Finding entertainment in art on First Friday - Coroflot
www.uafsunstar.com
art
april 07, 2009
13
Finding entertainment in art on First Friday By Mitsu Kubo Sun Star Reporter As someone who comes from a big city like Seattle, it can get frustrating trying to find something to do in the second-largest city in Alaska. Clubs? Malls? Even just taking a stroll can be next to impossible in the frigid temperatures of our winters (which spans from fall to spring). For city slickers, the lack of urban entertainment can be as straining as cabin fever. On Friday April 3, I found some of this entertainment I had previously thought Fairbanks lacking in First Friday. I went to the galleries of Well Street, Bear Gallery and New Horizons, where I saw some thought-provoking art and spoke with a couple of local artists. At the Well Street Gallery was Linda Payne, who has taken many UAF art classes. Payne has done six solo shows and says this show was particularly challenging for her. Both Payne and UAF adjunct art teacher/local cartoonist Jamie Smith referenced Steven King’s recent best-seller, “On Writing,” to liken some artists’ approach
to that of creative writers in that the two artists let their art guide them into a stream of artwork with a connecting theme(s) or idea(s). But this year, Payne says her thoughts are in many different directions, “possibly because of the presidential elections and this year’s winter.” At the New Horizon Gallery, metal artist Larry Mostella granted me an insightful interview as well. Mostella has shipped his work to countries as far away as Japan, England, Australia and Portugal, with mountain scenes especially popular in Europe. The most popular pieces, says Mostella, are the compact tree sculptures, which people find easy to fit into their luggage. Ironically, Mostella tells me, he gets so tired of cutting out the metallic vegetation. The brochure of Mostell’s art show, Critters & Things, explains the interesting process for his artwork: “Each piece is hand cut from 11-gauge, cold-rolled steel using Mostella’s own designs. The piece is then worked with a metal grinder to create the surface texture, and a blow torch is taken to the back in order to make the
Photo by Mitsu Kubo/Sun Star
Larry Mostella’s metal vegetation is on display at the New Horizon Gallery. metal bloom with color. Different mixtures of gases and different temperatures create different colors in the metal. Blues and purples are higher temperatures, oranges and golds are lower temperatures. In addition, some pieces may have braised areas, where molten brass has been applied to the surface of the steel. Sometimes, as on his birch tree
pieces, brass and copper accents are added.” The next First Friday is May 1, so be sure to give your overlyworked finals brain a break and do as Ferris Bueller did on his infamous day off—go see (soon-tobe) world-famous art, get to know our local artists, and get free food while you’re at it.
Emotive Lessons thoughtful, but ultimately unclear By Michael R.L. Kern Sun Star Reporter James Stugart opened his show at the University of Alaska art gallery this month. Entitled “Emotive Lessons,” it is an exhibition that revolves around the realm of emotions and the significance they play in our everyday lives. Or at least that’s what I got from the tagline on his exhibit’s poster. In reality, this Bachelor of Fine Arts candidate has created sculpture that is, as I would describe it, an irritating avant-garde mishap of obtuse dolor. Not to vilify the artist, but the show just made me want to leave the room. It wasn’t the least bit inviting or even all that clear what he was trying to say with what he rolled out for viewing. It is clear that thought went into the exhibit, but the first exhibit that I had to crane myself into position to look at clearly, a reverse written slab with a mirror awkwardly positioned above it, was just a string of incoherent and repetitive musings. The heart on a plate that invited you to touch it revealed a screeching rant of obscenity that went on a bit too long. The giant eyeball with a television monitor in it struck me
Photo by Michael R.L. Kern/Sun Star
The Golden Boy Marches Blindly, a piece from James Stugart’s show Emotive Lessons, is on display at the University of Alaska art gallery. as a dangerous floor obstruction rather than art, and the crate that seemed to be a metaphor about pain, or something, just struck me as being a crate. Now let me say something about the part
I enjoyed. The piece about being torn into pieces was nicely executed and, while too big for a person to invest in, I easily saw it on a business wall. “The Golden Boy Marches Blindly” is a bronze sculpture that would be very dangerous to have around uncased. As I looked at it I feared tripping and becoming impaled. However, I liked the primitive yet flowing shape and shining ray effect of both its spines and the lighting reflecting off the shiny finish. “Skeletons in the Closet” brought back memories of horror movies I’ve enjoyed and vaguely made me think of cannibalism, but I didn’t know if that was the artist’s intention. Maybe there was something else here, but it wasn’t memorable. I guess the closing point should be that as I traveled the depths of his emotional personality, the joyfulness at the surface was paper-thin and the scared, trapped, torn and repellant side was the remainder. I know that my artistic opinion is as good as the next man’s, but as someone who’s been writing about art for the last two years, I can say that I’ve seen worse, but mostly better. At least he has people talking about him.
