Terminal at APSU

Received this last week--it's an on-line project hosted by the Art Department at Austin Peay, currently featuring a project curated by Jodi Hays from TSU, currently we are all in this together: on collectives, highways,and the superhighway. I haven't had a chance to go through this yet, so I figured I'd park the URL here for my benefit as much as anyone else's.

Nashville Visual Arts Events September 4-16

Well everyone has been very busy and has something to offer for the beginning of the month. The start of “the season,” if we’ve got one of those.

The best thing this month is Scarritt-Bennett getting into the mix as an art venue. The space is starting up with a show by 7 women with Nashville ties all of whom got MFAs from Vermont College of Art—this includes Barbara Yontz, Kristi Hargrove, Amanda Dillingham, and Jodi Hays. The curator is Sabine Schlunk, an artist who is new to town and showed some nice pieces at TSU last Spring.

TAG Gallery is showing two of its artists at Estel—Lori Field and Anna Jaap. I’ve been getting very interested in Anna’s work lately.

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, send me an email at dcmaddox@comcast.net. To get taken off the list, email to that effect at the same address.

September 4

Carlos Picon lecture at the Parthenon. Picon is the curator of Greek, Roman, and Etruscan art at the Metropolitan Museum in New York. As in the guy in charge of one of the world’s great collections of classical art. This collection has gained new prominence with a renovation of the galleries that has been extremely well perceived. When you go to the Met, go see it. Go to the left off the entrance hall. I think Picon is going to discuss the renovation of the galleries, which may or may not be interesting, but I hope he will talk about the art in those galleries. The lecture is free but you need to call ahead for a ticket (862-8431).

September 5

Scarritt-Bennett Gallery F, The New Dress Code. For the gallery’s inaugural exhibit, Sabine Schlunk organized a show around the work of seven women with Nashville ties who have gone through Vermont College of Art’s low-residence MFA program. No college in Middle Tennessee has an MFA program in the visual arts, so people who want this degree usually have to move, but low-residency programs have been a good solution for folks who want to keep their ties here. One of the best low-res MFAs is offered by Vermont College, and their growing group of local alumnae includes really good people—Barbara Yontz, Kristi Hargrove, Amanda Dillingham, Jodi Hays, Erika Nichols, Michelle Sciumbato, and Mandy Sauer. The reception is from 5 to 9, and includes music from Lola, Carry A. Nation (that’s Sarah Dark, Sherry Cothran and Jewly Hight’s group—old hymns updated, electric guitars, marching drums, and clogging), and Xiaolun Qi.

September 6

TAG at Estel, Lori Field and Anna Jaap. It sounds like Lori Field is getting some decent interest lately. Among other things, she gives her surfaces a distinctive tangibility through layers of encaustic and beeswax. Like Fields, Anna Jaap makes images that are pretty—delicate floral and botanic elements and pastel colors, but also darker threads. In earlier work she also combined carefully rendered shapes with their opposite, gestures and shapes marked on the surface blindly. Control/out of control is one of the tensions she uses to give the paintings their energy.

Twist: Irene Wills. Irene Wills and her family are great supporters of the arts and culture in Nashville, and she herself paints. This show puts her paintings, largely florals and garden scenes, into the spotlight..

Twist at 214 3^rd Avenue, Process. A one-night show including Kelly Bonadies, Kristi Hargrove, Erin Plew, Nick Stolle, Terry Thacker, Iwonka Waskowski, and John Whitten Oh yeah, and I’m going to be playing. Me, Amy Marcantel, and Joseph Hudson, doing some sort of derivative of Forest Bride filtered through the ears of people who have been listening to Fred Anderson and Ornette Coleman.

Plowhaus, Sprawl: Art in the Urban World In their new home at the Tennessee Art League on Broadway, another group show by members of the coop.

DPC Art Luck and Fundraising Concert featuring Les Kerr, Sarah Dark, Julie Lee, and Dave Perkins This is a closing reception for the show of pieces our kids did on icons. They came up with some amazing things. Get Sarah Dark or one of the others to walk you through the show—it’s worth it.

