the right wing and strips of heavy white paper wrap the tail feathers. Almost human-like, the talons of one leg suggest an emaciated
hand, bent plaintively. Eyes Open Slowly #9 (2013) is a stately African kudu, seemingly alive, whose curious horns lend the animal an exotic dignity. He looks into the distance as though he is disdainful of the viewer. His alert stance is undercut, however, by the fact that his torso is truncated at the shoulders, like a bust. He rests on a mounting board with a measuring tape draped around his neck.
Several of the photographs become intriguing abstractions due to how they are framed. Revealing the scratch marks of the many dogs who have lived at the shop, Eyes Open Slowly #5 (2013) shows the gray metal door; its surface is etched with reiterated canine markings both rhythmical and random. Eyes Open Slowly #14 (2013) is the unfolded skin of an ostrich with a few feathers, together with the bird’s characteristic markings and distinctive gray-blue and tan coloration. Eyes Open Slowly #11 (2013) shows the mottled surface of the salt floor used in the curing process for hides. Embedded in the surface is the unordered debris of decades, which includes a nail.
Thalken has happened upon an absorbing subject — taxidermy — as a springboard to explore mortality, that illusive yet compelling interplay between life and death, or what the Aenied calls, “the tears of things.” In doing so, she simultaneously offers a meditation on the sometimes ambiguous, often mysterious, relation-ships between man and creature.
Constance Thalken, Eyes Open Slowly #1, 2013, 43”x 28 1/2 “, Archival pigment print, Photo courtesy of the artist.
Constance Thalken, Eyes Open Slowly #10, 2013, 43”x 28 1/2 “, Archival pigment print, Photo courtesy of the artist.
Constance Thalken, Eyes Open Slowly #9, 2013, 43’x28 1/2”, Archival pigment print, Photo courtesy of the artist.
Margaret Keller, Rampart, 2014, 30 x 22 inches, graphite and watercolor on paper. Photo by the author.
Melissa Cowper-Smith, Urban Farming, 2015, 21 x 15 inches, digital print on homegrown and homemade cotton paper. Photo credit: Carolyn Furnish
The 57th Annual Delta ExhibitionArkansas Art CenterLittle Rock, AR July 10 – September 20, 2015
I viewed this exhibition just after it opened and took time with each of the 82 works on display. Many of the pieces speak to juror George Dombek’s roots in architecture; angularity is the overriding motif. I’ve chosen three works to concentrate on here, each falling loosely within the architectural theme.
Melissa Cowper-Smith’s Urban Farming is a digital print on homegrown and home-made cotton paper. The artist was born in Calgary, Canada, and now resides in Morrilton, Arkansas. At first blush, this piece appeared to be a watercolor. The warm colors melt into each other, bringing the kitchen scene outdoors, as if under a fall-leafed tree. A closer look reveals that the modern stove, the track lighting, the bucket of sunflowers, and, oddly but delightfully, the two chandeliers, are all photographs, made pleasingly obscure by the inconsistencies of the handmade paper. The door to the green world outside, also photographic, leads the viewer to the idea of “farm,” while the architectural kitchen, with its angles and track lighting, simultaneously brings to mind an urban setting.
Margaret L. Keller’s Rampart is watercolor and graphite on paper. Keller was born in Independence, Missouri, and now lives in Mabelvale, Arkansas. Water overwhelms Keller’s graphite drawing of a sink, faucet, and electrical outlets. The graphite-rendered items are in the process of being “flooded” by the watercolor subjects. The rings of tensile strength under the water spider’s feet present a feeble sign of resistance to the water’s intrusion into the sink. The storm view above the bathroom fixtures is beautiful but ominous. Keller’s title, Rampart, that which protects or holds back danger, foreshadows a situation of failure. The space above the sink, where a mirror might hang, may be a window, or, more likely, a breach in safety. Keller deftly draws commercial, quotidian plumbing fixtures, and inserts beauty and psychological drama into their midst.
