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Cleaver Magazine

Fresh-Cut Lit & Art

 
 

Author Archives: laserj

Art That Speaks

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 29, 2023 by laserjMarch 20, 2023

Art That Speaks
Digital images by David Sheskin

These images come from a large body of works which I refer to as Art That Speaks which involve the creative integration of art and text.

My Art That Speaks images, which must be read to be fully appreciated, are atypical in that unlike most art they challenge the viewer on both a visual and cerebral level. Although some of the works in the collection are mixed media (for example, using ceramic tiles), the images presented here were created digitally using computer software. My Art That Speaks images employ the format of a Scrabble board to provide a unique and/or humorous commentary on a broad spectrum of topical and fictional subjects ― the relevant commentary appearing in every odd-numbered line of text.

I view my Art That Speaks images as an anthology of parables or fables, intended to provoke in the reader reactions ranging from amusement to reflection (and perhaps even shock).

 

IF YOU THINK YOU MAY HAVE HEARD THE BIG BANG

 

THIS IS A TEST


VOTER REGISTRATION

 

MOSES

 

ELEMENTS

 


David Sheskin is a writer and artist who has been published extensively over the years. Most recently his work has appeared in The Dalhousie Review, The Satirist, Chicago Quarterly Review, Tamarind and Shenandoah.  His most recent books are Art That Speaks, David Sheskin’s Cabinet of Curiosities and Outrageous Wedding Announcements.

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Published on March 29, 2023 in Art, Issue 41. (Click for permalink.)

Of Comfort and Connection: Paintings by Lex Lucius

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 12, 2022 by laserjDecember 3, 2022

Of Comfort and Connection
Paintings by Lex Lucius

I live in the Roaring Fork Valley just north of Aspen, Colorado, tucked into the Rocky Mountains. My life is full of family, painting, and horses. My clothes smell of the stable, and on far too many days, my boots, of the pasture.

Less than five minutes from my painting studio is the stable where my wife Aimée keeps her jumping horses and my daughter, her pony. When I drive over and watch them ride, which I do several times a week, I pass by a field of polo ponies. It is these ponies that have become my favorites to paint. I love their small, muscled bodies, and I see strength and determination in their movements. At the stable our warmbloods are huge, muscled, yet incredibly calm animals. Even in my paintings they have a sureness of movement and a stillness that speaks of this confidence.

I try to invoke the feelings I get from these animals, but just as importantly I also try to bring the stories and dreams we all carry within us when we think of horses and what horses mean to us all. I am focusing on art I want to see, art that makes me feel. It is my hope that these paintings bring out feelings of comfort and connection in the viewers also.
—Lex Lucius, December 2022

Young Polo Pony

 

Study of Pancho II

Study of Pancho III

Horse in Paddock

Thoroughbread Standing I

Erased Horse


As a fine artist, Lex has exhibited in galleries throughout Northern California and New Mexico, as well as New York City, New Orleans, and Vancouver, BC. Lex’s work can be found in many private collections around the country. Lex is currently working in acrylic and ink on wood panel.

Lex Lucius holds a BFA in Printmaking from CCA and a MFA from UNM. His aesthetic sense stems from his years as a fine artist and sculptor, and enhances his mastery of metal fabrication.

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Published on December 12, 2022 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

To What Survived: Sculpture by Mario Loprete

Cleaver Magazine Posted on June 25, 2022 by laserjJune 24, 2022

TO WHAT SURVIVED
Sculpture by Mario Loprete

For my concrete sculptures, I use my personal clothing. Through my artistic process in which I use plaster, resin, and cement, I transform these articles of clothing into artworks to hang. The intended effect is that my DNA and my memory remain inside the ​concrete so that the person who looks at these sculptures is transformed into a type of postmodern archeologist, studying my works as urban artifacts.

I like to think that those who look at my sculptures, created in 2020, will be able to perceive the anguish, the vulnerability, and the fear that each of us may have felt in the face of a planetary problem that was covid 19. Under a layer of cement are my clothes with which I lived during this nefarious period — clothes that survived covid 19, very similar to what survived after the 2,000-year-old catastrophic eruption of Pompeii, and capable of recounting man’s inability to face the tragedy of broken lives and destroyed economies.

[ click any image to enlarge ]


Mario Loprete is a graduate of the Accademia of Belle Arti, Catanzaro, Italy. He writes, “Painting for me is my first love. An important, pure love. Creating a painting, starting from the spasmodic research of a concept with which I want to transmit my message — this is the foundation of painting for me. Sculpture is now my lover, an artistic betrayal to painting. It is a voluptuous and sensual lover that inspires different emotions which strike prohibited chords.”

Visit Mario on Instagram at @marioloprete

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Published on June 25, 2022 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

LAYERING LIGHT: Paintings by Bette Ridgeway

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 25, 2022 by laserjMarch 15, 2022

LAYERING LIGHT
Paintings by Bette Ridgeway

Bette Ridgeway is best known for her large-scale, luminous poured canvases that push the boundaries of light, color, and design. Her youth spent in the beautiful Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York and her extensive global travel has informed her colorful palette. For the past two decades, the high desert light of Santa Fe, NM has fueled Ridgeway’s art practice.

Her three decades of mentorship by the acclaimed Abstract Expressionist Paul Jenkins set her on her lifetime journey of non-objective painting on large canvas. She explores the interrelation and change of color in various conditions and on a variety of surfaces. Her artistic foundations in line drawing, watercolor, graphic design, and oils gave way to acrylics, which she found to be more versatile for her layering technique. Ridgeway has spent the last thirty years developing her signature technique, called “layering light,” in which she uses many layers of thin, transparent acrylics on linen and canvas to produce a fluidity and viscosity similar to traditional watercolor. Delving further, Ridgeway expanded her work into 3D, joining paint and resin to aluminum and steel with sculptures of minimal towers.

Ridgeway depicts movement in her work, sometimes kinetic and full of emotion, sometimes bold and masterful, sometimes languid and tentative. She sees herself as the channel, the work coming through her, but it is not hers. It goes out into the world—it has a life of its own.

[click on any image to enlarge]

Birth of the Blues

Canyon Winds

Chroma

California Dreaming

Calypso

Coherence


For over four decades, Bette Ridgeway has exhibited globally with more than eighty prestigious venues, including the Palais Royale, Paris and Embassy of Madagascar. Her awards include Top 60 Contemporary Masters and Leonardo DaVinci Prize. Her work appears in the permanent collections of the Mayo Clinic and Federal Reserve Bank. Her work also appears in International Contemporary Masters and 100 Famous Contemporary Artists. Visit her website at ridgewaystudio.com

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Published on March 25, 2022 in Art, Issue 37. (Click for permalink.)

YET SOMETHING DEEPLY FAMILIAR: The Photography of Natalie Christensen

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 20, 2021 by laserjDecember 13, 2021

YET SOMETHING DEEPLY FAMILIAR
Photographs by Natalie Christensen

Photographer Natalie Christensen has an inimitable, and enchanting, focus on the exploration of the more banal peripheral landscapes that often go unnoticed by the casual observer. “I quickly became aware that these isolated moments in the suburban landscape were rich with metaphor. Closed and open doors, empty parking lots and forgotten swimming pools draw me to a scene; yet it was my reactions to these objects and spaces that elicited interpretation and projection.”

Christensen had worked as a psychotherapist for over twenty-five years and was particularly influenced by the theories of depth psychologist Carl Jung. This influence is evident in her photographs, as shadows and psychological metaphors are favored subjects.

“The symbols and spaces in my images are an invitation to explore a rich world that is concealed from consciousness, and an enticement to contemplate narratives that have no remarkable life yet tap into something deeply familiar to our experience; often disturbing, sometimes amusing…unquestionably present.”

In Santa Fe, where Christensen is based, her work is inspired by commonplace architecture and streetscapes. She realizes that the places she frequents for her images are probably not what people visualize when they think of Santa Fe, a major tourist destination with a carefully cultivated image. “I don’t have to go anywhere special to make my photography; instead I find my images around shopping centers, apartment complexes and office parks.” Choosing to shoot in locations that may be viewed as uninteresting or even visually off-putting, Christensen finds this challenging, to “see” something hidden in plain sight, noting “it is our nature to ignore what is unpleasant, but sometimes I get a glimpse of the sublime in these ordinary places. When I find it, it feels like I have discovered gold.”

Christensen is repeatedly drawn to the swimming pool as a metaphor for the unconscious. In American culture, pools symbolize the luxury of leisure. Yet she also sees a darker interpretation — evoking repressed desires, unexplained tension and looming disaster. “These photographs of a manufactured oasis suggest a binary connection between the world above and the world below, linking submersion in water with the workings of the subconscious.”

She dismantles all of these scenes to color fields, geometry and shadow. She shoots every day and is almost never without a camera. Enjoy some of her work below!

[click to enlarge any image]

temptress

surveillance

fissures

gestalt at Monument Valley

she had an idea

untitled – window with cloud

you can’t get there from here

are these chairs taken

lavender door


Christensen has exhibited in noted museums and galleries in the U.S. and internationally, was a UAE Embassy invitee for a UAE Architecture Delegation tour, has been invited as Artist-in-Residence to Chateau d’Orquevaux, France, and a photobook, 007 – Natalie Christensen, has recently been published by Setanta Books, London. She has guest lectured at the Royal College of Art and led photography workshops at The Royal Photographic Society, London, and Meow Wolf, Santa Fe.

Named one of the Los Angeles Center of Digital Art’s “Ten Photographers to Watch,” Christensen is the recipient of several prestigious photography awards, has work in permanent collections, and publications include The Guardian, Creative Boom, The British Journal of Photography, LandEscape Art Review, Art Reveal Magazine, Aesthetica Magazine, and Magazine 43. Christensen is represented by Catherine et Andre Hug Galerie, Paris; Turner Carroll Gallery, Santa Fe; Nordic Art Agency, Malmo; and Susan Spiritus Gallery, Newport Beach. Visit her website at nataliechristensenphoto.com

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Published on December 20, 2021 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

Weird, Weird West by Chris Vaughan

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 23, 2021 by laserjSeptember 23, 2021

Weird, Weird West
Collages by Chris Vaughan

All of these works are part of an ongoing series of paper collages, collectively called Weird, Weird West.

The Weird West series of collages began with a ménage à trois that I found immediately menacing and whimsical: Cowboys, Seashore and Life Patterns and a King Penguin 1947 history of the greeting card called “Compliments of the Season.” The host book on cowboys was hungry for a more disparate diet: WW2 pilot manuals, Albers, Düsseldorf skylines and British executions. It was this menace and whimsy of out-of-season dolls in the desert, crustaceous-faced hangmen, Hyde Park pigeon feeders launching Spitfires over wagon trails, runaway girls remembering cities from an East German future and Folkstone’s seaside disturbing frozen Wyoming that kept me cutting and discovering new, skewed tales of the Weird West.

It’s important to me that materials are, as near as possible, found images, uninfluenced by my own tastes and aesthetic prejudices. That’s why I hunt books and magazines in places that generate randomness – bric-a-brac shops, charity book corners (constantly replenished with unimaginably eccentric juxtapositions: books on Japanese flower arrangement, English gardens, Marilyn Monroe, corn snakes, climbing in Kent, a soiled Grey’s Anatomy, postcards from Guernsey), off shelves of the unwanted, old-hat picture books put out to pasture in the dust. Ordinarily I’m a skeptic, but when collaging I’ve an unflappable faith in a strange combination of synchronicity and reincarnation. There are few things more satisfying to me than resurrecting images, concocting live pictures out of what’s been left for dead.

—Chris Vaughan, September 2021

Oak Motel

Floodplains

A Hanging

The Waterhole

Ranchers

Too Late


Chris Vaughan is a writer and artist from Whitstable, currently living a short jog from “The End of Europe” in the South District of Gibraltar. His work has previously appeared in Ambit, The Lifted Brow, Philosophy Now, Epiphany Magazine, The Rumpus, Bright Lights Film Journal, Bookslut, and The Warwick Review.

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Published on September 23, 2021 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

FROM THE HEART OF OLD MAGAZINES by Sherry Shahan

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 23, 2021 by laserjSeptember 23, 2021

FROM THE HEART OF OLD MAGAZINES
Collages by Sherry Shahan

Feeling shipwrecked in 2020, I began ripping words from the heart of old magazines. My scissors were like me, rusty and dull. The glue, too thick. My collages resembled drawings found in a kindergarten classroom. I like that about them; it frees me from ideas of what art should be. Decades ago I approached photography much the same way. I rarely considered myself a professional even after my photos appeared in national magazines and newspapers. My collages seem to spill into two categories: those that pick at the scabs of humanity and those that reflect promise and possibility. Both styles express my purpose, passion, and personal truths.

—Sherry Shahan, September 2021

Bizarre Dance

Endurance

Day Dream

Waiting

You Are Not Alone

Floating


Sherry Shahan has wandered the globe as a travel journalist, often watching the world and its people from behind: whether in the hub of London, a backstreet in Havana, or alone from a window in a squat hotel room in Paris; whether with a 35 mm camera or an iPhone. Over the past many months, she’s begun looking inward, living more fully inside her own skin. She is no longer too old or too slow. She moves at her own pace, eschewing imperfections and embracing her authentic female self. Her art and photography have appeared in Los Angeles Times, Gargoyle, december, Backpacker, Country Living, Lemon Sprouting, Open Minds and elsewhere. She earned an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts and taught a creative writing course for UCLA for 10 years. www.SherryShahan.com

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Published on September 23, 2021 in Art, Thwack. (Click for permalink.)

Digital Paintings by Joe Lugara

Cleaver Magazine Posted on June 29, 2021 by laserjJune 29, 2021

DIGITAL PAINTINGS
by Joe Lugara

These works are from two distinct series of digital paintings, Framework and Dark Oddities. I enjoy the clash of the man-made and the organic, the grids contrasting with the shape-shifting blobs.

The Framework series asks one of those short questions that begs a long answer: Am I inside or outside? The pictures offer seemingly objective experiences that turn uncomfortably subjective on the viewer. Does being on the “inside” mean being trapped or incarcerated, or does it mean being in the know and accepted?