Studio B, Steven Miller and Victor Schmidt. Miler paints from enlarged photos of viruses like HIV, the make something beautiful out of something frightening idea. Schmidt is a sculptor grounded in traditional metalworking techniques.

Sri Ganesha Temple, concert by Binay Pathak, Madhusudhan Barman, Gopal Barman. Pathak plays Harmonium as a solo instrument—it’s a keyboard with bellows, sort of a stationary accordion used more often to accompany vocalists. The concert starts at 6:30.

LeQuire Gallery, New Approaches to Figurative Painting. With a strong sense of their mission and aesthetics, LeQuire present a group show that includes gallery artists and others: Juliette Aristedes, Cindy Billingsley, Josh Bronaugh, Ron Cheek, Brendan Getz, Murat Kaboulov, William Kooinga, Alan LeQuire, Jonathan Matthews, Jonathan Stone, Brody Vincnet, and Jammie Williams.

The Arts Company, Three Generations of Nashville Photographers. That would be Ed Clark, Bob Schatz, and Greg Miller. This will include photos from Schatz’ series on Southern writers’ homes, which are darned interesting. My wife the perfume freak was very interested to see a bottle of something sitting in one of the women’s bathrooms, maybe Eudora Welty. Clark, who passed away in 2000, documented the city for the Tennessean and Life. And Greg Miller’s new to the gallery.

September 7

CRAFT: A Creative Community A group of local artists/artisans, bringing Nashville into the world of DIY crafts, holds its monthly sale/fair in the parking lot of Lipstick Lounge from 11-5 on Sunday.

September 11

Sarratt, Retablos: Miracles on the Border. Retablos are traditional Mexican religious paintings. The collection on display at Sarratt features retablos that incorporate contemporary experiences of migration. Jorge Durand of the University of Guadalajara will give a lecture on them at 4:00 in Buttrick 102. Sarratt’s expanding our range with this show.

September 12

Frist Center, Rodin. This is a show drawn from one of the major collections of Rodin’s sculpture, assembled by Iris and Gerald Cantor. It’s a big show, 60 sculptures, and includes The Kiss and The Thinker. My favorite Rodin sculpture is the portrait of Balzac, but I don’t know if one of those is here. The point for me is that the brute strength in Rodin’s masses lines makes this timelessly modern art that doesn’t let itself get relegated to sentiment and tradition.

University School of Nashville, Jaime Raybin. A closing reception for Jaime’s exhibit of her Milk Shelf series at USN. 6-7:30.

September 12-13

NAA Studio Tour and Juried Show. Nashville Area Arts, which runs a web site consolidating a lot of information on Nashville visual arts, has organized a tour of 30 artists’ studios in Nashville. The tour is on Saturday—not guided, you get a map listing everyone participating, and their studios are open from 10-6 on Saturday. Friday evening they are having a reception at Belmont’s Leu Gallery for a juried show that I assume is taken from participating artists.

September 13

Ruby Green, Chris Campbell: Necessary Collector After a summer hiatus, Ruby Green is back with an exhibit of pieces from director Chris Campbell’s personal collection. The artists include many who have exhibited at Ruby Green over the year, and plenty of others: Sue Coe, Mark Mulroney, Sandra Bermudez, Mary Shaffer, Terry Glispin, Leslie Kneisel, Sam Dunson, Cheryl Pfeiffer, Angela Willcoks, Jill Larson, Mery Lynn McKorkle, Don Evans, Erin Anfinson, Donte K Hayes, Cecelia Kane, Richard Mitchell, Michael Durham, Donna Stack, Tom Zarilli, Joseph Whitt, Hunter Brice.

Cumberland, Raine Bedsole and David Kroll Kroll is one of the gallery’s figurative painters, more or less surrealist, relishing the fine details of birds, fish, and objects. Bedsole is sort of the opposite, a painter of almost abstract compositions where surface texture is everything, and who tends towards forms that are simple in their basic outlines and complex in detail.