Jennifer Sargent’s* Shadow Play 3 is a combination of graphite, gouache, and embroidery floss on paper. Sargent was born in London, England, and currently resides in Memphis, Tennessee. This multifaceted composition is comprised of architectural components — arches, bridges, buttresses, cathedral rose windows — as well as more organic elements like knots, embroidery thread, and human hands. The cutout hand shapes appear four times, with four different surface designs. The red-painted hand pair is reminiscent of an illustration from a 1930s needlecraft manual. From there, Sargent cuts out the same hand shape and places it in various positions throughout the piece. The pure white hands take the shape of a wolf, as when using one’s hands for shadow play on a wall. The other pairs, with net-like designs added, remind one of fluid, dancing “henna hands.” Like the repetitive, many-faceted shapes in Sargent’s work, the unex-pected possibilities of shadow play continue to play on the viewer as well.
*Full disclosure: Sargent is Board Chair of Number: Inc.
Carolyn Furnish is a tapestry artist living in Little Rock, AR.
www.johnjonesarchitect.com
䌀愀爀椀琀愀猀 嘀椀氀氀愀最攀 ㈀㔀 㤀 䠀愀爀瘀愀爀搀 䄀瘀攀⸀Ⰰ 䴀攀洀瀀栀椀猀Ⰰ 吀一 ㌀㠀㈀⠀㤀 ⤀ ㌀㈀㜀ⴀ㔀㈀㐀㘀Ⰰ 挀愀爀椀琀愀猀瘀椀氀氀愀最攀⸀漀爀最⸀
倀愀爀椀猀栀 䠀愀氀氀 愀琀 䌀栀甀爀挀栀 漀昀 琀栀攀 䠀漀氀礀 䌀漀洀洀甀渀椀漀渀㐀㘀㐀㔀 圀愀氀渀甀琀 䜀爀漀瘀攀 簀 䴀攀洀瀀栀椀猀Ⰰ 吀攀渀渀攀猀猀攀攀 ㌀㠀㜀
匀愀琀甀爀搀愀礀Ⰰ 㜀 伀挀琀漀戀攀爀 ㈀ 㔀
匀愀瘀攀 琀栀攀 䐀愀琀攀℀
伀甀爀 䴀椀猀猀椀漀渀㨀吀漀 戀爀攀愀欀 搀漀眀渀 眀愀氀氀猀 漀昀 栀漀猀琀椀氀椀琀礀戀攀琀眀攀攀渀 琀栀攀 挀甀氀琀甀爀攀猀Ⰰ 琀漀 戀甀椀氀搀戀爀椀搀最攀猀 漀昀 氀漀瘀攀 愀渀搀 琀爀甀猀琀 戀攀琀眀攀攀渀 戀爀椀搀最攀猀 漀昀 氀漀瘀攀 愀渀搀 琀爀甀猀琀 戀攀琀眀攀攀渀 琀栀攀 爀椀挀栀 愀渀搀 琀栀漀猀攀 洀愀搀攀 瀀漀漀爀 ☀ 琀漀 瀀爀漀瘀椀搀攀 愀 瀀漀猀椀琀椀瘀攀 愀氀琀攀爀渀愀琀椀瘀攀 琀漀 琀栀攀 猀琀爀攀攀琀 挀漀爀渀攀爀猀 昀漀爀 琀栀攀 渀攀椀最栀戀漀爀栀漀漀搀挀栀椀氀搀爀攀渀⸀
䠀漀甀爀猀㨀 愀洀 ⴀ 㠀瀀洀 䴀漀渀⸀ 琀栀爀甀 匀愀琀⸀Ⰰ 䌀氀漀猀攀搀 匀甀渀搀愀礀
NASHVILLE’S DESTINATION FOR COLLECTIBLE CONTEMPORARY ART
TINNEY CONTEMPORARY
237 5TH AVENUE NORTH | NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE | 615.255.7816
HOURS: TUESDAY - SATURDAY, 11 AM - 5 PM, AND BY APPOINTMENT.
