It has been a bit SKETCHY, so far.

It is a tad more than half over and it has already been a busy, busy summer in the studio! Yes, I taught a small drawing class, I took a break and judged art out in Utah, and there was that wonderful working vacation to look at galleries in Atlanta (see my previous posts about the Atlanta galleries and especially about Kevin Cole’s work). But making and prepping art work for two shows this fall is really keeping me hopping … and happy.

View S.W. from Old White Bridge Road, 2012

The first show is in Virginia, at the gallery of the Staunton-Augusta Art Center. Since I am hanging work in both their larger gallery and their more intimate small gallery, I decided to divide my show into two separate but similar bodies of work. For that smaller gallery, I figure on hanging about 25 sketches. My thought was that the small size of the works would fit the space and feel of the gallery nicely. These sketches will probably be quieter, simpler and perhaps a little bit more playful than their larger cousins in the main gallery.

For the sketches; I have been using pencil, ink, and wash drawings. A few of the sketches are done in full color. For those, I have worked in watercolor or water-soluble drawing media. When I am feeling visually playful though, I am apt to combine many of those materials in one sketch! There maybe another kind of surprise in this quieter show. I am including some sketches that definitely look like they are E. 20th Century Modern; others feel like they are just out of the 18th or 19th century (think: École des Beaux-Arts or Royal Art Academy). A few have elements of both; makes me a little bit giddy.

To get a nice group of sketches together, this year I have followed my own advice and kept sketchbooks at hand all the time. And I have been scouring the roads on both sides of the mountains … every trip, every errand.  I have been more likely to stop beside the road, wander down a creek bed, or scramble up a ravine than to get home on time. I hope I haven’t been to late to often, but the sketching has been wonderful. Relaxing and challenging all at once. Again, hopping … and completely happy.

I will have to write about the larger works … the paintings that will be in the larger front gallery in Staunton and the drawings in the Calhoun, Georgia show … a little later.  For now, it is time to get back into the studio.  And get another image started …

Only one more week! Have you met Kevin Cole yet?

Have you ever had a colleague that you thought was an incredible professional?  Have you had some friends that you think are really marvelous human beings (I certainly hope so)?

It is a privileged to meet folks that fit into both of those categories. There are some wonderful artists and artist-educators that I have gotten to know over the years. Some I met simply because of their absolutely amazing art work. Others I worked with or met at conferences and professional gatherings. The ones who have proven to be human beings of rare decency and kindness are the best though. And I have been lucky to call a few of them friends.

One of the reasons for this recent trip to Atlanta, was to see one such artist, colleague, and friend … Kevin Cole. Kevin and I met for the first time about six years ago. Since Kevin and I both have serious Atlanta connections … and we already had several mutual artist friends around the country, you would have thought we should have met long before then. Somehow, family and work stuff had just kept our paths from crossing earlier.

Anyway, on our rather impromptu trip to Atlanta, we were able to catch up with Kevin and finally meet his lovely wife and daughter. They graciously showed us around their beautiful place. It is full of art from fellow artists. It was especially nice to see work by artists that we both know … and some I only know of.

A real treat for me as a fellow artist was having Kevin show me around his studios. Like me, Kevin has converted a basement and a garage into workspace. I must admit his studio is a wee bit larger and is a more finished than mine. (No envy, we are all working at getting it right!)

I really like his work. Kevin has done traditional painting, drawing, and murals; he has worked in collage/assemblage with paper and with printmaking. Now Kevin is usually working in sculptural modes; most of his current work is done in painted metal.  The work is exciting on several levels.  On one hand the forms are sinuous and seductive … some of the relief pieces undulate as though they are trying to free themselves from the supporting wall/surface. Other seem to want to really become completely of the wall. And the color, sometime it is a joyful and riotous affair. But every time I slow down and really look at his use of  color, I begin to see networks of relationships, repetitions, and subtle harmonies within the boldness.

Dorothy Gillespie, 1999

There are two artists whose work I think of when I look at Kevin’s painted sculptures. One is Sam Gilliam who made paintings that he presented as three dimensional objects. (I believe Kevin knew Sam pretty well.)