Group show at The Vine, Murfreesboro. A one-night show organized by John Schramlin in a new venue in downtown Murfreesboro (118 W. Vine), with work by Joey Tigert, Tarri Driver, Jeff Bertrand, James Clark, Charles Bennett, Charles Clary, and Schramlin. 6 to 10.

September 16

Eugene Borza lecture at the Parthenon. The second lecture in a month on classical art and architecture at the Parthenon, this time by a professor from Penn State. Borza will discuss the history of the Parthenon (the one in Greece) and current research and restoration efforts. Like the event on Sept 4, it’s free but you need a ticket, which you get by calling 862-8431

Nashville Visual Arts Events July 5-13

This Saturday will be sad—the last opening for TAG as a stand alone gallery. The community has also gotten word from Daniel Lai that he won’t be reopening Dangenart. So that space will go dark for now, and we lose two important sources of interesting shows. Maybe someone comparable will come in there.

One narrative we can apply is we’re sorry to see Jerry Dale and Daniel go, they’ve each done a great job in their own ways, as the vitality of the current gallery scene attests. We will miss both places, but isn’t it great that other galleries are opening all the time. OK.

But another narrative is that this, in combination with a few other things (some of them stretching back a few years), indicates an ongoing depletion of aesthetic vitality. The cause of that could be specific to Nashville’s art community, or maybe it’s a matter of larger economic forces. Selling art is hard and maybe it’s getting harder, and it’s not clear that Nashville’s downtown renaissance is everything we want or need it to be, and pressure from everything from oil prices to the floods in the Midwest ain’t helping.

I may have occasion to weigh in on this more later. I need to do some homework first.

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.

July 5

TAG: Rik Catlow, Matthew Feyld, Jason Dunda, Julianna Bright. Jerry Dale’s ending up with a good show. To start with, he’s got Kelly Williams, and I’ve really liked her work, which is a fragmented exposure of her immediate perceptions that gives a vivid sense of the phenomenology of perception (to borrow a phrase) at work. You can probably think of Rik Catlow and Jason Dunda as falling in the Juxtapose realm of artists with a visual connection to cartooning and illustration. The same goes for Julianna Bright, but I also see bits of some sort of indeterminate European folk drawing and Amy Cutler’s characters.

Rymer, Phurba Namgay Something different for Rymer—a Bhutanese painter, trained in traditional styles who combines the techniques and imagery of those traditions with modern elements. He lives part time in Nashville now.

Sera Davis Advisory, Pamela Johnson and Anne Karsten. This is the new group in Matt Mikulla’s old space on the second floor of the Arcade. They are running an art consulting business but also will present artists in a gallery setting. The two painters here have different takes on consumer society—Johnson makes oversized images of mass-produced foods, magnifying their attractions as objects of desire, and Karsten takes objects for sale on eBay and makes them the subject of “psychological portraits.”

DPC Art Luck For this month, the Art Luck supper is continuing the art from The Contributor, Nashville’s street newspaper But this month there’s also going to be a concert by Carry Nation, which is Sarah Masen, Jewly Hight (Jewly’s also a pretty fair scholar), and Sherry Cothran. I saw them a few months back and found them really engaging. They do some things with old hymns and songs they’ve written, and the three women are compelling performers in different ways. The group is going to perform at DPC around 6 or so and then move matter to Twist to play later set there. You might see them wandering up or down 5^th Avenue too.

A bunch of galleries have continuing shows:

Estel, Common Thread: Cathy Breslaw, Vanessa Oppenhoff, Teri Moore.

Arts Company: Brother Mel

Tinney + Cannon Contemporary: Linda Mitchell

Plowhaus at Tennessee Art League: Value Menu Show (everything $49.99 or less) I think this show is continuing.

Twist: Quinn Dukes. Plus that concert by Carry Nation.

LeQuire Gallery: Learning Green Sri Ganesha Temple, Odissi Dance Program In conjunction with the Temple’s celebration of Jagannath Ratha Yatra (Chariot Festival), there will be a performance by the dance company Rudrakshya from India. The company performs in the classical style of the eastern Indian state of Orissa. It is described as having many sculptural elements, recalling Indian temple relief sculptures. The program starts at 6:30, after the Temple’s chariot procession from 4-5:30.