The drops and splotches in the Dark Oddities are likewise objectively/subjectively charged. Alluding to specimens on microscope slides, they suggest things observed—scrutinized—and then make a U-turn on the viewer. The question they pose to me is whether their seemingly bloody forms are healthy or diseased. I find that my response depends on the size of the blotch or drop, and especially its shape. The simple fact that they’re red is a clincher for my recoiling nearly every time. The experience always hits me as a form of bigotry.

All art is contrast—light/dark, high note/low note, wide/narrow—but objective/subjective is the contrast with which all art begins. The artist adopts a point of view and works from that angle. These two series were made independently but they share that objective/subjective polarity. They lure with curious shapes and then ask discomfiting questions.

My abstract digital paintings are made from either new blank Photoshop files or from poor quality photographs that I’ve taken that I call, unimaginatively, “source photos”. The subjects of the source photos are as irrelevant as their quality. In the process of “painting” them with the software, they become entirely different from what they were. It’s a painterly approach, not a photographic one.

I’ll occasionally leave a trace of the source photo, if it adds something special to the work, but my goal is to generate a new image. I want the pieces to be otherworldly, a bit out of the realm of photography.

Framework Series

Dark Oddities Series


Joe Lugara took up painting and photography as a boy after his father discarded them as hobbies. His works depict odd forms and objects, inexplicable phenomena, and fantastic dreamscapes, taking as their basis horror and science fiction films produced from the 1930s through the late 1960s. He began creating digital paintings in the 2010s; they debuted in a 2018 solo exhibition at the Noyes Museum of Art in his home state of New Jersey.

Lugara’s work has been featured in several publications and has appeared in more than 40 exhibitions in museums and galleries in the New York metropolitan area, including the New Jersey State Museum and 80 Washington Square East Galleries at New York University. You can visit his website at joelugara.com

Raymond Rorke, Editor

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Published on June 29, 2021 in Art, Issue 34. (Click for permalink.)

SENSITIVE SKIN: Ceramics by Constance McBride

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 29, 2021 by laserjMarch 29, 2021

SENSITIVE SKIN
Ceramics by Constance McBride

“Everyone wants to have an illusion of themselves, that they’re a bit attractive, but the older I get it seems more important to be absolutely honest and direct.” — Chantal Joffe

When I was a kid I discovered Seventeen Magazine and it really messed me up. I recently googled it and was shocked to see that it debuted in 1944. I always had the impression that it began in the ‘60s or ‘70s when I was a subscriber. From Wikipedia: “It began as a publication geared toward inspiring teen girls to become model workers and citizens. Soon after its debut, Seventeen took a more fashion and romance oriented approach in presenting its material while promoting self-confidence in young women.” I have to disagree with this idea of promoting self-confidence in young women.

What I think it really did was cause many young women to angst about their faces and their bodies; something I did for a very long time. That and having a beautiful mother led me to focus on the topic of aging in a youth obsessed culture when I began my art practice.

I use clay (a medium historically excluded from the fine art world) to investigate the aging process, a notion rejected by many and specifically linked to failure as it relates to women. Through unidealized female faces and figures, I explore themes of identity and memory; referencing my own body to claim agency as the subject and owner of my work. I hand build my pieces with stoneware and paper clay. Colorants including under glazes, stains, oxides and graphite are applied to a figure’s surface to further magnify a countenance of grace and wisdom seen in senescent women.

I create my work through a lens of empowerment to address contemporary issues faced by women.

Bust (sculpture) of a woman with large red wounds and black wires coming out of them

Lonely Girl Room 315

Close up of woman's face and large wound on head

Lonely Girl Room 315, detail

Back of the sculpted woman's head with black wires pouring out of open wound

Lonely Girl Room 122, back view

Sculpted body in fetal position with arms outstretched

Truth from Within

Front view of sculpted body with large black wound on head

Truth from Within, front view

Sculpted body laying flat on sand next to shells and driftwood

Between Two Worlds

Close up of head and chest of sculpted body

Between Two Worlds, detail

Three faces made of clay stacked on each other horizontally

Whisperers

Side view of three clay faces stacked on top of each other

Whisperers, side view

Sculpture of woman's chest and torso laying horizontally

Time’s Relentless Melt

Works

Lonely Girl Room 315
2013
Ceramic, Under Glaze, Iron Oxide, Pastel, Wire
14″ x 10″ x 6″
(photographer – Mike Healy)

Lonely Girl Room 315, detail
(photographer – Mike Healy)

Lonely Girl Room 122, back view
2013
Ceramic, Under Glaze, Iron Oxide, Pastel, Wire
14″ x 10″ x 6″
(photographer – Sean Deckert)

Truth from Within
2016
Ceramic, Copper Carbonate, Wax, Wire
20″ x 36″ x 14″
(Photo courtesy of Phoenix Art Museum)

Truth from Within, front view
(Photographer – Amy Weaver)

Between Two Worlds
2020
Ceramic, Copper Carbonate, Wax, Wire, Desert Debris
21″ x 57″ x 9″ (figure)
(Photographer – Joshua Steffy)

Between Two Worlds, detail

Whisperers
2015
Ceramic, Graphite
10″ x 13″ x 11″
(Photographer- Chris Loomis)

Whisperers, side view
(Photographer – Chris Loomis)

Time’s Relentless Melt
2014
Ceramic, Graphite
8″ x 18″ x 7″
(Photograper – Aaron Rothman)

 


Headshot of Constance McBrideA native of Philadelphia, PA, Constance McBride’s work centers on issues most experienced by women. When residing in the Southwest, observations of the desert made a transformative impact on her practice. Her work has been supported by grants from the Arizona Commission on the Arts, Phoenix Art Museum’s Contemporary Forum, Philadelphia Sculptors and the Arts Aid PHL program. Museum exhibitions include Phoenix Art Museum and Udinotti Museum of Figurative Art in AZ, Las Cruces Museum of Art in NM, San Angelo Museum of Art in TX, The State Museum of Pennsylvania and Biggs Museum of American Art in DE. Notable gallery exhibitions include Craft Forms at Wayne Art Center and The Clay Studio National in PA, America’s ClayFest International at Blue Line Arts in CA and Beyond the Brickyard at Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in MT. McBride’s work has received attention from Yahoo News, Visual Art Source, Philly Artblog, Philadelphia Stories, Schuylkill Valley Journal and the international platform Ceramics Now. Now living and working in Chester Springs, PA, she is actively involved with art communities in the Philadelphia metro area. McBride earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Arcadia University, Glenside, PA. See more of her work here.

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Published on March 29, 2021 in Issue 33, Thwack. (Click for permalink.)

Sensitive Skin: Ceramics by Constance McBride

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 29, 2021 by laserjMarch 20, 2021

SENSITIVE SKIN:
Ceramics by Constance McBride

 

“Everyone wants to have an illusion of themselves, that they’re a bit attractive, but the older I get it seems more important to be absolutely honest and direct.” – Chantal Joffe

When I was a kid I discovered Seventeen Magazine and it really messed me up. I recently googled it and was shocked to see that it debuted in 1944. I always had the impression that it began in the ‘60s or ‘70s when I was a subscriber.   From Wikipedia: “It began as a publication geared toward inspiring teen girls to become model workers and citizens. Soon after its debut, Seventeen took a more fashion and romance oriented approach in presenting its material while promoting self-confidence in young women.” I have to disagree with this idea of promoting self-confidence in young women.

What I think it really did was cause many young women to angst about their faces and their bodies; something I did for a very long time. That and having a beautiful mother led me to focus on the topic of aging in a youth obsessed culture when I began my art practice.

I use clay (a medium historically excluded from the fine art world) to investigate the aging process, a notion rejected by many and specifically linked to failure as it relates to women. Through unidealized female faces and figures, I explore themes of identity and memory; referencing my own body to claim agency as the subject and owner of my work. I hand build my pieces with stoneware and paper clay. Colorants including under glazes, stains, oxides and graphite are applied to a figure’s surface to further magnify a countenance of grace and wisdom seen in senescent women.

I create my work through a lens of empowerment to address contemporary issues faced by women.

 

[click on any image to enlarge it]

Lonely Girl Room 315

Lonely Girl Room 315, detail

Lonely Girl Room 315, back view

Truth from Within

Truth from Within, front view

Between Two Worlds

Between Two Worlds, detail

Whisperers

Whisperers, back view

Time’s Relentless Melt

 

Works

  1. Lonely Girl Room 315
    2013
    Ceramic, Under Glaze, Iron Oxide, Pastel, Wire
    14″ x 10″ x 6″
    (photographer – Mike Healy)
  2. Lonely Girl Room 315-detail
  3. Lonely Girl Room 122-back view
    (photographer – Sean Deckert)
  4. Truth from Within
    2016
    Ceramic, Copper Carbonate, Wax, Wire
    20″ x 36″ x 14″
    (Photo courtesy of Phoenix Art Museum)
  5. Truth from Within – front view
    (Photographer – Amy Weaver)
  6. Between Two Worlds
    2020
    Ceramic, Copper Carbonate, Wax, Wire, Desert Debris
    21″ x 57″ x 9″ (figure)
    (Photographer – Joshua Steffy)
  7. Between Two Worlds 3
  8. Whisperers
    2015
    Ceramic, Graphite
    10″ x 13″ x 11″
    (Photographer- Chris Loomis)
  9. Whisperers – back view
  10. Time’s Relentless Melt
    2014
    Ceramic, Graphite
    8″ x 18″ x 7″
    (Photograper – Aaron

A native of Philadelphia, PA, Constance McBride’s work explores themes of identity and memory with an emphasis being placed on issues most experienced by women. When residing in the Southwest, observations of the desert made a transformative impact on her practice. Her work has been supported by grants from the Arizona Commission on the Arts, Phoenix Art Museum’s Contemporary Forum, Philadelphia Sculptors and the Arts Aid PHL program. Museum exhibitions include Phoenix Art Museum and Udinotti Museum of Figurative Art in AZ, Las Cruces Museum of Art in NM, San Angelo Museum of Art in TX, The State Museum of Pennsylvania and Biggs Museum of American Art in DE. Notable gallery exhibitions include Craft Forms at Wayne Art Center and The Clay Studio National in PA, America’s ClayFest International at Blue Line Arts in CA and Beyond the Brickyard at Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in MT. McBride’s work has received attention from Yahoo News, Visual Art Source, Philly Artblog, Philadelphia Stories, Schuylkill Valley Journal and the international platform Ceramics Now. Now living and working in Chester Springs, PA, she is actively involved with art communities in the Philadelphia metro area. McBride earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Arcadia University, Glenside, PA. See more of her work here.

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Published on March 29, 2021 in Art, Issue 33, Thwack. (Click for permalink.)

HEAVY BREATHING IN NIGHT: Paintings by Morgan Motes

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 18, 2020 by laserjDecember 16, 2020

HEAVY BREATHING IN NIGHT:
Paintings by Morgan Motes

 

Morgan Motes’ work is a visual representation of the feeling of being alone in nature. It is an expressionistic attempt to return to a sublime and nuanced world often left out of our technologically mediated lives. His method is conversational and meditative, letting paint speak for itself, leading to compositions that are as organic and living as they are fragmented and foreign. His paintings are abstract, without temporal beginning or ending, and present a moment in its full affective force. Landscapes are not landscapes, but heavy breathing in night.

[ click images to enlarge ]

Ring Park / Acrylic on canvas / 2019 / 30×36

A few years ago, I spent a day hunting shark teeth in Gainesville, Florida’s Ring Park. It was very strange to un-bury shark teeth from a creek, miles away from any beach, from when Florida was underwater. The place felt ancient, I wanted to explore it with paint.

 

Black Water Sound / Acrylic on canvas / 2019 / 28×30

I was standing in the woods at night hearing the world undress.

 

Nocturne: Noontootla Creek / Acrylic on canvas / 2019 / 24×36

Noontootla Creek is a place I frequently camp at in north Georgia, I feel a kind of connection to it. My interest in this spot, in the way it makes me feel when I’m there, is what made me initially explore landscape painting.

 

Black Water Feeling / Acrylic and oil on canvas / 2019 / 30×30

A kind of chest of ground, imagining a heartbeat beneath a pond. This is what it feels like to be calmly held by earth.

 

Black Water / Acrylic on canvas / 2019 / 20×24

My initial study of water, thinking about the retention pond my apartment lives with.

 

Black Water In Weather / Acrylic and oil on canvas / 2020 / 36×36

A process piece, painted over and over again until it was nearly fully black, and then carved and washed away with turpentine, until a composition revealed. Then touched up to feel more water-like.

 

Self-Portrait In the Retention Pond / Acrylic and oil on canvas / 2019 / 24×36

If I see myself in the retention pond, then I am the retention pond, at least for that moment. This piece is about the inseparation of us and what’s outside of us, like becoming nature, the world itself. Also, retention ponds are cool and are not loved enough.

 


Motes was born in 1997, in the small town Palatka, Florida. He previously attended Florida School of the Arts in 2018, and is working on his BA in painting, drawing and printmaking, with a minor in creative writing, at the University of North Florida. Motes has shown his work in numerous juried group shows and in multiple solo shows in small galleries throughout Florida. Motes’s paintings have appeared in The Talon Review, and The Fine Print Magazine’s “Prairie” collection. His poems have appeared in West Trade Review. Learn more on his blog www.morganmotes.com/blog

 

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Published on December 18, 2020 in Art, Issue 32. (Click for permalink.)

Terra in Flux: An Ekphrastic Collaboration by Mark Danowsky and John Singletary

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 29, 2020 by laserjSeptember 28, 2020

TERRA IN FLUX
An Ekphrastic Collaboration
by Mark Danowsky and John Singletary

The word ekphrasis comes from the Greek for the description of a work of art produced as a rhetorical exercise, often used in the adjectival form ekphrastic. It is a vivid, often dramatic, verbal description of a visual work of art, either real or imagined. In ancient times, it referred to a description of any thing, person, or experience. The word comes from the Greek ἐκ ek and φράσις phrásis, ‘out’ and ‘speak’ respectively, and the verb ἐκφράζειν ekphrázein, “to proclaim or call an inanimate object by name”.

