Nashville Visual Arts Events and Other Stuff April 2009

Last month, I missed the fact that Sisavanh Houghton is exhibiting in the small gallery at Tinney Contemporary, in addition to the show by Rachel McCampbell in the main room (which features a big sculpture in the middle that looks energetic and fun, maybe a little creepy in a way that seems appropriate given the show’s theme of endangered species, the environment under threat). Anyway, Sisavanh’s one of the more versatile artists around, nice to see that she’s showing at Tinney.

Update: Beth's show has been pushed out to Sunday May 10. One of the more unusual things this month will be Beth Gilmore’s installation at the Belmont Mansion. Beth works there (and is sometimes called on to channel Adelicia Acklen) and has used images from Ward-Belmont College in her work. She’s getting a chance to bring things together in a one afternoon/night show in an unused room at the Mansion on May 10.

I’ve got a few readings here—I don’t really mean to get into that business with this listing, but one’s at an art gallery so it goes in, and others involve friends.

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

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April 1

Portland Brew 12 South, David Dark book release event. David is releasing his third book, The Sacredness of Questioning Everything, and celebrating with a gathering at Portland Brew. He’s inviting everyone to bring a story, song or poem to read/perform, in keeping with an interest in people talking to each other. The new book is very good, a mix of media and pop culture criticism, social philosophy, and theology, and probably a bunch of other areas of inquiry if I spent some more time thinking about it. I think of David’s stock in trade being his reading of pop culture as sources for insight on the divine and on politics and community as aspects of the Divine. In this book he engages that, but also addresses more conventional political and theological discourse. He’s particularly convincing in his interpretation of the Civil Rights Movement as a basis for theory and practice of social and political life in the broadest terms. Things get going at Portland Brew at 7:00.

April 2

Zeitgeist, reading by Amanda Little. Little is a journalist who covers energy and the environment and will be reading from her book Power Trip, about the roots of the current energy crisis in America’s history of energy use. It’s based on reporting from the front lines—oil rigs, power stations, etc. 6-8 PM

April 4

Twist, Jen Cartwright and Off the Wall. Cartwright is doing a room-sized sculpture made from paper bound to wire forms, built up from small units. The Off the Wall group is showing work from an exhibition they did this winter at the Renaissance Center in Dickson—I’m glad they’re showing the work in Nashville. Janet Heilbronn has some luscious paintings, Iwonka Waskowski continues to develop her small drawings and paintings (to mention just two). The other members are Mahlea Jones, Quinn Dukes, Jenny Luckett, and Jaime Raybin.

LeQuire, Contemporary Portraits. In keeping with their mission to promote the vitality of traditional forms and methods, LeQuire’s showing work by several portraitists: Murat Kaboulov, Joshua Bronaugh, Alan LeQuire, Brody Vincent. Vincent makes interesting, technically polished symbolic images. LeQuire’s ability is this area is obvious (some small sculptures of nudes come to mind), and Kaboulov is one of several Russian artists connected to the gallery.

Estel, Deb Garlick and Tim Yankosky. Two artists focusing particular visual motifs. Many of Garlick’s paintings feature a simple white dress, on an anonymous figure or by itself. Yankosky’s totem is a goldfish. Both artists place their highlighted elements into different setting that represent psychological states and play around with stock verbal phrases.

Rymer, Hunt Slonem. A solo show of paintings of animals and bayou scenes.

The Arts Company, John Baeder. Nashvillian Baeder has created well-known photorealist paintings and watercolors of places like diners, hamburger stands, and Nashville neighborhood landmarks. For the last two months the Arts Company has been showing the photographs he took and used as references for his paintings, and they have one more installation of these photos scheduled for this month.

Downtown Presbyterian Church, Exhale: Breath Becomes Word. For Art Crawl night, the church will host a spoken word/reading organized by Chris Leonard and featuring a bunch of folks, including David Dark (see April 1). And the annual group show for the Lent season continues, including a delightful drawing by David Hellams that was awarded a purchase prize.

Sera Davis: Kin Froshin, Griffin Norman, Jennifer Hecker.

Terrazzo, Zeitgeist artists. It seems like Zeitgeist is expanding its monthly series at the Terrazzo—they’ve got shows in 3 of the building’s suites with work up by Ciprian Contreras, Mike Calway-Fagen, Shane Doling, David Wright LaGrone, Brady Haston, Richard Feaster, Lain York, John Donovan, Buddy Jackson, Will Berry, Hollis Bennett. And Hollow Ox will be playing.

