Posts Tagged ‘Public Art’
Art Fair! Public Art! Western Visions Art!
A wee behind. Hectic week. Apologies, all! Things have been down, but once a gal is up again, everything good in the world looks even better!
Hey, maybe you didn’t even notice, because everyone is so darn busy! Many good things happening in the Arts!
1: Art Fair Jackson Hole happening again this weekend, starting today! Runs through Sunday. I think the Art Association still needs volunteers, drop Steph Fellows a line at steph@artassociation.org, or call her cell phone: 303-250-3508. I’m volunteering Saturday, 3:30-6:00 p.m. See you there!
2: Exact wording from J.H. Public Art Initiative press materials reads:
TOWN COUNCIL APPROVES OPEN AIR EXHIBITION! ”Imagine discovering the art of our day on Snow King, in Town or on Pearl Street, free and accessible to all people! The Mayor and Town Council granted permission to the Public Art Initiative to host an exhibition of museum quality work in public space. Artwork will be professionally curated and changes every 18 months. The Town will provide staff support and assistance insuring the art located on public property. We hope to start this program next summer”.
AND…also verbatim:
PUBLIC ART ADMINISTERS 3 NEW PROJECTS!
John Frechette: Bison and Grizzly DNA at the new Home Ranch Building designed by Carney Logan and Burke Architects. Budget $27,000. Funding Town of Jackson. Installation: Fall 2011
– Spring 2012.
Ben Roth: Six custom animal bike racks at the National Musuem of Wildlife Art inspired from the collection. Budget: $7500, Funding: Teton County, Community Pathways and National Museum of Wildlife Art. Installation: Fall 2011.
Don Rambadt: A three part installation for the retaining walls framing the Highway 89 pathway underpass announcing the Museum’s sculpture trail. Budget: $25,000, Funding: Teton County and Community Pathways. Installation: Fall 2011 and Spring 2012.
3: The National Museum of Wildlife Art is really gearing up for 2011′s Western Visions Miniatures and More Show & Sale. The J.H. Fall Arts Festival is soooo close!
Straight from the Museum:
“2011 Western Visions scheduled events include the Sketch Show & Sale and Original Prints Show & Sale, Aug. 20 – Sept. 25; and Palates & Palettes, with mini-quesadillas and margaritas accompanying the art on view, Sept. 9. The Jewelry and Artisan Luncheon takes place Sept. 14, with the 24th Annual Wild West Artist Party offering live music and meet-the-artist opps the evening of Sept. 15. Start placing your bids Sept. 3 for the drawing during the big event, the 24th Annual
Miniatures and More Show & Sale, Sept. 16. And on Sept. 28, a coffee-in-the-gallery Art A’ Brewin’ event allows a final chance to browse works still available for sale.”
Find out all you need to know about Western Visions by visiting www.wildlifeart.org, or contacting Western Visions’ superb co-ordinator, Jennifer Lee, at 307.732.5412. An online catalog aids long-distance participation, and the Museum has addes a “streamlined digital bidding system.” Cool stuff!
A new group in town, Global Arts Corps, inaugurates its Jackson Hole annual Summer Institute with an Opening Conference July 8-9, 2011. Perceptual Change: Alternatives for Conflict Resolution is billed as a “conversation between Scientists, Artists, Ex-Combatants, Educators and Activists.” Such a diverse roster of speakers ideally will provide stimulating discussion. Conference events take place at Jackson’s Center for the Arts.
The conference will cover topics ranging from “Empathy, Neurology and Comedy” to “Truth, Uncertainty Principles and Parody” to “Ensemble Phenomena: Unpacking Clichés.” With conflict resolution as its umbrella theme, it will be interesting to see how the conference will attack that theme. Every possible personality and interpretive medium are lined up: ex-combatants representing Northern Ireland’s conflicts, performing artists, journalists, clinical psychologists…the event will be moderated by the BBC’s William Crawley.
Breaking down assumptions that inevitably crop up during conflict is an art form. A key to resolving any issue is to address the “quiet” topics people find most difficult to air. Quell reactivity, and you’ve got a platform for
intimacy. I’m not the problem, and neither are you. The problem is the problem. Most arguments are not about the “surface” subject, they are about other issues between two parties that have not been properly addressed. Resolving conflict is largely about rational comprehension of issues at hand.
What is Global Arts Corps? Babs Case is the creative inspiration behind the new initiative. As Dancers’ Workshop’s executive director, her work ranks amongst Jackson’s most consistent and successful. Few non-profit leaders are more admired, and rightfully so. Global Arts Corps believes that “…the population in Jackson is one with the interests, experiences, and resources to actively participate in our discussion and to affect a significant difference in the world beyond our small valley.”