[tap on any image to enlarge]

Terra in Flux

The bathroom mirror breaks my face
no, my face breaks the mirror

nose, a Picasso—

all comes down to energy

*

In Tai Chi, you create
an imaginary ball
then pass, smooth
smooth, smooth
sculptor at the wheel
passing it, passing it
back to yourself

*

fluid motion
blurs the line
we choose to walk against

*

You touch yourself touching
the face of love
closeness by another name
proximity one boon companion

Tell me when it is you feel
& I’ll go cold as fate
comet without gamble
trailing spectre-like
your unholy geist

*

The Rockefeller Center
zamboni operator down with flu
still can smooth & smooth

*

Faces of a masquerade
play at Janus
when lean Judas

*

free at least
sprawled
vagrant on the rocks

*

Mother of God
Sister of Heartbreak
Daughter of Chaos

*

the beauty line
ties humanity to grace
by way of athleticism—
what it means to be perfect

*

ouroboros

the difference
between naked & nude—

*

dancing

a spectrum
that begins in innocence
& ends in Babylon

*

There is nothing inherently wrong with Cypress trees.
Or apocryphal texts.

The believer tells you it’s a mistake not to believe.
The nonbeliever can’t tell you anything for sure.

I fall asleep & dream about a ball of light
passed from generation to generation.

I wake & stretch—

In Tai Chi, you take an open stance. Take an imaginary ball in your hands.
Circle the sphere. It can be crystal. You can call it an orb. You cannot drop this ball.

*

We know pareidolia—seeing
faces in things. We make
intentional masks
some just so we can walk around
being another, feeling safe.

*

Forget the self, sun
in Elizabethan world view
the great chain of being
we inhabit the middle
above all common earthly things
below the heavens, angels, divinity

 

 


 

Mark Danowsky is author of the poetry collection ​As Falls Trees ​(NightBallet Press, 2018). His poems have appeared in Gargoyle, Kestrel, North Dakota Quarterly, and elsewhere. He’s managing editor for the Schuylkill Valley Journal​.

 

.

.

 

John Singletary Headshot. Photo credit: Stephen PerloffJohn Singletary is a photographer and multimedia artist based in Philadelphia, PA. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography from The University of the Arts. His work has been collected by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Center for Fine Art Photography as well as other institutional and private collections. He has exhibited at the LG Tripp Gallery, The Pennsylvania State Museum, The James Oliver Gallery, Sol Mednick and The Delaware Contemporary Museum. He is also a contributing writer for The Photo Review Journal.​ Photo credit: Stephen Perloff.

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Published on September 29, 2020 in Art, Collaboration, Issue 31. (Click for permalink.)

THE MYTH OF THE ARAN FISHERMAN: The Art of Jan Powell

Cleaver Magazine Posted on June 29, 2020 by laserjJune 29, 2020

THE MYTH OF THE ARAN FISHERMAN
The Art of Jan Powell
by Melanie Carden

[click images to enlarge]

Knitting transcends time and is a dominant theme in Jan Powell’s life and work as an artist. Through her use and creative exploration of this craft, Jan has produced—over the past four decades—a tangible amalgam of heritage, feminism, and memory.

While working towards her master’s degree, another artist told Jan the legend of the Aran fishermen, whose intricately hand-woven sweaters have long been the topic of myth and symbolism. Though proven untrue over the years, the sweaters were long believed to help identify the Irish fishermen if they died at sea and washed ashore.

It was 2004. The tragic tsunami of Indonesia was still in the headlines, and the artist found herself in sincere sympathy for the families of those killed. The story of the Irish fishermen so profoundly resonated with Powell—whose mother and grandmother taught her to knit—she shifted her art to focus on the exploration of and use of knitting, so steeped in symbolism of identity, heritage, femininity, time, and memory.

Parallel Perceptions

What began as a conversation with the artist’s brothers, Parallel Perceptions is a monotype print created from deconstructed garments. While reminiscing, each sibling had such dissimilar memories of the same childhood story. It struck Jan as remarkable that though the basic structure of the memory was intact for each of them, the details—the fibers—had been uniquely distorted within each sibling’s mind over time.

Worn Out

Similarly, in Worn Out, Powell draws on her childhood. Just as her mom would unravel old sweaters to repurpose the yarn, Jan deconstructed children’s garments similar to the jumpers (sweaters) she and her brothers wore to create this piece. The symbolism of dismantling, through distortion, unraveling, and deconstruction, are as evident here as in her other works. Over time, our memories diminish, fade, and tatter—just like the sweaters.

 

The Fabric of Memory

Jan Powell’s artistic journey following the connective themes of fiber is also inspired by the work of the artist Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010). Bourgeois worked in a variety of media, including textiles, and believed that clothing is a metaphor for times past. Makers both, Jan’s mother and grandmother were avid knitters and dressmakers. The Fabric of Memory is a tribute to and celebration of this heritage. Inspired by Bourgeois’ metaphors and the feminine, lacy styles her grandmother wore, Powell built up layers of old, knitted garments to convey the passing of ages and the progression of time. Charcoal and graphite create intensity while the grey, monochromatic palette steeps the piece in the idea of faded diminishment.

Matriarchy reverberates through Powell’s textile work; the mother creates life, childhood memories—even, at times, the clothing. All of these strung together speak to one’s identity. Bourgeois once said, “You can retell your life and remember your life by the shape, weight, color and smell of those clothes in your closet. They are like weather, the ocean—changing all the time.”¹

Temporal Fossil #1

Temporal Fossil #2

It is in these ephemeral earthly elements that Powell draws inspiration for Temporal Fossils #1 and #2. These pieces—photographs of hand-knit shapes, frozen in ice—are designed to convey a sense of archeology and the fragility of the planet. Exhibited in HOT: Artists Respond to Global Warming at the Depot Square Gallery (Lexington, MA), the breadth of Powell’s storytelling is obvious. She has captured the ultimate power of matriarch, Mother Earth, as well as the juxtaposition of strength and fragility. Though not intended by the artist, a case can also be made that the effeminately cast Temporal Fossil #1 is a poignant snapshot of the complexities of the isolation of a woman’s infertility. The unattached string evokes a separation, a truncation in the ability to sustain life in the womb and here on earth as climate change erodes Mother Nature’s cycles.

Powell layers her temporal theme not just in the creation of this piece, but in its literal dissolve; the original has, of course, since melted. What appears cast in eternity is impermanent and fluid, like time itself.

Most recently, Jan’s work in Art on Science: 26 Etudes, is an installation in which a scientist is paired with and reacts to an artist’s work. The inspiration for her print Something Vanished was dementia, and it is a collaged monoprint involving photo transfer, intaglio, and hand-coloring.

Something Vanished

Both her mother and grandmother, honored in the piece, suffered from dementia. The artist’s love of these women and fear of the disease are represented in the piece. Powell’s piece was paired with David Kaplan, a biomedical professor whose work involves using silkworm cocoons to build neuroscience medical applications. Now sixty-nine years old, Powell says, “As I am getting older, I’m sort of thinking, ‘oh my God, when am I going to get dementia?’ I hadn’t realized it was going to be that emotional.”

Jan describes how emotion is a catalyst in the creation—but also the resolution—of a project. There is no failure in art she says, only the idea of resolution. She will ask herself, “Is it resolved?” Her philosophy of resolution has many components, and it changes with each work of art she produces. It may be texture, color, mastery of technique, or, of course, emotion. She has six unresolved versions of Something Vanished in her studio.

As in many of her works, Something Vanished offers layers of transparency, begging the question, what has been lost? Though the idea of hereditary dementia may be daunting to Powell, it is clear there is still so much left to be done—created—resolved. Just as the artist’s mother would unravel an old sweater to create a new one, Powell’s deconstructed textile tells the story of renewed purpose, even as threads fray and time plays trickster. The fibers may be worn thin from life’s elements, but Powell’s work lends proof that the myth of the Aran fishermen was, in fact, true. The weave of your sweater is your identity.

¹Morris, F. Herkenhoff. “P & Bernadec M. 2007 Louise Bourgeois: Tate Modern, London, 10 October 2007-20 January 2008.” London: Tate


Melanie Carden is a Boston-based writer and editor. Formerly a newspaper columnist, she writes about food sovereignty, cooking, culture, and social justice. She earned her BA in food and culture journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is a passionate advocate for lifelong learning—the traditional, immersive, and online classrooms alike—and remains an active alumnus for the University Without Walls department of her alma mater. Visit her website at www.melaniecarden.com

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Published on June 29, 2020 in Art, Issue 30. (Click for permalink.)

Umbrellas Could Have Brains: Paintings by Serge Lecomte

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 29, 2020 by laserjJune 25, 2020

UMBRELLAS COULD HAVE BRAINS
Paintings by Serge Lecomte

The real world for me is a mix of images where two realities or more cross. Take two known objects and connect them in some other way. As a teen I saw the paintings by Hieronymus Bosch and was taken by the surreal world he envisioned. The world was never the same for me after that. Images were no longer meant to stagnate in their inert state. Rocks weren’t simply rocks. They could become loaves of bread. And fish could turn into young maidens. Leaves on a tree could turn into birds and vice versa. And umbrellas could have brains. After all, they have to open and close.

Words have always inspired images to me. I began my career as a poet and novelist. Then one day, I quit writing because I thought painting would be a better way of expressing ideas. But the words I paint become transformed into images that may not represent a definition for the words. It’s all about connections in my mind, although I hope I can connect with my viewer. 

I love loud colors and adore the Fauvists because of their use of bright and pure (unmixed) colors. Color, shape and space are very important for me.

I don’t see myself repeating what others have done. I don’t believe in smearing paint and calling it abstract art. That movement is gone. I paint because I am addicted to painting and enjoy the creative process, even in gardening or making jam. Ever had papaya preserves with walnuts? Pretty surreal. Enjoy.

[click any image to enlarge]


Balancing Act
I recalled Charlie Chaplin in the movie The Circus where he was on a high wire while several monkeys are jumping on him. I imagined him flipping upside down. The picture stuck in my mind. And so, I painted a man walking upside down helped in the air by butterflies.

Barrier
This picture is the story of war about to begin. Barriers, walls, frontiers prevent people from  coming together.

Free as a Bird
Everything in this painting is free, except the man’s head in the cage. But I’m sure he thinks he’s as free as a bird in spite of the cage.

Gott mit uns (God is on our side)
It was originally inspired by a WWI belt buckle I saw when I met a German soldier in Philadelphia in 1960. The inscription “Gott mit uns” also appears on Nazi belt buckles. The words make no sense to me, but neither did the Crusades. And then there’s Mark Twain’s short story, “The War Prayer.”   My painting came into being from words.

Little Man
This painting was born from Alfonsina Storni’s poem, Hombre pequeñito.

Hombre pequeñito

Hombre pequeñito, hombre pequeñito,
Suelta a tu canario que quiere volar…
Yo soy el canario, hombre pequeñito,
déjame saltar.

Estuve en tu jaula, hombre pequeñito,
hombre pequeñito que jaula me das.
Digo pequeñito porque no me entiendes,
ni me entenderás.

Tampoco te entiendo, pero mientras tanto
ábreme la jaula que quiero escapar;
hombre pequeñito, te amé media hora,
no me pidas más.

Little little man, little little man,
set free your canary that wants to fly.
I am that canary, little little man,
leave me to fly.

I was in your cage, little little man,
little little man who gave me my cage.
I say “little little” because you don’t understand me,
nor will you understand.

Nor do I understand you, but meanwhile,
open for me the cage from which I want to escape.
Little little man, I loved you half an hour,
don’t ask me again.

It’s Raining Salmon
Having lived in Alaska for almost 40 years, salmon was on my table on a daily basis. The image recurs in my works in different fashions, sometimes as a head on a human body. Painting salmon in different poses is as if I were changing recipes. In Haruki Murakami’s novel Kafka on the Shore there is a downpour of fish.

Salt of the Earth
This picture was inspired by Toni Morisson’s The Beloved in which Sethe murders her child so that it would not know slavery. I embedded the face on the shore of the river.

The Waiting Room
The coffin is a waiting room, perhaps a place where the soul will one day awaken or not. In spite of death as a theme, there is also life in the tree fed by our decay. I remember Madame Bovary in which Lestiboudois, the cemetery caretaker, plants potatoes in the graveyard. Nothing like having fresh compost to nourish the spuds.

Zizi et Kiki au Café (Cute names for male and female sexual appendages in French)
First date over coffee isn’t about a cup of Java. Zizi obviously has the hots for Kiki, but her mouth is a Venus flytrap. I leave that one to your imagination.


I was born in Belgium. We came to the States where I spent my teens in South Philly. I went to Wagner Jr. High and attended Olney and Roxborough High Schools.  I then moved to Brooklyn. After graduating from Tilden High School I worked for New York Life Insurance Company, then joined the Medical Corps in the Air Force and was sent to Selma, AL, during the Civil Rights Movement.  There I was a crew member on helicopter rescue.  I earned a BA in Russian Studies from the University of Alabama and an MA and PhD from Vanderbilt University in Russian Literature with a minor in French Literature. I worked as a Green Beret language instructor at Fort Bragg, NC, from 1975-78. In 1988 I earned a BA from the University of Alaska Fairbanks in Spanish Literature and went on to work as a language teacher at the University of Alaska (1978-1997).

I was the poetry editor for Paper Radio for several years. I have worked as a house builder, pipe-fitter, orderly in a hospital, gardener, landscaper, driller for an assaying company, bartender in one of Fairbanks’ worst bars, and other jobs. I resided on the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska for 15 years and recently moved to Bellingham, WA.

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Published on March 29, 2020 in Art, Issue 29. (Click for permalink.)

A HISTORY OF ANYWAY

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 29, 2019 by laserjDecember 29, 2019

A HISTORY OF ANYWAY
Intermedia
by Nance Van Winckel

Sad lad of the far north, you with no means and no true lassie, with no way home and no home anyway, you voyage on.

And yes, as per usual, just when the key to all seems within reach, the dreaded forever descends.