BelArt (Arcade), Marleen De Waele De Bock. This is Marleen’s space, a steady participant in the Art Crawl. She’ll show some of her recent work this month.

Tennessee State Museum, The People's House: A Temple of Democracy. A show celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Tennessee State Capitol building. Part of the show is 66 paintings of the Capitol.

April 5

Family Wash, Franne Lee. A new set of paintings of birds and animals on old wood panels by Franne, one of the founders of the Plowhaus Coop. The opening is from 3-5.

Frist Center, Paul Vasterling and Trinita Kennedy lecture. A talk on the 13^th century Latin poems that Carl Orff set in Carmina Burana, and the process of choreographing the Nashville Ballet’s interpretation of it (being presented April 24-26 at TPAC). The talk’s also in conjunction with the collection of Medieval art from Cleveland on display at the museum.

April 9

TSU, Chester Higgins, Jr. lecture. Higgins has been a photographer for the New York Times sine the 70s, and has published his photos of African-American and African experience in Time magazine and in book form. The lecture begins at 4:00 in the Floyd Payne Campus Center

Gallery F., Surface + Insight artists’ talk. This show opened in March and continues through April 26. The artists involved are Ruth Zelanski, Laura Young, Stephanie Brooke West, Jennifer Campbell, and Ryan Hogan. They are giving a talk at 7:00 on the 9^th.

April 10

Watkins College, Michael Jones and Justin Patterson, senior shows. Reception from 6-8, the show closes on April 22.

April 15

Cheekwood, William Christenberry lecture. I reviewed this show in last week’s Scene. Christenberry is a major figure in photography and Southern art, and an experienced teacher. He’s at Cheekwood to give a lecture at 6:00. Whether or not you make it to the lecture, you should see the show.

Sarratt, Charles “Teenie” Harris. Photos of African-American life in Pittsburgh by Harris, lent by the Carnegie Mellon Museum of Art and the August Wilson Center for African-American Culture. It’s odd how often you get a confluence like this exhibit and the Higgins lecture at TSU.

April 16

Frist Center, Andrea Zittel lecture. Zittel is a major artist, making self-enclosed environments, and designing clothes (uniforms) and furniture that are part utopian experiment, part critique of fashion and consumption. Lecture starts at 6:30

APSU, Terminal Short Video Festival. Austin Peay’s on-line project Terminal will be going in Barry Jones’ words a “real world” event at 8:00 projecting videos onto the front of the Trahern Building.

Parthenon, Hans Goette lecture. Goette, from the German Archeological Institute in Berlin, will speak on the architecture and history of classical Greek theatres and how they were used for the presentation of plays, choral competitions, sacrifices, and civic ceremonies. The lecture is at 7:00 and free, but you need to call 862-8431 to reserve a seat.

April 17

Twist, Camille Jackson, Watkins Senior Show. Show open from 4-6

214 3rd Ave. N, Ellie Odom, Watkins Senior Show. Like the other one, running from 4-6 one day only.

April 18 and 19

4 Bridges Art Festival, Chattanooga. This is what Jerry Dale McFadden ran off to direct. It’s a big 2-day show with 150 artists at the Tennessee Pavillion, covering all media, “crafts” as well as “fine arts.”

April 21

Sewanee University Art Gallery, Art Majors Senior Show.

April 22

Belmont, Edie Maney. A solo show by a Nashville painter who takes an abstractionist’s approach, but sometimes with hints of figurative results.

April 23

TSU Art Gallery, Senior Show. Reception from 4-7

April 24

Watkins College, Erin Plew, Myrna Talbot, and Ashley Steverson Senior Shows.

Customs House Museum (Clarksville), David Farmerie lecture. Lecture by the artist in conjunction with a photo series on the theme of the 7 Deadly Sins.

April 25

Gallery One, Katharina Chapuis, Marc Civitarese Meditative abstract paintings by Chapuis, hazy wetlands landscapes by Civitarese.

May 10

Belmont Mansion, Beth Gilmore. As I said in the intro, Beth is getting to install her art in an unrestored room of the mansion, which is so appropriate since that’s where a lot of the images come from. Her whole approach is based on appropriating and absorbing images, and then looking for a home that allows a vivid sense of historical presence to express itself. This show will let a couple of ways of telling history reside together. And I think it’s been a while since Beth has shown her work on its own, and I’ve probably never seen it with this opportunity to occupy a space. The show will run from 6-9 on the 10^th.