The other artist, Dorothy Gillespie, I ran across in Raleigh, NC … during the 1980s and 90s. She constructed her assembled sculptures with multiple, long, and sinuously curving planes of aluminum. She paint them with joyous and celebratory color. Kevin’s work does not look derivative of these artists … they just explore some related visual territory.

Over the years, Kevin and his work have become a major part of the cultural scene in Atlanta. His work is prominently on display around the city. Currently this includes a show … Kevin Cole: Straight From The Soul, 25 Years In The Making, which is taking place at two venues:  MOCA GA from May 18 – July 28 and Southwest Arts Center (Southwest) from May 19 – July 28. The exhibition, was curated by Dr. Julie McGee.  (PS: There is a book to go with the exhibition too!)

So, if you can … swing by and see his work in Atlanta. Sure, you can see it online to but why not the real deal?. And if you ever get a chance to meet Kevin: you’ll see what I mean about him being such a descent fellow.

PS: If you are in the area, I also recommend you getting to the Sandler Hudson  Gallery which represents Kevin’s work.

   

Even MORE Hot Atlanta Art! … part 2

Yeah, at 9:00 am, and it was approaching 90 already. Muggy too. I did get all around the city in about 36 hours … despite all that heat.  You have heard of a gallery walk, we did the gallerry RUN. Atlanta folks will figure out that I missed some galleries. I did. My list was selective and … because they were setting up new shows and there were a few that were closed for all or part of the month of July. Imagine that a vacation from Atlanta’s hot summer … smart folk those art dealers and artists!

Well, despite not seeing the inside of EVERY gallery on my very selective list., there were some amazing works that we got to look at.

Abandon, by Matt Haffner, at Whitespace

The work by Matt Laffner was arresting in a action movie or a crime novel kind of way; the content was intended to grab hold of the viewer. And the flattened, almost silkscreen layered look of the image was a perfect choice to back this up. It reminded me of comic books and the covers of pulp fiction novels … in a wonderfully sophisticated way though. Laffner is tapping into our memories of pop images and updates them to fit his narrative. If you don’t ” cotton” to the comic book aesthetic,  think Golub without the tortured paint surface.

Another artist that caught my eye was the landscape painter Megan Lightell. Each of her works was square, four feet square. That format isn’t one that is traditional in landscape circles. We all know that; every time we turn on our computer printer we have to tell it if it is supposed to print in landscape format or not (usually not). Well the scale and format worked for Lightell. So did the painting of light. Whether she was giving us a bright clear light day, a thick southern day in the fields or a morning before the mist clears, I could see the light brightening up the and moving through air. In one I could almost taste the thick air of the coastal swamps and tidal rivers I grew up with in Georgia and Florida.  Here were the Southern landscape made anew that I had hoped to find.

Megan Lightell, Morning Creek

A direction that I am always pleased to find is an area that I like to explore, the visually intimate image. The ones with a grace and a charm that isn’t about the subject, ones where it is the artist’s choice of color and tone, or the artist’s material that sets up a sensual response. Something quiet that we can explore slowly and deeply.  I found that in two artists whose work I had never seen before. They were Stephanie Hargrave and Terri Dilling. Hargrave’s images are a delight; a delight in the same way that sweet, ripened fruit and Crème Brûlée make a perfect close to a meal. Each would be a perfect dessert, but if put together well … well you know.

Stephanie Hargrave, Floating series #9, 9×9

Hargraves’s range of opacity to transparency is SO nicely played in these works; there is a deliciousness found as you melt your way through the layers, past the clearly defined lines and shapes and down into a fog and haze of tone. These are not bold or dynamic works. They are delicate visual treats that you want to spend a bit of time enjoying. They really are worth the time, even when they are competing with larger works or 104 degree summer heat.

Terri Dilling, Littoral Zone series #2, cyanotype & gouache

Another artist who plays with images that flirt with fog and haze is Terri Dilling. These works get their complexity from a wonderful and unexpected pairing disparate materials … cyanotype and gouuache. Cyanotype is a old photographic technique. The invention seems to  go all the way back to 1842 for blueprinting, but Anna Atkins made the first photographic prints using the method in 1843. Unlike Anna Atkins, Dilling seems to be using a a layering of exposures to work up her images. And Dilling is also using Gouache? Gouache is of course a version of watercolor most often thought of from the designer world (animation and graphic designers) of the 1940s to 1980s. If you have a world art turn of mind, you also remember that Mughal and Persian miniatures often used a gouache type of watercolor.

