Nash Vis Arts Events Feb. 15-29

I have a suspiciously small number of openings for events the rest of the month. That can mean only two things—I’m missing a bunch of stuff and/or I’m going to have a lot of stuff to get into the March 1 etc. listing.

Myself, I’m going to be off in Scotland playing with the Cherry Blossoms at the Instal festival. I haven’t really comes to terms with the idea that I’m kinda of going to be sharing a bill with John Butcher and Donald Dietrich (of Borbetomagus). And Alan Silva.

As always, if you have an email list of your own, feel free to forward this.

If someone wants to get added directly to my list for the email version of this listing, send me an email at dcmaddox@comcast.net. To get taken off the list, email to that effect at the same address.

Feb. 15

Mark Hosford and Bill Fick, Vanderbilt Studio Arts Building Gallery Mark’s world in prints, drawing, and animation consists of cartoons of creatures that are hybrids between bugs, monsters, dolls, and children engaged in hard to define but usually gruesome actions. Fick, a professor from Duke, definitely is a kindred spirit, with a similarly cartoon-based style. His monsters seem to be taking shape from primordial processes or melting back into a more elemental stage. The opening runs from 5 to 7 on the 15^th.

Frist, Monet to Dali. An exhibit of late 19^th and early 20^th century paintings and sculpture on loan from the Cleveland Museum of Art. I’ve never been to the Cleveland Museum and don’t know what the highlights are, but it looks like most of the big names are represented: Monet, Van Gogh, Degas, Gauguin, etc.

Feb. 16

Finer Things, Benefit Show for Arrowmont Finer Things is sponsoring a one-week show of work by resident artists at the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in Gatlinburg. Arrowmont is one of the country’s absolute leading centers for teaching “crafts” disciplines—like the Appalachian Center for the Crafts, it’s a program of truly national stature. Arrowmont has a residence program for five artists working in wood, ceramics, fiber, printmaking, and metal, and Finer Things will have work by them. You can see profiles of the artists and some examples of their work here.

Feb. 29

Cutting Fine, Cutting Deep: Cut Paper Works, University of the South Art Gallery Sewanee professor Julie Puttgen (who had a show at Ruby Green around the time she started at Sewanee but who doesn’t seem to have been in evidence much in Nashville since) organized this group show. On one level, it is as advertised, a show of works that involve cut paper. It brings together artists from the U.S. and Switzerland—Puttgen was born in Switzerland but grew up in the States. The Swiss are all artists working within a traditional handicraft practice of papercutting called Scherenschnitt. Several of them create very intricate variations on folkloric images. The American artists are all definitely engaged in contemporary art, setting up a dialogue with the traditional practice.