[click images to enlarge]

Three feminine figures in white dresses and ornate orange headpieces speaking to someone dressed as a servant or clown, against a mountain backdrop. Text: A History of Anyway, The degradations happen, In poor light. In the meantime.  Found poetry on the page of an ancient book, which reads: ASS AND MOTHER. far, far was the babe for fees; no one thought himself home. Next to the text, an angelic figure speaking to a cloaked figure. Found poetry on a yellowed page, which reads: lad stretched then went not for her. Next to the words is an image of a royal figure holding a bird, next to a warrior holding a sword.Found poetry on a book page with a floral border. Text reads: given ths no, all high up fixed, with A.K.A in the corner. An image on the page shows a royal figure wearing a large gown, with the words "A.K.A.," "Clouded Thoughts," and "hidden tail" next to them.Found poetry on a page surrounded by a floral design, which reads: big white rooms ran to one edge. his bear dared not look He left afraid it danced. In the top right corner is an image of a bear laying on it back in chain and a cloaked figure standing over the bear.Found poetry on a stained book page. Title: THE KEY TO FOREVER LOST FOREVER. Text: her eyes begged but you your world, and dumb she went. Image of feminine figure looking into sun next to tall object with closed eye on it. Ornate art piece depicting animal-like royal figure wearing coat, accessories, and head gear. Stands against blue starry sky with black birds flying above and large colorful birds flying adjacent to the royal figure. Ghostly figure on top right. Text: To welcome what arrives to blacken the flowered fields.


Nance Van Winckel is the author of eight books of poetry, most recently Our Foreigner, winner of the Pacific Coast Poetry Series Prize (Beyond Baroque Press, 2017), Book of No Ledge (Pleiades Press Visual Poetry Series, 2016), and Pacific Walkers (U. of Washington Press, 2014). She’s also published five books of fiction, including Ever Yrs, a novel in the form of a scrapbook (Twisted Road Publications, 2014), and Boneland: Linked Stories (U. of Oklahoma Press, 2013). She teaches in the MFA programs at Eastern Washington University and Vermont College of Fine Arts. Read more at her website. 

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Published on December 29, 2019 in Art, Intermedia, Issue 28. (Click for permalink.)

STILL AND YET: Photographs by Richard Kagan

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 16, 2019 by laserjJune 3, 2020

Black-and-white farmland with sheep and treesSTILL AND YET
Photographs by Richard Kagan

Born in Philadelphia, Richard Kagan is a photographer and former furniture maker whose artistic career took a curiously circuitous path. He began as a self-taught street photographer while a student at Temple University. However, after leaving college to practice Buddhism under a visiting Japanese Zen Master in New York, Kagan became impassioned with the silent eloquence of handmade objects and pawned his camera to buy woodworking tools.

Following several years of apprenticeships, Kagan opened his own furniture workshop and founded the Richard Kagan Gallery—the first nationally recognized gallery for contemporary furniture artists. He taught at the Philadelphia College of Art (University of the Arts) for 10 years and exhibited furniture in museums and art institutions throughout the U.S. A back injury put an unexpected end to his woodworking career and opened the possibility to return to photography, thus bringing him back to where he began.

Beginning photography again in 1988, with academic studies and assisting other photographers, Kagan went on to have solo photography exhibitions in the United States, Great Britain, and South America. He taught photography at Drexel University in the mid-1990s. An early grant from the Arts Council of Wales enabled an extended project in the U.K. and Europe, culminating in an exhibition at the Royal National Eisteddfod. That project solidified a love of landscape photography first begun in Italy some years before.

Not surprisingly Kagan brought to photography some of the same aesthetic concerns with which he made furniture—a quest for quiet, understated, and elegant forms. His main bodies of work include Land/Spirit/Sky, landscapes photographed primarily in Europe; Iron Portraits, a series of austere yet sensuous portraits of antique tools and objects; and Blurred Time: Sacred Places In Kyoto, nighttime photographs taken on the grounds of temples and shrines in Japan (and on exhibit at the Philadelphia Episcopal Cathedral).

[click on any image to enlarge]

Iron Portraits

EXHAUST MUFFLER No. 1 (2008) | Floating in a black space, a fallen-off and run over, rusty automobile exhaust muffler. How ordinary and how humble in its sensuous skin of iron. And, like us, how vulnerable and how precious. I picked this up on the street as a 21-year-old living in New York’s East Village. Some 40 years later I photographed it.

EXHAUST MUFFLER No. 2 (2008) | Another muffler which, after I photographed it, I realized was influenced by a single still life painting that I also discovered at 21, and which had a profound influence on everything I’ve ever done. (Dali, Basket of Bread, 1945 — the year I was born. Not to be confused with his earlier version.) So many of my photographs have been about making something so absolutely still and yet possessed of an internal icon-like energy. Stillness is a major link between the objects and the landscapes, I think.

OIL CAN WITH LONG NECK (2004) | How could I not photograph this proud, elegant, oil can?

RECUMBENT SHEARS (1992) | About 14 inches long, this rusty pair of shears, like all of the objects I photograph, are just things that are part of my life. They live on shelves or stands throughout my home and studio.

DANCING PLIERS (2005) | For 20 years, prior to my career as a photographer, I worked with hand tools on a daily basis as a furniture maker. Working with wood was an expression of reverence and sensuality and I gave it up only as the result of a back injury. The silver lining in that dark cloud was that I got to pursue an earlier love, photography. Nonetheless, I am still inspired by the gentle grace and beauty of handheld tools.

SUGAR NIPPERS (2008) | Two centuries ago, sugar nippers were used by the wealthy, for table or kitchen use, to cut small pieces of sugar from conical shaped sugar loaves.

 

Land/Spirit/Sky

NEAR SIENA Tuscany, Italy (1990) | A clump of Italian cypress trees amidst a farmer’s land. This was the first of my landscape images. It spawned a decade of landscape photographs throughout Europe, the U.K., and Ireland.

CHAPEL OF THE MADONNA Tuscany, Italy (2001) | I knew I wanted to photograph this little family chapel with its two cypress trees, but it took a long afternoon of searching for the perfect point of view. In the actual (print) photograph, the chapel is bright white, while the rest of the image is a warm pink — a laborious technique of chemical split toning that affects the various tones of a black and white photo differently. In Photoshop it would only take two minutes.

RETURN TO GRANADA Andalusia, Spain (2000) | I like to photograph at night, though it has its own problems. During the 8-minute exposure that produced this photo, I covered the lens with a hat when cars were approaching. Somehow, I didn’t hear this car and thought the headlights had ruined the photo, but actually it’s what made it. Drawn to this image, but not happy with what I was getting, I worked on it in the darkroom for several days. Ultimately, I eliminated a house, tree, and other extraneous information.

PARQUE DE DOÑANA Andalusia, Spain (2000) | To make this photograph, I remember standing on a rental car roof with the 2 legs of the tripod astride my own and the 3rd tripod leg precariously perched on the top rail of a chain-link fence. A strong wind threatened to throw the camera, tripod and me over the fence. Stillness is a balm for the confusion of my life.

MONTURQUE Andalusia, Spain (2000) | What a joy when after days of fruitless searching, a horse, a building, and a hole in the clouds came together for the camera’s delight!

CAMPO DE SAN JUAN La Mancha, Spain (2000) | In Spain, I followed the route of Don Quixote along the path of Cervantes’ near-mythical hero.

The photographs in the Iron Portraits series were taken with a view camera — the old-style camera with a 4 x 5″ negative. The prints were made in a traditional wet darkroom in sizes ranging from 16 x 20″ to 36 x 46″.

The photographs in the Land/Spirit/Sky series were taken with Kodak 2475 Recording Film, a special purpose film with a very grainy, soft-focus quality that at times can resemble a drawing or mezzotint. They are 8 x 10″ and were also made in a darkroom.

◊◊◊

Richard Kagan

Photo by James Blocker.

A native of Philadelphia and a former furniture maker, Richard Kagan has been teaching, traveling, and photographing for over thirty years. When he is not in his darkroom hand crafting the fine nuances of black and white prints, or on the computer making color ones, he enjoys reading (Ocean Vuong, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous), meditating (on the mysteries of importing his AOL contacts into Gmail), and his cat (Takuhatsu). “I take relatively few photographs, compared to some photographers, but I spend a lot of time making work prints and thinking about each image on the contact sheet. I look for trends, I look for what’s happening that is consistently running through the contacts as well as for new directions. And from that I discover something about how I see.” Visit Richard’s website at richardkaganphoto.com for more photos and interviews.

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Published on September 16, 2019 in Art, Issue 27. (Click for permalink.)

PASSAGES: An Installation in Progress by Cheryl Harper

Cleaver Magazine Posted on June 3, 2019 by laserjJune 4, 2020

Fabrics with star of DavidPASSAGES: An Installation in Progress
by Cheryl Harper

 

I am one of those artists who thinks my work has to say something. I have nothing against paintings that bring together a disparate room décor or just make one feel good, but that’s not what I want to do. If you happen to like my work for any of those reasons, that’s fine, but if you are intrigued and compelled to think about bigger issues, that is my goal.

Since 2006 I’ve been making small statues of politicians, particularly of women in the national spotlight, in addition to works that address issues like anti-Semitism, terrorism, and gun violence. But in the last few years, I’ve been thinking about how I came to where I am now, a Jewish woman who lost extended family in the Holocaust and who married a direct descendant of a Southern plantation family that owned other people. I am a descendant of the oppressed who married into a family who oppressed.

I used to think of this in terms of predator/prey imagery but I’ve become more immersed in the complex history of both families, especially through the lens of today’s rising intolerance. We now live at a time to witness the last generation of Holocaust survivors, the rise of white nationalists, and the progeny of many generations of African slaves who are struggling with the past — and we see how these histories intersect. For example, American Jews were helping achieve civil rights legislation for African Americans in the 1960s, after half of the world population of Jewry was enslaved and mass murdered in Nazi Germany. Meanwhile, many whites in America are descendants of those who escaped persecution in Europe during the years of the Atlantic slave trade.

• • •

[click any image to enlarge]

Passages dress in progress, 2017, at James Oliver Gallery, Philadelphia

My current project, Passages, is a proposed traveling installation to American colleges. I am hoping to create dialog about who was privileged, who was enslaved, and how to approach a better understanding of our generational histories in order for all to move forward.

The point of view is female. There are original family wedding dresses overlaid with other clothing and accessories owned by mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers.

There are hangings and floor objects related to their standard of living and aspirations. Hand-printed wallpaper brings together imagery culled from family photographs and objects that refer to immigration, plantation life, and slavery.

My mother was a daughter of immigrants from the Pale, an area that straddles Poland and Russia. Her parents were first cousins, often the case in Europe, who scrabbled for a living in tiny villages, ironically similar to the practice of cousin marriage in royal families who sought to keep their families blue-blooded. My new-to-America grandparents were considered a match even in their teens, perhaps earlier; it was not a matter of love. My zayde (Yiddish for grandfather) had the responsibility of bringing over siblings to America. He was a man of very modest means, a cantor of Jewish Orthodox tradition, moving his family of four daughters and a housewife with poor English skills to a small town in New York State.

My European family in the 1930s

Here is a photograph of the other family members he was obligated to bring to America. The man in the oval, the father, was deceased. The two daughters died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. In this photograph, the girls hold proof they are educated as one holds a book and the other a scroll. Had my zayde and bubbe not emigrated, this likely would have been the fate of their four daughters, including my mother. I always had a sense of being hunted and unsafe, probably because of family stories that in childhood I overheard between adults. Post-war was a very confusing time for Jewish children in America. We knew everyone was sad but we didn’t know anything specific. It was only as teenagers when we read the Diary of Anne Frank that we began to understand what was lost. That was the beginning of our awakening.

• • •

A slave auction advertisement placed by my husband’s ancestor

My husband’s family came to the Colonies in the late 17th century. Isaac Lesesne was Huguenot, one of the French Protestants who suffered severe persecution at the hands of the Catholic majority and who emigrated for religious freedom and opportunity. It didn’t take him long to establish a rice plantation, then an indigo plantation for dyestuff. He settled in the wetlands near Charleston, known as Daniel Island, eventually expanding to several plantations and a dry goods store in Charleston. Lesesne had many slaves, the majority of whom were likely from Sierra Leone and knew how to grow rice and indigo. We found evidence of his family ancestors, particularly the Laurens, who marketed slaves, and an early runaway slave advertisement by the Lesesnes in the main regional newspaper.

A branch of my husband’s Southern family in the late 1920s

My husband and I researched objects that came down through his family through the centuries, studied the permanent exhibit of an archaeological excavation of the Daniel Island Lesesne plantation at the Charleston Museum, and visited the 18th century Lesesne family cemetery. We know who married whom and how the Lesesne branch of our family migrated to New Jersey through family fortune based on slave labor.

In this project, I am taking inspiration from Lesesne family objects dating back to the plantation, never sold, as the family was still wealthy during the Depression. In fact, this branch of the family was still collecting sterling silver service, Chinese snuff bottles, and semi-precious necklaces well into the 20th century.

• • •

 

Detail of an 1878 mizrah paper cutting, still in the extended family

Family heirlooms, augmented, passed down from my husband’s family

My family had no trappings of wealth, only entering the middle class in the mid 20th century. Among the very few objects passed down in my mother’s family was a brass plate, brought over in 1913. My father’s family, one generation ahead in America, had a few more objects of value such as cut glass and a pair of English brass candlesticks dating back to the 19th century. By sheer chance, we discovered a wonderful paper cutting dating to 1878, made by my great-grandfather’s brother as a going-away gift. In fact, it turns out to be a very important example of an artistic tradition in Galicia, Poland. Called a mizrah (Hebrew for “east”), it was mounted in the Brooklyn family home in the direction of Jerusalem. I used elements from this image, still owned by a branch of my family, as a part of my installation’s wallpaper. The lions, gazelles, birds, and snakes all had spiritual meaning to the maker and the recipient.

 

Wallpaper patterns made for Passages using block prints, stencils, and woodcuts

 

I saw similarities between the photos in families, such as little girls wearing matching dresses. I also saw differences. In my family, the clothing was the product of my great-grandfather’s home sweatshop, probably sewn by him, his wife, and older daughters. In my husband’s family, the picture I used was of my mother-in-law and her sister, who lived in a charming mansion in Northern New Jersey; their dresses were certainly not homemade. I also looked to the industry of the plantation, where the product alternated between indigo, then rice, then back to indigo.