July 6

CRAFT: A Creative Community A group of local artists/artisans, bringing Nashville into the world of DIY crafts, holds its monthly sale/fair in the parking lot of Lipstick Lounge from 11-5 on Sunday.

July 11

Centennial Art Center, CV-TACA Crafts Show. This is a pretty big show of area crafts artists. It includes a couple of very prominent fabrics artists—Paula Bowers-Hotvedt, who was part of the Judy Chicago project at Vandy, and Martha Christian whose large scale hangings have been shown in various places, but I go back to what I thought was a really effective placement in the airport lobby given the geological and topographical qualities of the work. Wood-turner Brenda Stein’s also in the show. 29 artists in total. Reception at 5:00.

July 13

Main Library, Beyond the Page: Carol Barton’s Art and Influence. Barton designs artists books with pop-up elements, and this exhibit features her work and books made by Nashville artists who have studied with her. No one can resist pop-up books. I don’t know if there’s an opening reception for this show, but the press says it opens on the 13^th.

Visual Arts Events June 19-29

Got a look at the Frist shows today. Lots of big, big paintings. Modern Baroque. Also, a nice set of drawings—I especially liked the work from Carol Prusa.

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.

June 19

Tony Hernandez, Gordon Jewish Community Center I know this is getting out too late for the reception (7-9 on Thursday the 19^th), but it is an opportunity to let you know that Hernandez, from Tinney+Cannon, has this show at the JCC that runs through June 30. Hernandez takes images inspired by the artwork from the kindercamps in the Nazi concentration camps and isolates them on wood panels. It’s the same body of work he showed earlier at Tinney+Cannon, if you missed that. Or want to see it again.

June 20

In.Form.All. A group show (one night only I believe) featuring Arlene Bates, Betsy Clapsaddle, Charla Steele, Hans Mooy, Judy Klich, Merry Beth Myrick, Shonna Sexton and Stacie Berry. It will be held from 5:30 to 8:30 at 5725 Stoneway Trail.

Frist Center, Color as Field and Shades of Grey. As a DC guy I thought of the Color Field painters as a local phenomenon revolving around Morris Louis, Gene Davis and Sam Gilliam. Washington is a little too close to NY for it to sustain much of its own artistic styles, so you tend to latch onto anything that looks like distinct local product—like Go-Go. Well, that narrow parochial view doesn’t hold up, as this show demonstrates—my DC people are there, but it goes way beyond that and Helen Frankenthaler is really the central figure. This show provides what turns out to be a quick (due to the sheer size of the paintings) survey of this era in American painting (1950-75). In another clever bit of Frist counter-programming, the CAP gallery has black and white drawings by regional artists: Kell Black from APSU, Sue Mulcahy, Jane Allen Nodine (South Carolina) and Carol Prusa (South Florida). Also, a video by Jennifer Steinkamp. The Color as Field curator, Karen Wilken, is speaking at the Frist Center Friday at 6:30.

Renaissance Center: Victoria Boone, Erin Anfinson, Julie Lee, and Doug Stevenson. The Ren Center in Dickson is picking up the pace in getting Nashville artists in front of viewers in Dickson and the surrounding counties. Last month they had John Donovan and the Southern Graphics Council, and this time several people who have been featured in Nashville galleries recently: Victoria Boone had a show at the Parthenon (it sounds like this features some of the same material or a continuation of that body of work), Julie was at Twist, and Erin Anfinson is carried by TAG (but I think the last show I show of hers was at Ruby Green about a year ago, but I might have missed something). This show goes up June 19 or 20, but they are dividing the receptions—they’ll have the reception for Boone and Stevenson on the 20^th, the receptions for Anfinson and Lee on the 27^th.