But maybe we should look closer to home to see why Dilling is using gouache. Remember watercolor is usually transparent. Gouache can be too … in thin layers. It can be opaque. So gouache can hide and reveal what is below … it can tease us with glimpses, illuminating or shielding. Just like the layering of the photogram process Terri Dilling is using. Now I see why those material belong together. Evocative and a bit mysterious.

Now I will wrap up. But I have one final thing to mention … one of the biggest reasons I made this trip to Atlanta. To see Kevin and his work which is on display  at several venues in Atlanta … work that I think you will really like. Here is a taste. I’ll post a bit more in a day or so.

Ties? Oh yes!

Atlanta was HOT, so was the Art!

We headed south last week. Pretty far south in fact; Atlanta. And it was HOT … the highs were above 100 every day we were in Georgia.  But hey, it is summer and we were in Hotlanta. And, to be sure Interstates 85, 75, and 20 were, as always, entertaining.

I was reminded pretty quickly about how wonderful a city it is … and not just because I was born there a “few” years ago.  We had really delicious meals with beautifully prepared dishes, local prepared beverages … graciously served at several restaurant and pubs. We enjoyed the rich mélange of old and new architecture and were excited to see such wonderful art in the cities galleries.

We were down on a working vacation. Even if we were only visiting for fun, we would have spent some time looking at art but that was the purpose of this trip. I was also hoping to meet an artist friend and colleague (more about Kevin Cole in a later post!) and looking at the galleries and art centers of the area.

In The Shadows, oil on tin 45×90, by Drew Galloway, at Marcia Woods Gallery

I expected that we would see quite a few landscape paintings. But landscapes in southern art are not always celebrations of the heroic or the pastoral. True, I did expect to see romanticized landscape … but also creepy, silly, and even un-seeable landscape. I figured to see the full range, running between folk, traditional, modern, and post-modern … with artists working the territories between these strategies … amalgamating interior visions with perceptual, scientific, and cultural imagery.

Atlanta’s galleries did not disappoint!

Trudging across hot sidewalks the first afternoon, we happened upon a painting exhibition by Drew Calloway. His show, of beautiful, single and multi-panel pieces painted on tin was wonderful find at Marcia Woods Gallery. While at first blush the work reads as photo-realism, the surfaces and layers of color and tonality are much more sumptuous. Not only was the work in the gallery exquisite, Marcia Woods herself graciously gave me some insights into Atlanta’s art scene.

FS 2137, Collage and acrylic on panel, 22 x 22, by Cecil Touchon, at Emily Amy Gallery

The first day we also stopped by two other west side/Castleberry area galleries, the Jennifer Schwartz Gallery and the Emily Amy Gallery.  At the Emily Amy Gallery there was a good show up but then I walked around a corner. There was a precious and harmonious work by Cecil Touchon. The simple shapes were a perfect balanced orchestration of complexity, suggestiveness, and calmness. It was like architecture. Perfectly put together.

Across the parking lot I was also blown away … but in a totally different manner.

Exploring the Michael J. Marshall photographs in the Jennifer Schwartz Gallery, I was astounded. Marshall prints his photograph on oriental paper (it looks like Kozo fiber paper to me) are then infused with wax and layered over images that are created on a wooden surface. His analytical and subjective images merge to create a symbiosis of ethereal beauty. I paint with similar tools and mine the translucency and space between scientific imagery, natural history, and the intuitive image for years. It was as if Marshall had read the images in my head and had leapt to a place I might have wished I had gone to myself. I have to explore his work more.

Ocean Point, Ink Jet Print on oriental paper, waxed and mounted over an image on wood, by Michael J. Marshall, at Jennifer Schwartz Gallery

We wrapped up the day at a local eatery and settled in for the night … the heat, the great food, and the visually exciting art left us tired and sated.

We were anticipating even more the next day; I planned the route to the east side galleries and the trip to see me friend south of town.

(to be continued…)