 

Studio study of ads for runaway slaves

 

In this installation, I plan to use Isaac Lesesne’s own words in an ad he placed for his runaway slaves, whom he considered lost property. As a culture, we need to acknowledge how black slaves were monetized, and the sorrow of Jewish slavery in recent history. If loss and misery can be shared and understood beyond our singular point of view, I think it will be helpful. The enslaved never leave this trauma behind completely.

I want to share these family histories through my art to create an experience and a vehicle for dialog. I envision a forest of dresses and collected objects and photos surrounded by wallpapers for an immersive experience. Beneath and above the dresses and perhaps in the floor spaces are collected objects that refer to the lopsided domesticity of the families, evidence that reflects privilege, hardship, ownership, and aspiration. Depending on the size of the space, the installation — as does history — can expand or contract.

 


artist cheryl harper in her studioCheryl Harper is an artist and independent curator in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area. She holds a BFA and an MFA in printmaking (Tyler School of Art and The University of Delaware) and an MA in art history (Temple University). Harper has received numerous awards and honors including a residency in 2018 at the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, the Fleisher Challenge (2008) and first prize in sculpture in Pennsylvania Art of the State (2008). She has had two solo shows at the James Oliver Gallery in Philadelphia, was a juried artist in ArtShip Olympia (2016) and many other exhibitions. Her curatorial projects include the upcoming Seamless: Craft media and Performance (spring 2020) at Rutgers-Camden. Visit Cheryl’s website at www.cherylharper.com

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Published on June 3, 2019 in Art, Issue 26. (Click for permalink.)

SEEING LEAVES OF GLASS, Glassworks, Essay, and Poetry by Paul J. Stankard

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 27, 2019 by laserjApril 23, 2019
Three clear glass paperweights with ornamental flowers, grass, and bees inside them

Paperweights. (1980s) Photo: Douglas Schaible

SEEING LEAVES OF GLASS
Glass Art & Homage to Walt Whitman

by Paul J. Stankard

 

HONEYBEES

In the hive
honeybees
breed
virgin queens.

Scented foragers
guided by sun
dance their language
about harvesting
to be done.

Dusted murmuring bodies
rubbing pink clover
wing repeated visits
lured by field’s odor.

Nectar
gathered in sun
made into honey,
Nature’s continuum.

—Paul Joseph Stankard, 2019

When I entered middle age, I hit a glass wall.

I felt that I was losing my creative mojo—the work was not evolving and I felt the need for more spontaneity. Feeling frustrated, I started to write poetry, seeing it as a medium to satisfy my creative need.

I was no stranger to poetry. As a child, I was a poor reader; I’m a dyslexic, a term that was barely known at that time. But my mother, who didn’t understand why I was such a poor reader, tutored me daily through my middle-school years. Books were a struggle for my tutoring sessions, but when Mom switched to poetry it was fun. She would read the poem first, and with my good memorization skills the words, rhythms and meter clicked with me, and I—for perhaps the first time—felt that I was comprehending written expression, an idea compressed into words.

Suddenly, the words were not my enemy. They were images of an expressed idea!

Three decades later, those boyhood lessons floated back into my creative consciousness as I was struggling to advance my artistic vision and interpret nature with new allusions.

So, feeling stymied with the glass, I decided to write a poem, which led to a series of poems paying homage to native plants.

BRAMBLE

Fertile decay nourishes
arched stems, green
growth; blossoms soften
thickets hooked thorns;
showy stamens satisfy
June insects; hairy
drupelets swell to juicy
blackberry.

The challenge of painting a word-picture paying homage to a flowering plant had an appeal to me. Interestingly enough, my verbal interpretation of the plant paralleled my interpretation of a crafted plant in glass—even though I had no idea at the time how to articulate this mode of expression in my art.

As an adult, I was self-taught. While enduring the stigma of being a poor student, I discovered I was not stupid, which motivated me to teach myself. Traditional education, including art school, would have just produced more frustration. I wanted to learn about art, so I began a journey of self-education by visiting museums and galleries. I wanted to acquire a broad education that would enable me to become more than a pair of hands; I wanted to become a well-rounded person in ways that would bring artistic maturity to my work, so I began listening to books on tape.

One of those tapes was Walt Whitman: A Life, by Justin Kaplan. I was introduced to an unusual person of heroic stature—someone who was largely self-taught. Whitman, I realized, to my delight, expressed nature in an intimate way that would come to influence my work.

After I read the line from “Spontaneous Me,” from Leaves of Grass…

Clear glass sphere with figures of bees, flowers, grass, and a honeycomb inside it

Honeybee Swarming a Floral Hive Cluster d. 8.0 ” (2010) Photo: Ron Farina

The hairy wild-bee that murmurs and hankers up and down…

…I went outside in the hot summer sun and captured a honeybee in a jelly jar—and was surprised to notice how hairy it actually was. That led me to experiment with the hairy allusion in glass. This made the bee a credible component that was a focal point of my floral interpretations.

But there was more to it than just reproducing the hairy aspect of the honeybee: the influence of Whitman, exemplified by his poetry, led me to interpret nature referentially. As a result, I began to learn from the process.

As I re-read my favorite Whitman poems, I noted in many instances he went beyond realism, along a journey leading to an almost spiritual realm. His words challenged me to attempt the same journey: to go beyond crafting realistic botanical models.

Like most, I didn’t connect with Whitman’s genius on the first read, and began to revisit the poems in ways that eventually allowed me to absorb the insightful intimacy of the words as they formed pictures in my mind.

The influence of Whitman’s words, coupled with my respect for his genius, led me to display excerpts of his poetry on the walls in my studio and exhibitions. Whitman was my guide through walks in the woods and Leaves of Grass became my textbook. I wanted to articulate the same depth of feeling on a visual level in glass as Walt did in words.

I was touched by the abstract idea of how Whitman portrayed a morning glory in “Song of Myself.” He elevates a simple flower to a spiritual level:

Clear glass sphere with wilted grass, daffodils, and blue flowers inside itA morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the meta- physics of books

My poem about blackberries, as well as my later glass interpretations, were complemented by Whitman’s unusual word choices, enhanced by the spiritual force relating to all living things. He expressed this in another line from “Song of Myself”:

…the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven

As a craftsperson who worked with his hands for four decades, I was heartened with Whitman’s intuitive insight into hand skills when I read this line from “Song of Myself”:

Clear glass sphere with flowers, bees, and a honeycomb inside it

Flowers and Fruit Bouquet with Swarming Honeybees d. 6″ (2014) Photo: Ron Farina

…the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery

Whitman’s poetry led me to pursue a convergence of writing, teaching, and glass art-making. I hadn’t been to art school and didn’t share the often-exotic influences referenced by my contemporaries. But Whitman infused me with confidence. His celebration of the ordinary as extraordinary gave me pride in my celebration of the familiar things into crafted glass components: blossoms, bees, roots and leaves encased in glass.

[ click any image on this page to enlarge ]

Clear glass sphere with flowers, bees, honeycomb, and fruit inside it

Honeybee Swarm with Flowers and Fruit, d. 6″ (2012) Chicago Art Institute Rubloff Collection; Photo: Ron Farina

Clear glass rectangle with a mask inside it, topped with flowers, fruit, and one bee

Tea Rose Bouquet Botanical with Mask h. 5.5″ (2004) Photo: Douglas Schaible

During his time, Whitman thought that his poetry was under-appreciated and that his worth would only be understood by future generations. Similarly, this idea of spiritually connecting to the future, long after I die, motivated me to write this poem, which I offer as homage to Walt Whitman:

Clear glass sphere with bouquet of colorful flowers inside it

Walt Whitman’s Garden Bouquet d. 4″ (2018)

Receive this glass
it holds my memories
crafted blossoms
suspended in stillness
to be pollinated by your sight
anticipating your touch
through time.

Happy 200th Birthday, Walt Whitman.

 


Close-up of Paul J. StankardInternationally acclaimed artist and pioneer in the studio glass movement, Paul J. Stankard is considered a living master who translates nature in glass. His work is represented in over 80 museums around the world. Stankard is the recipient of numerous awards and honorary doctorate degrees. He most recently received the Masters of the Medium award from Smithsonian’s The James Renwick Alliance and the Lifetime Achievement award from the Glass Art Society. He is an Artist-in-Residence and Honorary Professor at Salem Community College. Stankard authored three books: an autobiography in 2007 titled No Green Berries or Leaves, an educational resource in 2014 titled Spark the Creative Flame, and most recently, Studio Craft as Career: A Guide to Achieving Excellence in Art-making. Visit Paul and his works at paulstankard.com

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Published on March 27, 2019 in Art, Issue 25. (Click for permalink.)

INSPIRED TO SEE: Paintings by Giovanni Casadei

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 4, 2018 by laserjMay 1, 2019

Painting by Giovanni Casadei. The Music Pier and the Ferris Wheel. Oil on panel, 10.5 x 13"INSPIRED TO SEE
Paintings by Giovanni Casadei

I was born and raised in Rome, Italy. Since the age of four I have been exposed to art, thanks to my Uncle Roberto, who religiously picked me up every Sunday morning to bring me to a museum to contemplate art. At the age of fourteen, I bought my first oil painting set with my savings, and I painted on my own for the next eight years. From 1978 to 1980, I studied at the Scuola Libera del Nudo (Free School for Drawing and Painting sponsored by the Academy of Fine Arts of Rome) under the instruction of the Armenian artist, Alfonso Avanessian. From 1980 to 1981, I was enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, then from 1981 to 1983, studied further under Alfonso Avanessian, during which I experimented with drawing, oil pastels, dry pastels, tempera, watercolor, acrylic, and oil paintings. It was a very productive, creative, and formative period for me.

On December 1, 1983, I arrived in Philadelphia. At the age of twenty-seven, I was beginning the biggest adventure of my life—to be an artist.

When I first arrived in Philadelphia, I worked as a house painter by day and as an artist by night. In 1988 I enrolled in a four-year certificate program at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, where I studied under Seymour Remenick, who became my mentor and friend for the last ten years of his life. Seymour gave me the support to make my own mistakes and to learn from them. His love for art, painting, and people was contagious. This love is an integral part of my vision as an artist. Seymour reinforced my belief in following my heart and what I love in life.

Since 1997 I have been teaching painting at various art centers in the Philadelphia area. I enjoy teaching and sharing my knowledge and experiences from my studio and as an en plein air painter with my students. I have found teaching to be inspiring, challenging, and creative. My approach to painting is to communicate to the viewer my love for life and humankind. I strive to capture in the act of painting a moment that exists in me, inspired by the light and colors that nature offers us every moment.

I am and always was inspired by light.

I have been painting for forty-eight years and I still remember my fascination for the light in Caravaggio’s paintings when I was six years old, and when I was a young adult I would spend hours watching the changing light from the crest of the Gianicolo over the rooftops of Rome. I would say that light is the subject matter of my paintings, and I still carry the nostalgic experience of light from Rome now in my work.

I paint from life, going on location to paint landscapes and seascapes in the Alla Prima Technique (resolving them in one sitting), or staying in my studio to paint still lifes in the Multiple Sitting Technique. I always paint from direct observation, and this is because I want to have the experience of seeing more than reproducing an exact copy of nature.

I want to describe the experience of seeing that comes to me as the feelings and intuitions I get in the act of painting. I want to express, with a kind of shorthand application of paint, the unspoken aspects of Nature as it is revealed by the ever-changing light. Light transforms objects; light transcends concepts. Light creates space.

As light breaks down forms into masses of illumination and shadow, and as light drains or saturates colors into spaces of moving intensities, the experience of seeing is endlessly changing, infinitely fluid and changeable. I have been painting landscapes and still lifes for such a long time because I see the world with new eyes every time I paint.

Communicating this spontaneity and the immediacy of nature through my process of painting, I hope to inspire others to consider the beauty of everyday life. To be present in the moment is what makes our lives richer.

[click on any image to enlarge]

Ocean City, Big Clouds. Oil on panel, 12.5 x 13.5″

Ocean City, 14th St. Fishing Pier. Oil on panel.

Sunny and Windy Day at the Beach. Oil on panel, 8 x 12″

The Music Pier and the Ferris Wheel. Oil on panel, 10.5 x 13″

Approaching Sunset. Oil on panel, 9 x 14″

Light and Dark. Oil on panel, 7.25 x 11.75″

Cloudy Day on the Delaware. Oil on panel, 12 x 12″

Strawberry Mansion Bridge. Oil on panel, 12 x 14″

The Columbia Bridge. Oil on panel, 12.5 x 14″


Headshot of Giovanni Casadei

Giovanni Casadei was born and raised in Rome, Italy where he studied at the Scuola Libera del Nudo and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, as well as under the instruction of the Armenian artist, Alfonso Avanessian. In December 1983 he arrived in Philadelphia, where he studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts under his mentor Seymour Remenick. He has been showing and selling his work in Philadelphia and other major cities for the last twenty years. More at www.giocasadei.com.

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Published on December 4, 2018 in Art, Issue 24. (Click for permalink.)

MINDSCAPES: Photographs by Denise Gallagher

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 5, 2018 by laserjAugust 20, 2018

Everyman Gazes into the Future. Rovinj, Croatia 2017

MINDSCAPES
Photographs by Denise Gallagher

I consider myself a painter who photographs. I had given up on painting about ten years ago since I didn’t feel I could authentically express what was mine to express. Then, about eight years ago, I fell into photographing what I came to call my “magical landscapes.” These images came almost effortlessly and opened up worlds I never imagined. I credit this experience with giving me the courage to explore the real world. During the last five years, I have traveled around the world twice for extended periods of time. I tend to perceive now that most every landscape has the potential to be a magical landscape, given the right lighting and composition.

When I travel, I love to simply wander, to experience a place with no agenda, simply to be available to receive the beauty of the moment. It is an open and receptive state and, in a way, capturing the image is just part of the process of relaxing and seeing 180 degrees. I’ve heard there are books on the zen of photography. I would say I fell into it naturally.

I’m from Philadelphia but I currently live in Fairfield, Iowa. When I return to Iowa after traveling, I create “Ritual Art Events” which I show at our local art gallery. At these evenings, I interweave short films I have created with my images, using transitions and movement (à la Ken Burns), spoken word, and soundscapes. One of my latest films combines the real with the imaginary magical landscapes. Having the imagery projected large, merging with other images and set to music, feels closest to what I consider my authentic voice.