Lecture topics could provide more specifics about the meat and intent of this conference.
What significant differences might this gathering make to the world? What level of conflict will this workshop address? We are not culturally diverse, and we are relatively comfortable. Many of us have tried living out of the valley, only to return. We are a gated community. Who will 
attend? We have many world leaders in our midst—business, political and academic titans. Will we learn how to move into a larger understanding of the complexities in the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan or South Africa? Will we be trained to lobby for legislation with greater finesse? Generate new ideas on combating poverty and predjudice? Discuss immigration or the tensions that arise when we speak about cultural differences? Get a grip on conflicting global economic forces?
Man, I dislike people who don’t like to resolve conflict! They make me want to punch ‘em out!
This is a free event; it cannot have been free to produce. May it reap great rewards.
For more information about Global Arts Corps’ Summer Institute, visit www.globalartscorps.org/summer-institute.html, or call 307.733.6398.
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The Street ART & Social Justice Workshop takes place July 8 & 9, 10:00 am – 4:00 pm each day, at the Center for the Arts. Attendees can help design and paint a community mural on the walls of the the Garaman underpass. Get your “Street art”
techniques down—techniques will taught and utilized. Cultural diversity is the theme and students can become official ambassadors of the pedestrian corridor. Famed street artists Judy Baca, JR, Bansky and others will be reviewed. Local artists will speak and demonstrate: Ricki Arno, Ryan Heyworth, Mike Tierney and Wendell Field are on the list.
A donation of $20 to cover supplies will be charged; space is limited and registration is required. Jackson Public Art Initiative in charge. Info, details: 307.413.1474
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“John Nieto, universally recognized as an American Master, continually defines himself within the wide parameters of his trademark brand of expressionism. Nieto, and one name says it all, transcends mere representation with sensitivity and sensibility, utilizing an intrepid stature unequaled by any imitator.” - Dean Munn, Altamira Fine Art
What better way to greet Independence Week than by honoring one of America’s great painters, John Nieto? A new Nieto exhibition, American Icon, will be on display July 1-14 at Altamira Fine Art, with an artist’s reception on Saturday, July 2, 2:00-4:00 pm.
Altamira Director Mark D. Tarrant has remarked that “…the gallery is privileged to represent Nieto….Nieto is widely regarded as one of America’s most accomplished, dynamic and exciting contemporary artists.” Tarrant points out that Nieto’s work concentrates on themes that transcend mere representation. The artist’s intense primary colors and bold use of paint “create both dimension and character on the canvas. “He is truly an American master,” Tarrant affirms.
Nieto’s Fauvist style of assembling electric colors reflects deep knowledge and emotion. The artist’s lineage includes Hispanic and American Indian parents, and NIeto’s family tree is documented back
300 years. His potent paintings are their own documentaries. They are commentaries on a people, on animal and Native American spirits, on landscape and history.
“A species of hope resides in the possibility of seeing one thing, one phenomenon or essence, so clearly and fully that the light of its understanding illuminates the rest of life,” writes Santa Fe author and scholar William deBuys. John Nieto’s paintings are, at once, hope and essence. www.altamiraart.com 307.739.4700
Saturday, June 18, 2011, the doors at Factory Studios open at 6:30 p.m. sharp. Doors will close at 7:30 p.m. and Art+Cloth+Street kicks off. If you show after 7:30, you don’t get in. The show is a fundraiser for the Factory Studios and tickets are $75 for front row seats and a limited edition Teton Art Lab print & four drink/raffle tokens; $20 for standing room and one token. Tickets are on sale at Valley Bookstore, Shades Café and via Factory Studios.
An “evening of art and fashion,” the show features exciting new work from three of Jackson’s most creative emerging clothing designers, Abbie Miller, Calla Grimes, and Owen Ashley.” Local arts specialists Lyndsay McCandless and Suzanne Morlock will discuss–perhaps debate–the intersection of clothing, art, and fashion. A runway show follows.