June 21

Zeitgeist, Dialogue 3, Sculpture The second in Zeitgeist’s medium shows, sculpture up now. I’m enjoying John Donovan’s recent work, which I think may be a function of its significance sinking in on me. It’s always important to see Greg Pond’s latest work. I haven’t seen Michael Baggarly’s work in a while, so this will be good. Also: Jason Briggs, Mark Bynon, Mark Clarson, Buddy Jackson, Christopher McNulty, Jack Dingo Ryan (who’s leaving town, not sure when—but I believe I was the last person to hear about it), and Bethany Springer.

June 27

Renaissance Center: Erin Anfinson and Julie Lee opening reception. See above—they’re splitting up the receptions this month. June 28

CRAFT: A Creative Community Summer Extravaganza. This group of local artists/artisans had their regular monthly show/sale on June 1, but there’s also doing a second event on Saturday the 28^th at Memorial Lutheran Church, 1211 Riverside Drive in East Nashville from 10 to 5.

Cheekwood, A Century on Paper A show of selections from Cheekwood’s collection, starting with early 20^th century artists like Reginald Marsh, but it probably picks up in interest with later stuff by Rauschenberg, Ruscha.

June 29

Magpie, etc. A new gallery on 10^th Avenue South, trying to extend the activity of 12^th itself. The gallery is the project of Emily Harper and Rhiannon Guillet, and in addition to art will have accessories, clothes (designed by Guillet), and jewelry.

OK, this is late getting to the web, but for the sake of completeness and the things coming in the next few weeks (there’s some Frist Center opening on the 20^th that didn’t quite make it in, but will get posted). This week features the triumphant return to town of performance artist Quinn Dukes, and some interesting artists using needle work and fabric at Estel.

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.

June 7

Twist, Quinn Dukes Quinn graduated from Nashville last year and moved to NewYork. The core of her art is a dramatic, ritualistic (well all performance art is) performance art that had involved odd costumes and a love of playing with dirt. From her artist’s statement, it sounds like she’s been having fun contrasting the relative wildness of Tennessee with her new urban environs, where the natural world comes onto the stage of the built landscape as more of an intruder.

Estel, Common Thread: Cathy Breslaw, Vanessa Oppenhoff, Teri Moore, and work by Rodney Wood. The Feminist Art Movement of the 60s and 70s reclaimed traditional women’s craft techniques as an avenue for artist expression. Over the decades, the influence of this movement can be seen in the way needlework has become a common technique in gallery art, getting to be just another medium like drawing or painting. Still, the medium occupies ambiguous ground, sometimes looking like a form of drawing, other times verging on sculpture, and still with a foot in the craft world. This show features three women making art with fabric and thread. Just to pick out one, Oppenhoff’s work includes several series—one takes variants of the simple figures used in instructional illustrations to describe the notions of threat in today’s society. In the small gallery, new paintings by Rodney Wood. Some of the new paintings struck me as being more naturalistic but still capturing the idea of something mysterious going on—it seems like a good direction, if I’m seeing it right.

TAG, Nice to Meet You group show. A group show of new and returning artists: Terri Saul, Keith Greiman, Mary Addison Hackett, Greg Gossel, Maura Cluthe, Andrew Hem.

Arts Company, Brother Mel. A big 80^th birthday show for Brother Mel, celebrating 50 years of art-making and 10 years at the Arts Company. This Marianist monk makes art in all sorts of media, changing styles with the context and purpose of his art. He’s been one of the Arts Company’s consistently popular artists.

Rymer, Dominic Besner, Aniocles Gregoire, Leszek Wyczolkowski, Antoine Claes, Kristina Colucci Rymer is opening its new location on 5^th Avenue with a group show. It’s like one door down from Tinney+Cannon, which with Arts Company gives us three major galleries in a row.

Tinney+Cannon, Linda Mitchell Mixed media paintings, a lot of which feature animals in fanciful settings.

