Posts Tagged ‘Tayloe Piggott Gallery’
Sue Sommers (sue@suesommers.com) has sent out an appeal to anyone able to assist arts advocate Gregory Gaylor, whose studio burned down about a month ago. The fire destroyed his life’s work–all his art–his records, materials and, horrifically, even took the life of his cat. It’s almost impossible to imagine Gaylor’s pain. If you can help Gaylor begin anew, please mail your contributions to this fund, established to help him do just that. Mail your check to: The Gregory Gaylor Art Fund, Rock Springs National Bank, PO Box 880, Rock Springs, WY 82902. You may also email Gaylor your good wishes: kgaylor@sweetwaterhsa.com. Snail mail: 628 B Street, Rock Springs, WY, 82901.
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The Tayloe Piggott Gallery welcomes contemporary artists Celia Gerard and Tadaaki Kuwayama. A reception for the artists takes place Friday, May 18, 5-8 pm. Works remain up through July 10, 2012.
Kuwayama’s work uses simple geometric structure and color–grey and yellow wall panels are juxtaposed against 
cylindrical forms arranged on the gallery floor. There’s a John Cage-like sense of open space and music, of the simple rearrangement and compression of air, made visible through color. “Kuwayama can focus on color, the subtle patina of a green or pink, or silver that emanate across the surface of the aluminum squares or rectangles. Each painting is a presence, a harmonized order of form and color,” says the gallery.
An opening reception takes place 5-8:00 pm at the Tayloe Piggott Gallery on Wednesday, April 18th, for Jackson artists Susan Thulin and Suzanne Morlock. The joint exhibition, currently on display, remains up through May 15, 2012. It’s a rewarding acknowledgement of Jackson’s art talent when such sophisticated venues are produced on behalf of local artists. Thulin’s highly textural, rhythmically painted canvases and Morlock’s undulating, tactile weavings are well paired.
Morlock’s show title, Pasalubong, is a Filipino word referring to the the tradition of bringing gifts when one goes to visit another person at their home. The visitor, in turn, returns to their own home bearing gifts they’ve received during their visit. The works depart from Morlock’s large installation pieces, and are more intimate in scale so as to be “enclosed” by the gallery’s space.
Sometimes it all boils down to the boat.
Now on exhibition at the Tayloe Piggott Gallery, artist Kathryn Lynch’s River Tugs is an opus to the painter’s surroundings, and her naive, folk-like painting style is refreshing. It’s cool to have these paintings of tugboats and other vessels in Jackson, because they’re subject matter not often offered up in our mountain town. Lynch leaves out nautical details and concentrates on each boat’s essence—for her, these tugs are “symbols of the ongoing solitary traveler in each of us.” The theme is one we’ve picked up on in the most recent Piggott gallery shows, and these works encourage us to give pause—and that’s a good thing. No rushing. Lynch’s tonal, broad strokes, rendered in grays, greens, orange and blues, suggest play even as they suggest a certain somber observation of our collective psyche.
As children, pushing our Fisher Price tugboats around and around in the bath made the prospect of approaching bedtime much more welcome. Splashing play, followed by a dive under the blankets and dream time.
Showing concurrently at Tayloe Piggott is Nicole Charbonnet’s body of new works, Wild Things. Charbonnet’s layered, fresco-like works “serve as a metaphor for the phenomenon of recollection,” and portray animals found in the wild and iconic wild West horses and cowboy themes. Charbonnet also explores our own perceptions of self through non-human imagery; her work expresses a longing—and also a reverence—for days gone by.
She sees in her process of “erasing” the paint and overlaying additional layers something that both celebrates and criticizes the values portrayed by her subjects. “I’m raising questions about their current viability in a changed world. I make them look old and tired, though still beautiful, to ask if it’s time to relegate them to memory.”
A New Orleans native, Charbonnet says her home city greatly influences her work. “If you watch New Orleans, you see everywhere the effects of the process of time on surfaces,” she says. adding “That’s true of every place, every person.” The artist builds up her paintings with layers of textures, images, words, fabrics and collaged papers from all manner of sources. Says Charbonnet,“Nothing is ever completely gone, so even if you don’t hold a conscious memory of something, it forms the fabric and texture of who you are. I try to re-create the process your mind goes through in becoming what it is. You see something, and it reminds you of something else, another context, another feeling, even while the original image remains.”
River Tugs and Wild Things remain on exhbition through February 7, 2012. www.tayloepiggottgallery.com
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Trailside Galleries annual Holiday Miniatures Show opens with a gallery reception on Thursday, December 29, 5-8:00 pm. The gallery is excited to début “exquisite” new miniature paintings from most of the gallery’s roster of
artists. The gallery will feature new works by such noted Western artists as Kyle Sims, Dan Smith, Adam Smith, Joseph Sulkowski, Guy Coheleach, Robert Duncan, Nicholas Coleman, David Mayer, and many others.
The show’s opening takes place in conjunction with that evening’s downtown Jackson Holiday ArtWalk. While you are there, venture upstairs to see what’s new at the Jackson Hole Art Auction offices; Trailside produces the annual Fall Arts Festival event in conjunction with the Gerald Peters Gallery. For more information, phone 307-733-3186. www.trailsidegalleries.com …
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Thursday, December 22, wildlife artist Mary Roberson gives an artist’s demonstration at Altamira Fine Art, 3-5:00 pm. An artist’s conversation, “My Sketch Book,” will be presented by Roberson at 6:00 pm.