Abbie Miller/A.M. Renegade : “I’m working with the idea of geometry instead of drape,” she said. “I always like to see how far I can tip everything to the stage of bad proportion or ugliness, and then pull it back to a point where its flattering on the body. I like a play between natural and urban, earth tones and synthetic colors. It has to do with my fascination with cities and my weird romance with construction sites mixed with the experience of living here…” www.abbiesumiller.com
Calla Grimes: “My approach to designing clothing starts really with my own desire to wear easy everyday clothing that features the body’s best assets,” Grimes said. “I love to feel that I am in a wonderful piece of clothing that can be worn day into night, with a very strong element of the feminine. I use linen, linen blends, wool jerseys and fine knits, and silks of every kind.” callajacobson@gmail.com
Owen Ashley/Ashelter: Owen Ashley is a Jackson native and a founding designer for Anomoly Farm. His own label, Orson Ashelter, features functional outdoor-inspired fashion. “You can wear all of it outside and it won’t get ruined,” he said. “If it is meant to keep you warm it will; if it is supposed to keep you cool it will.” Ashley is currently working with shotgun-perforated vinyl faux leather, reclaimed from the Jackson Hole Airport. owen@anomalyfarm.com
www.factorystudios.org. Contact: Abbie Miller, abbgrab@gmail.com or 307-760-5035
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“The landscape is the tangible connection between man and God. It is a very humbling task—trying to paint the unseen qualities of a landscape as well as what is seen.” – Glenn Dean
Altamira Fine Art presents Bill Schenck, Glenn Dean and Logan Hagege in a new show, Earth & Sky, opening Thursday, June 16, with an artists’ reception from 5-8pm. Works remain on exhibit through June 26.
Schenck is the West’s Roy Lichtenstein. A bold, flattened pop-art style is Schenck’s hallmark. A former Jackson Hole resident, the artist now
lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His work reflects his environs and their people. In his early paintings, a sense of ‘makin’ a bit of fun’ of Western cowboys and cowgirls was common. Though Schenck continues to paint in a bright comic book style, a new reverence for indigenous peoples is evident. Native Americans are depicted in softer romantic hues, horses are purple spirits set against vast Southwestern deserts. “His work is characterized by hot colors, surreal juxtapositions and patterning which explore clashes between wilderness and civilization, the individual and community, nature and culture, freedom and restriction,” notes the gallery.
Hagege was born in 1980; he’s a mere 31 years old. A biographical profile describes Logan as being influenced by diverse past masters: Gustav Klimpt, N.C. Wyeth, T.W. Dewing and
Maynard Dixon. In Hagege’s works I see Klimpt’s sensuality of line; N.C. Wyeth’s dramatic, historic compositions; Dewing’s proud, emblematic portraits; and Dixon’s electrifying Southwestern vistas. I can’t help thinking that German painter Hans Holbein (1497-1543), the greatest portraitist of his day, has cast his spirit into Hagege’s paintings.
Dean is a landscapist. Maynard Dixon’s powerful influence reappears in Dean’s glowing Southwest mesas and endless skies. Clouds billow & morph, pulling us toward Heaven. Ranch hands and cowboys are tiny figures passing through great canyons and deserts. Nature is dominant. Western landscape painters of the early 1900′s “…emphasized the importance of seeing the color of light combined with interesting compositions and seemingly effortless designs, while carefully observing the simple and basic characteristics of a specific location,” says the artist. “It still feels like I’m at a magic show when I see work by those artists.”
Magic runs through it; and by “it,” I mean this show. www.altamiraart.com
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Saturday, June 18, is “Saturday U” day at the National Museum of Wildlife Art. Two presentations to note:
9-10 a.m. — “The Oglala Lakota (Sioux) and the Modernization of American Culture, 1848-1890,” presented by Jeff Means, history assistant professor.
10:15-11:15 a.m. — “Public Art and Community: Building Partnerships through Art,” presented by Susan Moldenhauer, UW Art Museum director and chief curator. Why is public art important, and what can it do for a community? Moldenhauer discusses how the program “Sculpture, A Wyoming Invitational” was created and implemented.
For more details, or to register for college credit or Professional Teaching Standards Board (PTSB) credit, call Susan Thulin, CWC outreach coordinator, (307) 733-7425.
We are so wild. Soon, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem will be awash in wildlife as adults give birth, bears come out from hibernation, and the creatures of the Earth migrate to their summer habitats.
If Spring seems a little far off, stop by Trailside Galleries during the month of March and take in their annual Wildlife Discovery Show. Through March 31, 2011 the Jackson gallery showcases the works of Western artists exploring creative styles, subject matter and mediums. The roster of noted artists includes: Kyle Sims, Nancy
Glazier, Bonnie Marris, Ralph Oberg, Sarah Woods, Nancy Glazier, James Morgan, Sherry Sander, Lindsay Scott, John Seerey-Lester, Ryan Skidmore, Adam Smith, Daniel Smith, Linda St. Clair, Richard D. Thomas, and Kathy Wipfler.
Many new works are on exhibition. While you are there, take a turn upstairs and make your way back to the Jackson Hole Art Auction offices and gallery, where works slated to be auctioned off this September are also on display. www.trailsidegalleries.com.