[ click any image to enlarge ]

Magical Morning in Val D’Orcia. Tuscany, Italy 2016

Walking In the Shire Near Bishop’s Castle. Shropshire, England 2017

Fall Magic Near Lake Pukaki. Canterbury, New Zealand 2013

Morning Comes Over Me. Glass House Mountains, Australia 2017

Solitary Woman. Lembongan, Bali 2017

Lightly Tethered in Lembongan. Lembongan, Bali 2017

Arabian Sunset. My Kitchen, Fairfield, Iowa 2015

Holding the Fallen Angel. My Kitchen, Fairfield, Iowa 2017

You Never Can Tell. My Kitchen, Fairfield, Iowa 2014

 


Denise Gallagher is a photographer/painter, occupational therapist, and world traveler, currently living in Fairfield, Iowa. She has exhibited her paintings and photography extensively in one-woman and group shows, and has produced ritual art events at ICON Contemporary Art Gallery in Fairfield and also, on a smaller scale, as she travels. She believes her therapy work and art work are intimately connected, one informing the other. Denise received a BS in Art Ed from Temple in 1979, including a year at Tyler Rome, and went on to receive an OT degree from Jefferson College of Allied Health in 1986. Denise has traveled around the world twice during the last five years, photographing daily. This past year she did volunteer work with Syrian refugees in Greece and taught Tai Chi in Bali. Visit her website at www.denise-healer-artist.com

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Published on September 5, 2018 in Art, Issue 23. (Click for permalink.)

LIVING AS ART by Matthew Courtney

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 15, 2017 by laserjDecember 6, 2017

Anarctic Moon

LIVING AS ART
Ceramic Works
by Matthew Courtney

[click on images to enlarge]

matt courtney art

All World Camel

To be in the presence of Matt Courtney’s ceramic art is to be embraced by a feeling at once familiar and unanticipated — a sensation that comes not only by directly looking, but also sensed, unsolicited, out of the corner of the eye. It’s a kind of well-being and heightened awareness that can happen while sitting outdoors, perhaps beside a percolating stream or a mile-wide river: small wonders, big sky. It’s all good.

Almost instinctively, Courtney’s ceramic pieces bring that palpable sensation indoors, where they acquire something domestic, grounded in a place that feels like home. That hits home.

Our connection with ceramic objects has always been like this. For millennia we humans have lived with objects made of clay. Fashioned with purpose and imagination, they have accumulated in our living spaces around needs of food and shelter, desire and memory. To live by the possibilities of clay is, really, to live by the possibilities of art: clay objects take the shape of our lives while shaping the course of our lives, and ultimately become the tangible signifiers of the art of living.

How fortunate, then, to encounter Courtney’s ceramic works at a place called the House Gallery — a gallery that’s actually the real-life home of Henry Bermudez and Michelle Marcuse. Located at 1816 Frankford Avenue, it’s in the heart of Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood, a stone’s throw from the Kensington High School for the Creative and Performing Arts.

◊ ◊ ◊

house gallery matt courtney art

Inside the living room at House Gallery

Knock on the door, enter a tile-lined foyer, and step inside. You’re now in the wide-open living room of a typical Philly row house, with an antique fireplace and Grotrian-Steinweg grand piano at one end, and a renovated eat-in kitchen at the other. The morning sun pours through windows while a white cat (“Bobby”) spies from the top of the stairs (there are, in all, three cats living here, it turns out). Meanwhile, one of Courtney’s three-headed camels peers out the window; there’s construction going on down the block.

This is the House Gallery, a non-commercial gallery in a private residence where established Philadelphia artists have the opportunity to show their work as “house guests,” and where First Friday openings are just like house parties. It’s a work of love — and vision. Henry, who’s from Venezuela, and his wife Michelle, from South Africa, are both artists (Henry represented Venezuela in the 1986 Venice Biennale and met Michelle at his first solo show in Philadelphia). Seven years ago Henry and Michelle had the idea of re-imagining their living space, not just for themselves, but as a shared “open salon” for artists, an everyday, comfortable meeting place where neighbors and artists could rub shoulders. Today, original details of the house — the faux marble of the fireplace, carved chestnut staircase railings, and worn hardwood floors — blend in seamlessly with the scrubbed white walls and sleek modernist kitchen. It all feels “lived in,” just as Courtney’s work feels “lived with.” A perfect match.

house gallery matt courtney art

“Four Spires” at the House Gallery at 1816 Frankford Avenue

Stepping back, the House Gallery is also a refreshing assertion about how to experience art in our daily lives. It’s not an entirely new idea — think of the princely collectors centuries ago whose sumptuous palazzi became the museums and galleries of today — but it’s perhaps a more nobly aspirational one, presenting art and artists in a more intimate, immediately accessible way.

Accessibility is absolutely central to Courtney’s artworks. First off, they’re made of clay, a timeless, universal material with a long, built-in history of familiar human connections. Then, his objects are always immediately recognizable: game balls from various sports, human figures, animals, vessel forms. Additionally, he makes work at scales meant to inhabit living spaces as gracefully as gallery spaces. Ultimately, there’s an underlying human authenticity at work here: artworks sprouted from daily life, planted in real-life contexts, and holding their own among the overgrown artifices of the art market’s gallery scene.

skydivers matt courtney art

Minoan Octopus Urn With Skydivers

Courtney’s subjects are firmly rooted in real life, specifically his childhood, where he spent his time at home drawing, playing sports, and exploring the nearby woods. An important part of his art practice is about maintaining that innocence, a sense of wonder and play while making art, even after years of formal education, teaching, and residencies abroad. One technique is to use molds — industrial molds, molds he makes of everyday objects, molds he makes of his own pieces — to create multiple parts which are then assembled in seemingly random ways. The results: improvised replications and reconstructions of memory and instinct. Another technique involves creating large clay tubular cylinders, and allowing them to slump naturally while still wet; these can be assembled to become deformed rockets, statements about power and its contradictions (and a nod to his childhood hobby with model rockets). Another is to “raw fire” his pieces, a process that’s risky because moisture trapped inside the clay may not have time to burn off, resulting in mini explosions inside the kiln. Life happens, his pieces insist.

While many artists look to art for inspiration, Courtney is most informed by the lives of people he knows — friends, fellow teachers, or former college roommates, such as Susie Brandt, a fiber artist whose commitment to art is about investigating her family history and her mother’s dedication to the household. “Susie Brandt was my roommate for a year when I was at Philadelphia College of Art,” Courtney remembers. “She taught me about the importance of making art, that it was a serious thing, not a frivolous thing. The beginnings of my art making and thinking began with me trying to find a connection to my past that was at the foundation of the person I had become, similar to Susie’s connection to her mother’s skill at running a household.”

Early on, then, the domestic, lived-with vibe was there. It’s the human connection that matters, the conversation in the room.

camel triptych matt courtney art

Camel Triptych

“Another big influence was Kirk Mangus,” Courtney continues. “Kirk was my graduate school professor at Kent State and was hugely influential. I had an odd relationship with Kirk. I really admired him as an artist and teacher but it seemed as though he was always disappointed in me. He was very hesitant to tell any of us that he thought we were making good stuff. It wasn’t until much later that I heard from Eva (his wife) that he thought we (Monica Zimmerman, Keaton Wynn, and I) were the best students to come through Kent. His main teaching method was to come into the graduate studios where he also had a studio and talk about things like poetry, Greek history, or Korean folk pottery.” (Kirk Mangus passed away in 2013; read Matt’s moving — and funny — tribute here.)

“Another person is John Parris. He’s a high school friend with whom I do collaborations. John came with me down to Georgia to do a residency at Keaton’s school. We are currently brainstorming ideas for a new collaboration. John works like Keaton: idea, then drawing, then art. I seem to just start with clay and then the ideas develop.”

sixpin matt courtney art

Six Pin

Courtney’s conscious decisions around intention, material, and process allow for the incidental and the accidental — the non-scripted, the unplanned — and this in turn allows for a sly, playful ambiguity in his works because they can never quite be taken literally. Layered and metaphoric, while emphatically real, they tease our curiosity, tacitly prompting multiple reactions and interpretations. In a medium in which “everything has been said and done before,” Courtney thinks of it as jazz improvisation, letting himself and others have their own spin. (His late father was a musician who played upright bass in the Philadelphia Orchestra.)

“The not knowing is part of what excites me about making my work,” says Courtney. “It’s also a source of anxiety. I get very very bored when I know what it’s about. But, not knowing puts me in a bind when people ask me about my work, because I’m not sure. Not knowing makes the work alive for me but I feel uneasy not being able to give a quick and clear answer when I’m asked.”

“I’m most comfortable when I’m making art,” he confesses. “My studio’s in my basement, where I have four kilns. Plus, my side yard, where many of my pieces live outdoors.” One such piece, a massive series of chains, dominates an entire wall at the House Gallery. Each link is handmade, weighty and weathered, splotched here and there with a green mossy coating that naturally thrives on terra cotta that’s been left outside through summers and winters.

Small wonders, big sky. It’s all good.

chains matt courtney art

Ship Chain

◊ ◊ ◊

During this holiday season, you may find yourself sitting in front of a cozy fire, or wanting some company while sitting in front of a computer screen. If so, grab your headphones and settle into this lively, free-wheeling living-room conversation between artist Matt Courtney and DJ Ed Feldman on The Morning Feed show on G-Town Radio, where they share insights and commentary on everything from Chinese politics and Western aesthetics to Philly football and Czech beer. Enjoy!

MorningFeed with Matthew Courtney and Ed Feldman >>

morning feed with matt courtney

 

 

 

 


Matt CourtneyMatthew Courtney lives and works in Philadelphia as a sculptor and teacher. He received his BS at the University of the Arts and his MFA at Kent State University. A recipient of several fellowships and residencies, he currently teaches at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of the Arts, and Drexel University. Courtney’s recent exhibitions in Philadelphia include New Work (House Gallery) and Divergences (Cerulean Gallery). In 2015 and 2017 he was selected as artist-in-residence at Lanzhou City University in Lanzhou, China, where his work was exhibited in Post Painted Pottery. View Courtney’s complete works at matthewcourtneyart.com/home.html


List of Works:
1.  Antarctic Moon, ceramic, 36 x 60 x 9″ (2014)
2. All World Camel, ceramic, 20 x 15 x 10″ (2015)
3. Four Spires, terracotta, each rocket approximately 60 x 20 x 20″ (2016)
4. Minoan Octopus Urn With Skydivers, ceramic, 24 x 8 x 8″ (2012-2017)
5. Camel Triptych, ceramic, 10 x 26 x 7″ (2017)
6. Six Pin, mixed media (clay, wood, glass), 12 x 26 x 8″ (2017)
7. Ship Chain, ceramic, 96 x 120 x 24″ (1994-2016)

Photography by John Carlano.

 

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Published on December 15, 2017 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

WHAT WE SEE FEELS LIKE THE THING ITSELF by Micah Danges

Cleaver Magazine Posted on September 15, 2017 by laserjSeptember 12, 2017

WHAT WE SEE FEELS LIKE THE THING ITSELF
Photographs
by Micah Danges

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[ click any image to enlarge ]

My drive to take photographs is rooted in the unpredictability of such a seemingly predictable process. I use the precision of the camera in conjunction with the limitations of its mechanics to generate a series of inspiring problems that I can solve. I know that the assumptions that I make while shooting the photograph, about how life will translate onto film, will be proven wrong after it is developed and printed. This shift compels me to slow down, study the printed image and isolate key moments of transformation. From there, I consider the surface of the print and build a material relationship with the image that celebrates its singularity.

I want to continue to explore the photograph as a flexible medium that has the ability to be both image and object, and to find meaning in that dual understanding. My practice of joining other materials to the surface of photographs comes from an interest in deconstructing photography in a way that viewers can understand. I am not interested in stepping further away from certain elements of traditional photography. I am interested in exploring how both the strengths and shortcomings of the medium can be used to support the needs of each artwork I make.

 


Micah Danges (b. 1979) works and resides in Philadelphia. His work hovers between image and object, pushing the limit of what a photograph can be. He uses optical distortions that create abstract scenes from everyday items and places, in a distinctive merging of materials and process. For Danges, who prints on unconventional materials like silk, acrylic, and cotton, photography is a flexible and tactile medium. His work has been shown in solo exhibitions at the Abington Arts Center, the Samuel S. Fleisher Art Memorial, Cabrini College, and Vox Populi Gallery, and in group shows at The Michener Art Museum, Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery, The Print Center, and Fleisher/Ollman Gallery. Danges is a recipient of a 2012 Vermont Studio Center Fellowship, a 2013 Wind Challenge Grant from the Samuel S. Fleisher Art Memorial and was named a 2015 Fellow by The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage.

More images and information may be found at Danges’ website: www.micahdanges.com


Works:

Installation View, Summer Show
Abington Art Center
2015

Key, 4-6
Pigment Print on Adhesive
14″ x 11″
2015

Installation View 5
After Now, Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery
Philadelphia, PA
2017

Untitled 12 (Maestri Series)
Acrylic, Resin, Magazine Pages, and Photographs
15″ x 12″ x 3/8″
2016

Untitled 13 (Maestri Series)
Acrylic, Resin, Magazine Pages, and Ink Jet Photographs
15″ x 12″ x 3/8″
2016

Two Legs
Ink, Museum Board, Newsprint, Book Page
15″ x 12″ x 3/8″
2016

Installation View 2
After Now, Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery
Philadelphia, PA
2017

Two Parts (Section 4, Section 8)
Acrylic, Ink Jet Photographs
Each piece is 15″ x 12″ x 3/8″
2016

Two Parts (Section 4, Section 5)
Acrylic, Ink Jet Photographs
Each piece is 15″ x 12″ x 3/8″
2016

Two Parts (Section 14, Section 9)
Acrylic, Ink Jet Photographs
Each piece is 15.5″ x 12.5″ x .75″
2016

Two Parts (Section 17, Section 10)
Acrylic, Ink Jet Photographs
Each piece is 15.5″ x 12.5″ x .75″
2016

Material information about specific work selections

Maestri series
In these works, sections of photographs and magazine pages are cut, collaged, and face mounted to a frame-like acrylic form. A larger intact image is then face mounted to a solid acrylic rectangle with the same exterior dimensions. These two layers are stacked, then merged when the visible area over the larger image is filled in with a translucent resin.