art
april 07, 2009
13
Finding entertainment in art on First Friday By Mitsu Kubo Sun Star Reporter As someone who comes from a big city like Seattle, it can get frustrating trying to find something to do in the second-largest city in Alaska. Clubs? Malls? Even just taking a stroll can be next to impossible in the frigid temperatures of our winters (which spans from fall to spring). For city slickers, the lack of urban entertainment can be as straining as cabin fever. On Friday April 3, I found some of this entertainment I had previously thought Fairbanks lacking in First Friday. I went to the galleries of Well Street, Bear Gallery and New Horizons, where I saw some thought-provoking art and spoke with a couple of local artists. At the Well Street Gallery was Linda Payne, who has taken many UAF art classes. Payne has done six solo shows and says this show was particularly challenging for her. Both Payne and UAF adjunct art teacher/local cartoonist Jamie Smith referenced Steven King’s recent best-seller, “On Writing,” to liken some artists’ approach
to that of creative writers in that the two artists let their art guide them into a stream of artwork with a connecting theme(s) or idea(s). But this year, Payne says her thoughts are in many different directions, “possibly because of the presidential elections and this year’s winter.” At the New Horizon Gallery, metal artist Larry Mostella granted me an insightful interview as well. Mostella has shipped his work to countries as far away as Japan, England, Australia and Portugal, with mountain scenes especially popular in Europe. The most popular pieces, says Mostella, are the compact tree sculptures, which people find easy to fit into their luggage. Ironically, Mostella tells me, he gets so tired of cutting out the metallic vegetation. The brochure of Mostell’s art show, Critters & Things, explains the interesting process for his artwork: “Each piece is hand cut from 11-gauge, cold-rolled steel using Mostella’s own designs. The piece is then worked with a metal grinder to create the surface texture, and a blow torch is taken to the back in order to make the
Photo by Mitsu Kubo/Sun Star
Larry Mostella’s metal vegetation is on display at the New Horizon Gallery. metal bloom with color. Different mixtures of gases and different temperatures create different colors in the metal. Blues and purples are higher temperatures, oranges and golds are lower temperatures. In addition, some pieces may have braised areas, where molten brass has been applied to the surface of the steel. Sometimes, as on his birch tree
pieces, brass and copper accents are added.” The next First Friday is May 1, so be sure to give your overlyworked finals brain a break and do as Ferris Bueller did on his infamous day off—go see (soon-tobe) world-famous art, get to know our local artists, and get free food while you’re at it.
Emotive Lessons thoughtful, but ultimately unclear By Michael R.L. Kern Sun Star Reporter James Stugart opened his show at the University of Alaska art gallery this month. Entitled “Emotive Lessons,” it is an exhibition that revolves around the realm of emotions and the significance they play in our everyday lives. Or at least that’s what I got from the tagline on his exhibit’s poster. In reality, this Bachelor of Fine Arts candidate has created sculpture that is, as I would describe it, an irritating avant-garde mishap of obtuse dolor. Not to vilify the artist, but the show just made me want to leave the room. It wasn’t the least bit inviting or even all that clear what he was trying to say with what he rolled out for viewing. It is clear that thought went into the exhibit, but the first exhibit that I had to crane myself into position to look at clearly, a reverse written slab with a mirror awkwardly positioned above it, was just a string of incoherent and repetitive musings. The heart on a plate that invited you to touch it revealed a screeching rant of obscenity that went on a bit too long. The giant eyeball with a television monitor in it struck me
Photo by Michael R.L. Kern/Sun Star
The Golden Boy Marches Blindly, a piece from James Stugart’s show Emotive Lessons, is on display at the University of Alaska art gallery. as a dangerous floor obstruction rather than art, and the crate that seemed to be a metaphor about pain, or something, just struck me as being a crate. Now let me say something about the part
I enjoyed. The piece about being torn into pieces was nicely executed and, while too big for a person to invest in, I easily saw it on a business wall. “The Golden Boy Marches Blindly” is a bronze sculpture that would be very dangerous to have around uncased. As I looked at it I feared tripping and becoming impaled. However, I liked the primitive yet flowing shape and shining ray effect of both its spines and the lighting reflecting off the shiny finish. “Skeletons in the Closet” brought back memories of horror movies I’ve enjoyed and vaguely made me think of cannibalism, but I didn’t know if that was the artist’s intention. Maybe there was something else here, but it wasn’t memorable. I guess the closing point should be that as I traveled the depths of his emotional personality, the joyfulness at the surface was paper-thin and the scared, trapped, torn and repellant side was the remainder. I know that my artistic opinion is as good as the next man’s, but as someone who’s been writing about art for the last two years, I can say that I’ve seen worse, but mostly better. At least he has people talking about him.