WWW.TINNEYCONTEMPORARY.COM
ETSU Department of Art & Design and Slocumb Galleries with Honors College
CALL FOR ENTRIES
Positive/Negative 31 Annual National Juried Art Exhibition
Juror: Al Miner, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston February 8 to March 4, 2016, Slocumb Galleries
Deadline: December 17, 2015 Apply online: https://etsu.slideroom.com/#/permalink/program/27072
Inhabitants: Creatures of Imagined Worlds
Curators: Marty Henley and Kevin Reaves January 11 to February 5, 2016, Slocumb Galleries
Deadline: November 30, 2015
FLAGGED: Re-Imagining the Southern Identity Curator: Dr. Scott Koterbay
March 28 to April 15, 2016, Tipton Gallery Deadline: February 22, 2016
For info, email Slocumb Galleries’ Director Karlota Contreras-Koterbay at [email protected]
BEVERLY & SAM ROSS GALLERY
“Nick Peña: Cross Cut"August 21, 2015 - October 8, 2015 (noon)
OPENING RECEPTION:August 21, 2015, 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
FEATURED ARTISTS: WKNO Checking on the Arts, 9:00 a.m., August 21, 2015
Nick Pena will exhibit in the Gallery and the Foyer
Tacos or Sushi? By Annabelle MeachamOctober 16, 2015 – December 10, 2015 (noon)
OPENING RECEPTION:October 16, 2015, 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
FEATURED ARTISTS: WKNO Checking on the Arts, 9:00 a.m., October 16, 2015
In the Foyer: The Art of Marilyn Cali�
Interwoven:Drawings & Textiles by Jennifer SargentJanuary 15, 2016 – February 25, 2016 (noon)
OPENING RECEPTION:January 15 2016, 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
FEATURED ARTISTS: WKNO Checking on the Arts, 9:00 a.m., January 15, 2016
In The Foyer: Artists from theNational Ornamental Metal Museum
James W. Crews – A RetrospectiveMarch 4, 2016 – April 14, 2016 (noon)
OPENING RECEPTION:March 4, 2016, 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
FEATURED ARTISTS: WKNO Checking on the Arts, 9:00 a.m., March 4, 2016
In the Foyer: Selections from Our Collections at CBU
“The Call of the Clay” by Agnes Gordon StarkApril 22, 2016 – May 26, 2016
OPENING RECEPTION:April 22, 2016, 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
FEATURED ARTISTS: WKNO Checking on the Arts, 9:00 a.m., April 22, 2016
In The Foyer: Memphis Camera ClubCompetition Winners 2015-2016
Christian Brothers University, Memphis, TennesseeSeason 2015-2016 Schedule
Samuel H. Crone
August 1 - September 19, 2015Highlights from our collection of drawings and sketches tracing the artistic development of this 19th century “Memphis” artist who traveled through the art capitals of Europe for almost four decades.
September 18 from 5 to 7:30 p.m.Exhibition closing reception and dedication of the Samuel Hester Crone Gallery celebrating the Crone collection and archive, a gift of William S. Hu�.
Art Museum of the University of MemphisCommunication & Fine Arts BuildingFree Parking in Central Ave. lot on Saturdays9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday thru Saturday901.678.2225 / [email protected] us online at memphis.edu/amum
Watercolor, Eruption of Vesuvius from the Bay of Naples, April 1906, 3 3/4 x 5 inches. AMUM 2013.12.58
An Equal Opportunity/Affirmatve Action University.
6pm-9pm
Hours:MON 11am-6pm
TU 11am-6pmTR 11am-6pmFR 11am-6pm
SAT 10am-2pm
September 25-October 23
901.229.1041circuitoussuccession.com
500 S. 2ndMemphis, TN38103
Opening receptions are the last Friday
of every month!
Anne J. Froning
Elizabeth
Garat
Tommy
Foster
September 25th-October 23rd
Saj Crone Je� Mickey
On viewAugust 28th-September 21st
C
M
Y
CM
MY
CY
CMY
K
CXA_Lawrence Matthews_In A Violent Way_Flyer-ad_mech.pdf 1 8/20/15 11:51 AM
Kate Breakey, Las Sombras/The ShadowsOn Loan from The Wittliff Collections, Texas State University
UALR Fine Arts Building, Gallery 1August 12 - September 27, 2015Fieldwork - Alternative Process PhotographyKate Breakey, Beth Dow, Carol Golemboski & Jamie Johnson
Related Documents