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The Cultural Council of Jackson Hole announced that 2011-2012 Arts for All Grant Applications are available for arts and cultural organizations, as well as individual artists. The program is administered by the Cultural Council.
“The Arts for All grant program serves to distributes social service tax dollars from the Town of Jackson and Teton County for arts education, producing and presenting opportunities, and public projects by individual artists,” says the Council’s Alissa Davies. “Grant amounts can be up to $6,000, and all grants must be cash matched at least 1:1 by the applicant.”
Completed grant applications are due by June 1, 2011. Late applications will not be accepted. No support will be provided to organizations already receiving public support from Town or County funds. Arts for All funds are allocated to the Cultural Council at the discretion of the Jackson Town Council and the Teton County Board of Commissioners. There is no guarantee that these elected officials will approve Arts for All funding again this year.
For more information contact Davies at culturalcounciljh@gmail.com.
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There’s still time to send the National Museum of Wildlife Art (NMWA) your thoughts on its new sculpture trail, set to open to the public in 2012; the event coincides with NMWA’s 25th anniversary. Show your interest by logging on here and filling out an easy on-line questionaire.
NMWA’s President and CEO Jim McNutt has announced that the three-quarter mile long outdoor art venue designed by renowned landscape architect Walter Hood “will showcase nearly 30 permanent and temporary
artworks. The sculpture trail will connect to the recently constructed Jackson-to-Grand Teton National Park pathway via a new underpass for easy biker and hiker access. Sponsored in memory of James F. (Jim) Petersen, honoring his life-long commitment to education, art, and love of the Tetons, the sculpture trail further integrates the national museum’s collection with its natural – even rugged – Wyoming setting.”
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Finally, the Washington Post reported last week that the National Gallery of Art has acquired Thomas Moran’s “Green River Cliffs, Wyoming.” Long part of a private collection, the dramatic panorama joins two other Moran paintings already a part of the gallery’s collection. Moran’s work has steadily gained value over the years.
The National Museum of Wildlife Art (NMWA) holds an Open House at the Teton County Library for its new Sculpture Trail on Thursday, February 24, 4-6:00 pm. Free and open to the public, it is a chance to test your public art chops; and feel involved with creating Jackson’s first permanent, landscaped outdoor sculpture garden designed by urban landscape and site architect Walter Hood. Drawings, overview plans and various schematics will be available to view. Special laptops will be provided so that attendees can participate in a survey about the garden’s design. Museum representatives will be on hand.
In a May, 2009 post we wrote that “…the Museum says the trail will provide new ways for visitors to view wildlife art within a landscape; sculptor Richard Loffler’s Buffalo Trail will be part of the project. An amphitheater will replace the current drive at NMWA’s entrance and an “edge trail” will run along the east ledge of the current visitor’s parking area. Hood’s hope has always been to meld NMWA’s vantage point and contoured landscapes with views of the Elk Refuge, creating a greater visceral connection between the two sites.”
In a three-part Jackson Hole Art Blog interview with Hood, the Oakland-based landscape designer expressed high hopes for the project. ”If the landscape itself was powerful enough it could move people in fantastic ways,” said Hood. “That is what I am interested in. Standing out on NMWA’s hill, is there a way to allow a visitor to be in the Refuge? It is possible. NMWA’s architecture builds on the idea that it is “with the landscape,” and ironically that is one of the issues they are dealing with.” He added that he felt he could “….scale and shift existing landscape, so that art as well as the landscape is legible.”
“Attempt to eliminate design dichotomy, the experience of being either here, or there – either at the museum or in the landscape; either in Jackson or in the landscape,” Hood advised.
NMWA’s Sugden Curator of Education Jane Lavino worked closely with Hood on the project. “The museum’s new sculpture trail will directly connect to the North Highway 89 Pathway Project, a new branch of the Pathways system planned to lead from the north end of Jackson to Grand Teton National Park,” she says. “An underground tunnel will provide access to the museum, creating an inviting opportunity to mix culture and outdoor activity for bicyclers.”
Contact Jane Lavino or call (307) 732-5417 for more information.
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Friday, March 4, artist Kathryn Mapes Turner will lead 2011′s Federal Junior Duck Stamp program at the National Museum of Wildlife Art. A valued annual arts and conservation tradition, the program provides opportunity for youth to learn more about duck species and their habitats through art. Students will begin creating their entries for the 2011 contest, hosted by NMWA. Workshops are organized by age and take place in the Chrystie and Esperti Classrooms.
9:30AM – 12:00PM: K – 5th grade students.
1:00 – 3:30PM: 6 – 12th grade students.
Pre-registration is required. Call (307) 732-5435 to register. Museum Members $20, non-members $25.