Altamira takes its name from Spain’s famous Upper Paleolithic cave paintings of wild beasts. Of all Altamira’s artists, Roberson is most connected to that wild spirit, and inner knowledge that animals inform us.
Not What I am Doing, How I am Feeling, a show of new works by Alissa Davies, opens Wednesday, November 16, 6-9:00 pm, at Elevated Grounds, Wilson, Wyoming. “Come enjoy drinks and nibbles and Alissa’s new artwork,” says Davies’ Facebook page. The munchies will no doubt be yummy, but the real treat will be Davies’ art.
I know, because I have some of her paintings. Though Davies is most often identified as Dancers’ Workshop’s communications director, she’s been painting for years. Think back, and you’ll recall
Davies’ amorphous, abstract paintings hanging from tree branches, fastened with clothespins, floating on a gentle breeze in DW’s Executive Director Babs Case’s back yard. Ah, those were the days….our first pop-up art shows (pssst: that link to Chicago’s Pop Up Art Loop was inadvertent, but ain’t it cool? Store windows, people! Store windows!) happened at Harpo’s Art Fair, a summertime event Case generously hosted at her home. My little Alissa paintings are pretty tiny—maybe 4 x 8″, the size of a postcard. Davies is also an Art Fair alumni. I’ve bought from her there, too. Her little paintings make great gifts, but it’s damn hard to give them away.
The title of this show,” says Davies, “is an overall mantra for my life. I want to feel myself moving through the days, the months, the years. Simply, I am striving to be more present to experiences that make me happy, expose me to beauty, challenge me and make me assertive. I want my artistic process to be the same, a discovery.”
Davies’ paintings are organic, and they’re really collages. Bleached corrugated paper, colored strips, paint and graphite pencil are arranged like pebbles in a little tidal pool, or a child’s collection of special objects. It feels like invisible river currents nudge Davies’ shapes around, and once those shapes and objects are perfectly placed, the water is still. It gives me great joy to look at my Alissa paintings.
Native New Yorker and artist Jane Rosen’s exhibition Two Natures opens at the Tayloe Piggott Gallery this month. On exhibition through August 23, 2011, the show opens with a reception on Thursday, July 14th, 5-8 pm at the gallery.
Visiting any great museum’s ancient collections of Egyptian, Greek, or Native American artifacts, I’m cloaked in hushed reverence. I expect Two Natures elicits similar response. Winds of time have worn these sculptures down to their souls. What’s left is an exquisite silent truth.
Though born on the East Coast, Rosen “found herself captivated by the accessibility of nature on a visit to the West Coast.” Rosen’s work channels ancient world cultures; she has said that 
Eskimo, Native American and Egyptian art histories inspire her. She’s also influenced by daVinci and Michelangelo. A chapel, a graveyard. Rosen’s sculptures stand like Stonehenge’s rock pillars, full of mystery and great powers. These animal forms are not sex specific; but they recall the Acropolis Caryatid Porch of the Erechtheion.
“Rosen’s drawings act as her journal where she studies and understands the form before chiseling a limestone sculpture or hand blowing a glass bird,” the gallery says. She relishes process,
the “alchemy.” Works reach their final form after Rosen scratches away and adds layers of sumi-e ink, paint, coffee, beeswax, Korean water color and marble mix.
Gallery owner Tayloe Piggott likens seeing Rosen’s studio to “witnessing the flash of spirit that Brancusi sought to capture.”
“With this perspective framing my vision I capture the profound essence of nature and art seen through the animal life. It was our reciprocal vision of the life force that instinctually and immediately connected me to Jane’s work. Her art, whether bird, fish or fowl, resonates with the fundamentality of the being’s spirit. The word “essence” is defined as “the permanent as contrasted with the temporary element of being.” Her sculpture is essence,” Piggott says.
The gallery has also collected several stunning Dale Chihuly glass vessels. Transluscent and fluid, they provide sparkling juxtaposition to Rosen’s avian sculptures.
For more information, email art@tayloepiggottgallery.com.
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Wyoming Gallery, upstairs at Jack Dennis Sports, welcomes artists Meredith Campbell, Ruth Rawhouser, and Teri Billingham at an opening reception Friday, July 15, 4-7:30 pm.
Campbell paints wildlife scenes on wood; she began painting functional pieces, but her work evolved into the fine art arena. Not long ago she began creating oil-on-canvas animal portraits. Rawhouser paints en plein air, relishing the
world as it is in any given moment. Interestlingly, she never paints in fences or other signs of humananity’s presence in the Wyoming landscapes she loves. Jackson native Teri Billingham’s stained glass panels reflect the artist’s love of the Tetons and surrounding landscapes, its wildlife and inspiring childhood memories.
For information, contact Mindy at jdwyominggallery.com. www.jdwyominggallery.com
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Here it comes again….the Art Fair Rap!
Dude, it’s July, so it’s time to share
‘Bout that annual gig, the Jackson Hole Art Fair!
Or, “Art Fair Jackson Hole” as it prefers to be called;
Nobody asked me. I’m not involved.
Hey man, don’t be bored!
Sometimes Harrison Ford
Comes to check out the art, and he brings Flockhart.
Buy ceramics, toys, fibers – this poem’s the town crier
For an Art Fair Weekend, come rain or come shine-er.
Paintings, baskets, jewels, tents
Sunscreen, beer & fivers
All make for a day art lovers could die for!
See the Fair! Have Fun! This rap is all done.
The Jackson Hole Art Association Art Fair 2011 dates are July 15 – 17 & August 19 – 21. The fun happens at Miller Park, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Daily entrance fee is $3. www.artassociation.org