Two Legs
This piece is composed of a portion of a magazine page, fixed between pieces of newsprint and suspended in wax. The composition is set into an ink-tinted museum board panel.

Two Parts series
Photographs depicting fragments of plant materials suspended between two sections of highly reflective acrylic panels. A rectangle is excised from the center of the top panel and replaced with a different section of photograph from the same series.


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Published on September 15, 2017 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

DEFT PERCEPTION by Hannah Thompsett

Cleaver Magazine Posted on June 7, 2017 by laserjJune 1, 2017

DEFT PERCEPTION
Works of Porcelain and Paper, Plausibility and Pause
by Hannah Thompsett

[click on images to enlarge]

Deft Perception: installation view

We all accumulate knowledge of our world through experience. Unconsciously, we learn to trust our perceptions as truth. But when this truth is challenged, our trust falters. We’re suddenly aware of the malleability and subjectivity of each of our constructed realities, our beliefs and expectations.

To explore and test the boundaries of that trust, I created Deft Perception: Allusions of Reality, a body of work in porcelain, paper, and photographs. When is something easily perceivable or believable? When do we need to take a second look to reassure or reevaluate our expectation of truth? To address these questions, I decided to slow down the process of visual perception by using constructed objects in spatially arranged situations. As an artist, I want us to consider the delicacy and individuality of our assumed truths and to become newly conscious of how the world of exterior phenomena informs and reassures — even as it contradicts and challenges — our perceived realities.

◊ ◊ ◊

I have been working in ceramics since my days as an undergrad. I began working with paper several years later and photography another year after that. Eventually I took up the process of folding paper forms, translating them into ceramic, and recording their arrangements with photography. I was interested in how information could be transferred through different materials and dimensions: from a flat drawing to a dimensional paper form to a ceramic object to a record. How does information change through these transformations and what roles do material and form play in translating and expressing that information? These questions and processes have all led to my thinking about perception (specifically visual perception) and are the impetus for my current practice.

Sheets of paper or porcelain memories?

When we step into Deft Perception, one of the first things we may realize is that the sheets of “paper” leaning against the wall are actually made of thin sheets of colored porcelain. They began as folded or crumpled pieces of paper, which I directionally sprayed with various white, grey, and black liquid porcelains called “slips”. These shades of slips recorded the paper’s peaks, valleys, creases, and puckers as a tonal image. At this point, the porcelained paper was very wet and pliable, so I could smooth it out and, when dry, fire it in a kiln. This burned away the paper and yielded a thin, flat, rigid panel depicting the original paper’s topography. The resulting porcelain object was no longer paper, but a representation of paper, a memory of paper.

Images or objects? Paper or porcelain?

What’s revealed in the slow, meticulous process of constructing these porcelain panels is a striking tension between two kinds of information: the representation of crinkled paper as an image and the materiality of the flat porcelain object. The panels allude to paper through their representation of paper’s surface, their rectangular format, and their thin, white edges. But though the panels reference paper, they are never mistaken for paper because the materiality of the porcelain is so prominent. And because I set the panels on the floor, leaned them against the wall, and stacked them against each other, their stiffness and physicality as objects is even more clearly emphasized. Moreover, because I used a different range of grey scales to create each of the panels, they’re distinguished even further as individual objects while being drawn farther away from the allusion to paper. It is this give and take, between image and object, that gives us pause and asks us to question what information is more important or truthful, if any, in forming our perceptions.

These kinds of tensions and contradictions exist in all representational images, often without our realizing it. Out of habit, and without consciously thinking about it, we recognize familiar situations in images and automatically transgress our own spatial and temporal reality to enter into their constructed realities. However, it is not possible to completely ignore our own real place in time and space, and so there is a paradox whenever we view pictorial representations: we simultaneously recognize, believe, and accept two separate situations or realities. Trompe l’oeil and illusion are attempts to eliminate this paradox through deception, but I enjoy the sense of this paradox, and I employ allusion instead of illusion where allusion is suggestive, but not deceptive.¹

Which is real? Which is a photo? Are they all objects?

To further complicate things, the framed images hanging on the wall in Deft Perception are actually enlarged photographs of the ceramic panels. At first, they appear as crumpled paper or images of crumpled paper. However, they are actually images of the ceramic record of the original piece of paper. By translating perceived information again, this time though photography, another layer of material information is added. Displaying the photos closely with the ceramic panels, it’s easy to compare the two. We see their similarities as images, but also recognize the difference between the materiality of the panels and the photographs as objects.

On closer inspection, we see that the photographs are enlargements of the ceramic panels, emphasizing the texture of the sprayed slip particles. This dotted texture is reminiscent of pixelated information, an artifact of digital photography, but the “pixelation” here is actually an artifact of the ceramic process, not the photography process. This pixelation is often interrupted by flaws in the ceramic surface that happen during the firing, such as ruptures and cracks. Ultimately, the photographs simultaneously depict both paper and ceramic as subjects.

Light and shadow: real or fake?

But how truthful are these photographs? Even as they record the flat surface of the panels, the light and shadow depicted are fake. Instead of actual light and shadow, the photographs capture a flatly lit representation of light and shadow. This information becomes evident because of the presence of the ceramic panels nearby. Comparing the photographs and the panels slows down the process of perception and allows time for the viewer to consider the many levels of information presented.

I am still a novice in photography, but as I utilize it, I enjoy what it contributes conceptually to the work through its process and history. At its dawning, photography was regarded as a mechanical reproduction of reality, capturing visual phenomenon with truthful, objective authority. It has since become clear, though, that this process is distinctly separate from actual visual perception for many reasons. Authorship, disengagement from time, staging, framing, and manipulation of process are a few examples of why this implied veracity cannot be assumed. However, as a medium, photography is primed to explore both the notion of truth and that of representation.²

A ceramic pyramid stands against repeated photos of ceramic pyramids. Which is more “believable”? “Objective”?

To interrogate those notions in Deft Perception, I installed two large ceramic pyramids and a field of smaller ceramic pyramids within the space as a break from allusion and representation. These physical solids, pure in form and mass, provide a visual and haptic experience bound to the present. They engage the entire space and emphasize the materiality of the other objects. The wallpaper, on the other hand, is a photographic representation of the pyramids from a separate viewpoint, digitally repeated to create an abstract pattern. The three-dimensional objects and their two-dimensional translation create a kind of easy fiction, or uneasy friction, an opportunity to compare the experience of perceiving both.

Our accumulation of knowledge through experience is constant; we continuously perceive our surroundings and build expectations and beliefs that inform our future encounters. Our mentally archived stores of knowledge are constantly in flux, distinctive to each individual. The process is automatic, and we are unaware of it until our trusted beliefs or expectations are challenged. My aim is to slow down the process of perception — visually and spatially — to draw attention to it, while gathering moments to consider, and consider again, our personal truths.

A field of ceramic pyramids, gathering moments of light.

—

¹Jonas F. Soltis, Seeing, Knowing, and Believing: a Study of the Language of Visual Perception (Reading, Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company Inc, 1966), 137-138.

²Lyle Rexer, The Edge of Vision: The Rise of Abstraction in Photography. (New York: Aperature, 2009), 195.


Hannah Thompsett received her MFA in ceramics from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University in 2016. She received her BFA in ceramics from The State University of New York at New Paltz in 2011. During her time between degrees, she was an artist-in-residence at the Flower City Arts Center. She is currently a Ceramic Art Technician at Alfred University and continues her studio practice in Alfred and Wellsville, NY.

To see more of her work, visit www.hannahthompsett.com and @hannahthompsettsculpture on Instagram.


List of Works:
1. Deft Perception: Allusions of Reality, digital prints, ceramic, wallpaper, 2016, installation view
2. Arrangement 3 (five panels), ceramic, 2016, 64” x 32” x 4”
3. Arrangement 7 (three panels), ceramic, 2016, 32” x 33” x 2”
4. Deft Perception: Allusions of Reality, digital prints, ceramic, 2016, installation view
5. Photograph 3, digital print and wooden frame, 2016, with frame: 28” x 42” x 2”
6. Detail of White Pyramid, ceramic, 2016, 24” x 24” x 36”
7. Field of Pyramids, ceramic and wood, 2016, 58” x 58” x 14”

 

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Published on June 7, 2017 in Art, Issue 18. (Click for permalink.)

AMERICA UNSPOKEN: Paintings by Tina Blondell

Cleaver Magazine Posted on March 22, 2017 by laserjMarch 23, 2017

AMERICA UNSPOKEN
Paintings
by Tina Blondell

“The Down Side of Up.” This painting explores my views concerning our national obsession with medicating citizens in an effort to subdue and dampen personalities. I believe this carries a steep cost in lost creative potential.


It is perhaps because I spent the first eight years of my life being uprooted from one country to another that I developed a keen skill for observing human behavior. I struggled to learn new languages and to fit in, often with great difficulty. It was during these formative years that I developed a personal language freed from words — the language of drawing and painting. By the time I arrived in the U.S. at the age of seventeen, I had formed a sense of self that allowed me to perceive the world with the eyes of an outsider. I was fascinated not only with the diversity of American people, but also the world they had shaped around them. And although English is the lingua franca across this great country, variation in the spoken word fascinates me to this day.

There is no easy way to explain who Americans are. We are a complex accumulation of beings with unique and varied cultures, traditions, and genetic histories. Perhaps this is why I feel most comfortable expressing my thoughts concerning American identity visually. My models are friends, family, and neighbors—all people with whom I have a personal connection. I have tried to capture something of their stories in my imagery.

click any image to enlarge


“Urban American Gothic.” I got the idea for this piece while hanging out with the models around their backyard pool last summer. I was immediately reminded of Grant Wood’s “American Gothic.” This work is a tribute to all families, regardless of religion, ethnicity, or gender. The Human Rights logo on the cap is the only hint that this is a same-sex couple.


This painting is entitled “I Walk the Line,” after Johnny Cash’s song of that title. It depicts a young father and daughter, with a nod to Caravaggio’s “Pilgrims Madonna.” With this work I address the blurring of gender roles in contemporary families and examine the archaic stereotypes of the past.


“These Boots Are Made for Walking.” This work is in honor of all women who have survived difficult times in their lives with their dignity intact.


“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” –Friedrich Nietzsche. This painting is named “A Boy Named Sue,” after Johnny Cash’s song of that title. It’s a personal piece about my son Sascha, and the effect his name had on him as a young child.


“Chinese Take-Out” is a now retired roller girl with the Minnesota Atomic Bombshells. She is a first generation Hmong from Laos. I wanted to include a Hmong woman in this series to honor the contributions they have made to American culture and history.


“Mr. VanMadrone” is a local blacksmith working in his shop in Minneapolis. He apprenticed to learn the trade in northern Wisconsin. This painting honors the working class and all who use their hands to create things. I am always eager to embrace the challenge of working with light.


In this piece, I have painted Ms. Antimony Bishop as the fictional character Nubia, a comic book superheroine published by DC Comics. The original Nubia was created by Robert Kanigher and Don Heck, and debuted in Wonder Woman #204. She is a symbol of the inner strength and determination of women everywhere.


“Mr. DuBois” is a now retired commercial diver and underwater welder originally from Louisiana. His job required him to perform under the most challenging of circumstances, to be highly trained, certified, and to be in peak physical and mental condition. This painting honors those who work behind the scenes and accomplish things we never question and take for granted.


“Ms. Jessica” is a painting of a friend who is the drummer in a Minneapolis punk rock band. I tried to capture her bad-ass enthusiasm for her craft.


“The Fire Tamer” is about a friend who is skilled in the art of fire performance. She performs locally and nationally with the Infiammati Fire Circus. Although she is trained in a number of performance skills, I was most interested in the challenge of painting fire, and the way the light of the fire played on her face and body.


“Upper Mississippi Valley Sicilian.” This is simply a painting of an Italian-American friend here in Minneapolis. I have a soft spot for Italians, having grown up in Livorno, Italy, and I am interested in the challenges a Mediterranean temperament can create in a northern Nordic culture.


This painting, “A Convenient Myth,” explores my views on how women are portrayed in history. In the ancient world women filled many leadership roles, however a fundamental shift appears to have happened sometime prior to the advent of our Common Era. Many of the myths and legends concerning powerful women of the ancient past were modified or appended, with the objective of portraying them (and by extension – all women) in a less positive light. The ancient Greeks, Persians, and Romans may have started this process, but it was enthusiastically carried forward by the monotheistic descendants of the Sons of Abraham. The legends of Medea, Eve, Jezebel, and Joan of Arc are but a few examples of stories designed to undermine women’s influence in human society. This piece explores how women have been villainized in religion and history, but also reveals how our ancient inheritance survives to the present – albeit just beneath the surface.

 


Tina Blondell was born in Salzburg, Austria, to an American father and Austrian mother who encouraged her early interest in art. Crucial to her education as an artist was her firsthand encounters with art in Italy, where she lived until 1971, particularly the work of Caravaggio and of Artemisia Gentileschi. Other influences are Goya, Francis Bacon, and Alice Neel, whose paintings combine an emotional impact with a vision of the human condition. Blondell’s involvement with earlier art informed her technique and interest in narrative, as well as her referencing images from the history of art in decidedly contemporary work.

In the mid 1990s, Blondell settled in Minneapolis, where she continues to live. Blondell has exhibited her work widely both nationally and internationally. Her work is in many private and public collections including the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and the Weisman Art Museum.

More images and information may be found at her website: tinablondellstudio.wixsite.com/tinablondellstudio


Works:

The Down Side of Up, (2008-09) oil on panel, 60 x 19 inches
Urban American Gothic, (
2008) oil on panel, 49 x 38 inches
I Walk the Line,
(2008) oil on panel, 60 x 30 inches
These Boots Are Made for Walking,
(2007) oil on panel, 29 x 34 inches
A Boy Named Sue, (
2008) oil on panel, 49 x 30 inches
Chinese Take-Out,
(2012) oil on panel, 51 x 38 inches
Mr. VanMadrone,
(2009) oil on canvas, 60 x 39 inches
Antimony as Nubia,
(2011) oil on panel, 36 x 48 inches
Mr. DuBois,
(2013) oil on panel, 16 x 20 inches
Ms. Jessica,
(2010) oil on panel, 50 x 39 inches
The Fire Tamer,
(2011) oil on panel, 60 x 41 inches
Upper Mississippi Valley Sicilian,
(2009) oil on canvas, 66 x 22 inches
A Convenient Myth,
(2007) oil on panel, 36 x 24 inches

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Published on March 22, 2017 in Art. (Click for permalink.)

WE ARE ALL MIGRATING TOGETHER by Shira Walinsky

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 28, 2016 by laserjMay 3, 2019

WE ARE ALL MIGRATING TOGETHER
Painted Bus Routes and Immigrant Roots
Mural
Arts in Philadelphia by Shira Walinsky

Introduction by Raymond Rorke

Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love and home of the famous LOVE statue by Robert Indiana, is taking love to new places.

If you happen to be in Philly, chances are you’ll catch sight of the 47 Bus. You can’t miss its bright blocks of color or its bold, emphatic message: WE ARE ALL MIGRATING TOGETHER.

 

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This “mural on wheels” is the brainchild of Shira Walinsky, mural artist, and filmmaker Laura Deutch. It runs daily from South Philadelphia’s Whitman Plaza, on through Center City, and all the way up to 5th and Godfrey in North Philadelphia, connecting several multilingual, multiethnic neighborhoods and commercial corridors. Riding the bus through this cross-sectional slice of the city you’ll inevitably hear a cross-cultural variety of languages spoken, while being wrapped in a welcoming collage that represents the patchwork of diverse people whose lives intersect every day. The back of the bus reads “We Are All Migrating Together”—words from the mouth of one of its drivers—and along the way you’ll see murals by and about refugee groups who have recently settled in Philadelphia—the Karen and Chin of Burma, the Bhutanese, the Nepalese.

The bus’s first stop, 8th and Snyder, is the site of Southeast by Southeast, a public arts space and social services community center originally founded as a six-month, pop-up storefront in 2011 by Shira Walinsky, artist Miriam Singer, and social worker Melissa Fogg under the Mural Arts Program with funding by the Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services.

Karen Dancers

Karen Dancers

Five years later, Southeast by Southeast is still going strong, a space for immigrant and refugee families to learn from one another, gain access to important social services, and lend their voices to highly visible public art projects. There, with the help of many volunteers and artists within the refugee community, Southeast by Southeast hosts regular ESL classes, citizenship classes, and grandparents’ groups. Monthly workshops draw from refugee skills and talents and include Burmese food night, Bollywood vs. Breakdance events, weaving and sewing demos, and more.

And there’s more ahead. Along the 47 Bus route you’ll find that Shira has created a number of murals in collaboration with refugee groups to mark their collective stories of identity and migration.

The 47 Bus Route and Mural Locations

The 47 Bus Route and Mural Locations [click to enlarge]

MURALS ALONG THE WAY

Namaste (7th and Shunk) depicts a monastery in Bhutan. This mural was originally for the owners of Namaste Grocery.

El Chilito Loco (8th and Jackson) appears at the restaurant El Chilito Loco. Shira worked with the restaurant owner to create a mural using iconography from the Mayan number system and the Aztec calendar.

From the Mountains to the City (7th and Emily) tells the story of leaving home, being forced to flee, and moving into the city. Most of the Karen, Chin, Burmese, and Bhutanese refugee groups who have settled in South Philadelphia have come from very rural areas or refugee camps.

Farming Up the Mountain (8th and Emily) tells the story of farming in a rural area and here in South Philadelphia. Most of the recent immigrants in South Philadelphia were farmers in their home countries. This mural is next door to the Growing Home Gardens, a refugee garden project by the Nationalities Service Center. The colors come from Karen and Nepali textiles.

Storefront (7th and Dudley) is the site of the original Southeast by Southeast location. This mural is evocative of textiles by the Karen people of southern and southeastern Myanmar (Burma).

Language Lab (7th and Moore) celebrates the over thirty languages spoken in South Philadelphia. If you are waiting for the 47 Bus you can learn a word in another language!

* * *

Poem About American Identity by Teenage Refugee

Poem About American Identity by Teenage Refugee

But all these projects and programs go beyond public perceptions of ethnic, immigrant minorities. There’s also the private joy and insight that comes from getting to know a refugee personally.

Shira writes:

There are many inspiring community members, but working with Ma Kay Saw has been really inspiring. Ma Kay Saw is a refugee from Burma. She grew up in Eastern Mountain Burma and is part of the Karen ethnic group. The Karen and other ethnic groups such as the Chin have been oppressed and engaged in civil war with the Burmese government for many years.

Ma Kay Saw had a 4th grade education, and worked helping her father farm in Burma. She also learned to weave. Each ethnic group in Burma has its own weaving traditions, and Karen weaving has beautiful, richly saturated colors.

Ma Kay Saw and her family fled from Burma, escaped through the jungle, and made it to a refugee camp in Thailand.

She arrived in the U.S. in 2011 with her husband and five children. She came with no English. She has been coming to the Southeast by Southeast community center since 2012 for ESL and women’s group activities. She has learned English and knows the 100 citizenship questions and is preparing to take the test.

Ma Kay Saw

Ma Kay Saw

A goal of the Southeast by Southeast community center has been to identify artists in the refugee community and find frameworks for their work. When I first saw Ma Kay weaving and making Karen clothing I was blown away by the complex patterns and rich color. I asked her if she would be able to do a weaving demo. At the time, a translator was needed to help present the demo, and she was somewhat hesitant, but in subsequent years she has led many demos and sales with confidence. Today, Ma Kay feels happy to connect people with Karen identity and traditions.

I am glad to be in a space where traditional and indigenous artists are given a framework and space for their work. I am inspired each time I see Ma Kay Saw and see her weaving—to see a resilience, an ability to learn, and to continue traditions from home.

* * *

Philadelphia, one of our nation’s forty sanctuary cities, has long been known as “a city of neighborhoods,” and South Philadelphia has long been a welcoming neighborhood for immigrants—the Irish of the 1840s, the Italians of the early 1900s, the Eastern European Jews of the 1920s, the Vietnamese and Cambodians of the 1970s, the Mexicans of the 1990s. Today, it’s the Burmese and Bhutanese who are arriving and settling in, and the annual Philadelphia New Year’s Day Mummers Parade, largely made up of South Philadelphians, is just around the corner.

We are all in this together, migrating together. Happy New Year.

—Raymond Rorke, December 2016

Postscript: It turns out that the Southeast by Southeast Brigade—Burmese, Sham, Chin, and Nepali dancers from the refugee community in South Philadelphia—got to strut their stuff in their very first Mummer’s Parade this year! Young members gave out Lao-style sukwon/mut khaen blessings, while elder women showed off their dancing skills.  “We were such a small group compared to the others we marched with, but everyone was very nice to us, and we heard from so many folks about the diversity, inclusivity, and culture we brought to the parade,” says Catzie Vilayphonh, a South Philly native who grew up watching the Mummers. “I think this may be the beginning of some great New Year traditions!” —RR

Dancers from the Southeast by Southeast Brigade in the Mummer’s Parade


Headshot of Shira WalinskyShira Walinsky lives and works in Philadelphia. As a painter, printmaker, muralist, and educator, she is focused on expanding the possibilities of partnerships between artists and communities. Shira received her MFA in painting from the University of Pennsylvania, and has completed eighteen murals in Philadelphia under the Mural Arts Program. In addition she created a series of seven lunch trucks focusing on identity, immigration, and work. She is currently co-teaching at the University of Pennsylvania with Jane Golden, Director of the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program. While pursuing interdisciplinary work both in teaching and her own work, Shira is interested in the cultures and subcultures of the city. How do personal stories fit into larger issues of the city? How has immigration continued to change the narratives and the face of the city? Shira’s work with people in local communities helps transform public spaces, and each project is a new hybrid with new sets of challenges for artists and communities to grow from. Visit www.shirawalinsky.net

Headshot of Raymond RorkeRaymond Rorke is an ardent fan of Cleaver Magazine. As a longtime writer and designer who has lived through the evolution of hand-set type into hand-coded webpages, he is fond of tinkering with words—and what goes into making them sing. Check out his ceramics portfolio here.

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Published on December 28, 2016 in Art, Issue 16. (Click for permalink.)

SPRING STREET: Works on Paper by Thom Sawyer

Cleaver Magazine Posted on December 28, 2016 by laserjJuly 1, 2020

SPRING STREET
Works on Paper
by Thom Sawyer

Unhappy small towns are all alike—claustrophobic, gossipy, dying.
—Timothy Egan

I have lived and worked in such a small town as this. Quiet, nondescript streets link manicured lawns and well-kept homes; neighbors guard their privacy as they intrude on the lives around them, paying close attention to the comings and goings of others, particularly those of relative newcomers. It is a strange mixture of the private and public, with odd boundaries that seem fluid—simultaneously hiding and displaying glimpses of interior narratives, opinions, rumors and expected codes of behavior.

[slideshow_deploy id=’27151′]

[click any image to enlarge]

My town is a place that echoes David Lynch’s fictional Lumberton and “things that are hidden within a small town… and things that are hidden within people.” Some of those hidden things were revealed during the renovation of the house my wife and I live in—one of the neighborhood’s knock-off mid-century modern homes. Stripped bare, uncovered surfaces inside the structure tell fragments of distant family histories, many of which are highly private; others merely reflect the mundane public face of the neighborhood.

This series of paintings and drawings chronicles the process of fitting into—or not fitting into—a closed community, as well as the discoveries of long ago buried personal stories and events. The works are done on site, from life. As a result, the surrounding environments become integral to the process of making and thinking.

Often, unanticipated moments help shape formal and conceptual directions. Many of these decisions find a place in the final image, but just as many move from a central focus to a periphery status, which may or may not appear in a later image. In this and other ways, working from life is central to the images’ fluidity and flexibility around visual and conceptual possibilities.

Cliff's Japanese Maple and Sonja's Crabapple Tree

Cliff’s Japanese Maple and Sonja’s Crabapple Tree (2013)

Mark making is also a central focus of this body of work. Marks are used directly with little, if any, rendering or modeling. Uninflected, each mark carries as much information as possible, combining with other marks to construct a greater complexity of form, space and light.

Such a process requires a high degree of focus: shape, line, mass, color, gesture, and spatial relationships are all considered and combined simultaneously. A dichotomy exists between this process of close observation and the final images, which often appear to have a strong graphic quality, as if the images came together in a single pass, or through a paint-by-number template. The ability of the paintings to flip back and forth across the boundary or edge between a flat surface and the illusion of depth, as well as abstraction and figuration, echoes the often permeable boundary between the past and present as well as the private and the public.

Other elements in the work refer to these dichotomies simultaneously. Windows, although not included in every image, play an important role throughout most of the series. Clearly, they function both as pathways into and out of the private and public. Windows rarely appear unobstructed—they are usually coupled with an element that responds to or blocks the outward view. This response or blocking corresponds to a conscious sense of community and the decision to actively engage or resist exchanges and communication with the neighborhood.

2012-fpr-newtown-good-sm

For Newtown (2012)

Semi-opaque plastic drop cloths function in both roles. Originally, the thin plastic tarps were used to isolate parts of the renovation within the structure, but they soon began to play a greater role in an evolving narrative or context.

In the piece Color Test, Mailbox and Elmo’s Stairs (2013) the drop cloth alludes to the flowing curtain that appears at the start of Lynch’s 1986 film Blue Velvet.

These thin sheets of plastic refer as well as to tragic private and public events: in For Newtown (2012), the drop cloth, while still evident in the upper right corner, has been pulled back to reveal a holiday tree hung upside down in a stairwell with a large window that looks out onto the neighborhood. This watercolor was completed at the time of the Newtown shootings and responds to that horror with a communal view (both from the inside and outside) using a well-known symbol frequently tied to the concept of peace. By setting this object on its head (and literally hanging it), many of its collective associations are subverted.


thom sawyer author photoThom Sawyer lives and works in New Mexico and Washington State. He received an MFA from the University of Pennsylvania and a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University. His work has been exhibited in solo and group venues including the Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington, DC), The Contemporary Austin (Austin, Texas), the Creative Arts Workshop (New Haven, Connecticut), the Sierra Arts Foundation (Reno, Nevada), the Washington Street Art Center (Somerville, Massachusetts), C. Grimaldis Gallery (Baltimore, Maryland), ARC Gallery (Chicago, Illinois), the Indianapolis Art Center (Indianapolis, Indiana) and Rogue Community College (Grants Pass, Oregon). His most recent show, titled 36 Views of Baylor Canyon, took place at the Branigan Cultural Center in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

Sawyer began his series Spring Street in 2012. Between 2010 and 2012 in southern New Mexico, he completed 36 Views of Baylor Canyon, a series of color pencil drawings focused on the intersection, or collision, between a private, domestic world and a larger, more far reaching global view. Since 2003 he has continued work on another series, Julia’s Garden, which examines aspects of love, language and the landscape.

More images and information may be found at his website: thomsawyer.net


Works:

Mildred and Helen, 2013, color pencil, 18 x 24 inches
Alice’s Closet,
2012, watercolor, 26 x 20 inches
New Mexico (Bed) (For Julia), 
2015, watercolor, 20 x 26 inches
Color Test, Mailbox and Elmo’s Stairs,
2013, watercolor, 20 x 26 inches
Dropcloth,
2014, color pencil, 18 x 24 inches
Elmo’s Rathole,
2013 and 2015, watercolor, 20 x 26 inches
Crazy Muriel’s,
watercolor, 20 x 26 inches
Vent,
2013, color pencil, 18 x 24 inches
Boomerang,
2015, watercolor, 26 x 20 inches
2 x 4 (For Uncle E.),
2013, color pencil, 24 x 18 inches
Intercom (For Aunt J.),
2013 and 2015, watercolor, 26 x 20 inches
Cliff’s Japanese Maple and Sonja’s Crabapple Tree, 
2013, color pencil, 24 x 18 inches
Pink Dresses, 2013, color pencil, 24 x 18 inches
For Newtown,
2012, watercolor, 26 x 20 inches

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Published on December 28, 2016 in Art, Issue 16. (Click for permalink.)

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