Plowhaus, Value Menu show, at Tennessee Art League. For a long time Plowhaus maintained nice space in East Nashville, but now the coop is homeless/itinerant. They’re doing their Value Menu show (everything under $49.99) on the second floor galleries of the Art League. The participants are Denny Adcock, Marlynda Augelli, Chuck Beard, John Barcus, Peggy Bonnington, Jennifer Bronstein, Chris Cheney, Jack Coggins, Carri Hofacker, John Holland, DJ Justice, Franne Lee, Stephen McClure, Carrie Mills, Susie Monick, Lois Moreno, Ayjey Odom, Tracy Ratliff, Julie Sola, Diane Stockard, Mary Sullivan, and David Wariner.

DPC Art Luck, The Art Works of the Contributor The Contributor is Nashville’s version of an idea in place in several cities to provide an opportunity for the homeless to earn some money and spread the word on their experience by producing a newspaper featuring articles and artwork mostly by members of the homeless community, sold by vendors from the homeless community. The Contributor got started earlier this year, and DPC is going to feature art work by some of the people involved with the paper and the homeless community in Nashville.

LeQuire Gallery, Learning Green Landscapes by Suta Lee, Arthur Barnes, Lori Putnam, Ashley Wiltshire. Barnes and Putnam do plein air work. Lee, a professor at Austin Peay, works in a couple of styles, but this show will include his very traditional watercolor landscapes.

Cumberland Gallery, Group show, Kit Reuther and new artists. Cumberland has their summer group show going, and they are also doing short-run features on some of their artists and cycling through some new artists. The new folks are Jeff Green, Denise Mayo Stewart-Sanabria, and Dane Carder. The feature from June 7-21 is Kit Reuther.

June 13

Untitled, Multiple Origami This quarter’s will be held at the University of Phoenix’ building out by the airport—you can see it on the right when you’re driving back into town from the Airport. I think you get to it by taking the Elm Hill Pike exit from Briley Parkway. Runs from 6-10.

June 14

Studio B Gallery, Kaaren Hirschowitz Engel. Kaaren’s latest paintings integrate Hebrew prayers from her childhood. I’m not sure if this is going to include some of her sculptural work—paintings rolled or cut up, like the globes hanging in the Arcade—or will focus more on on-the-wall paintings. The opening will be from 7-9 on the 14^th.

June 19

Renaissance Center: Victoria Boone, Erin Anfinson, Julie Lee, and Doug Stevenson. The Ren Center in Dickson is picking up the pace in getting Nashville artists in front of viewers in Dickson and the surrounding counties. Last month they had John Donovan and the Southern Graphics Council, and this time several people who have been featured in Nashville galleries recently: Victoria Boone had a show at the Parthenon, Julie was at Twist, and Erin Anfinson is carried by TAG (I think the last show I show of hers was at Ruby Green about a year ago, but I might have missed something). I don’t know for sure, but the reception might be on Friday the 20^th.

June 20

In.Form.All. A group show (one night only I believe) featuring Arlene Bates, Betsy Clapsaddle, Charla Steele, Hans Mooy, Judy Klich, Merry Beth Myrick, Shonna Sexton and Stacie Berry. It will be held from 5:30 to 8:30 at 5725 Stoneway Trail.

June 21

Zeitgeist, Dialogue 3, Sculpture The second in Zeitgeist’s medium-specific and media-bending shows, this one covers photography. Jason Briggs, Mark Bynon, Michael Baggarly, Mark Clarson, John Donovan, Buddy Jackson, Christopher McNulty, Greg Pond, Jack Dingo Ryan, Bethany Springer

June 28

CRAFT: A Creative Community Summer Extravaganza. This group of local artists/artisans had their regular monthly show/sale on June 1, but there’s also doing a second event on Saturday the 28^th at Memorial Lutheran Church, 1211 Riverside Drive in East Nashville from 10 to 5.

Cheekwood, A Century on Paper A show of selections from Cheekwood’s collection, starting with early 20^th century artists like Reginald Marsh, but probably picking up with later stuff by Rauschenberg, Ruscha.

Viewing notes on Durham and Donovan

If I can get my act together, I’m going to put together a long review of Erika Johnson’s piece at the Parthenon, but there’s some other things in the way of viewing notes I wanted to get out of my head.

I did a review of the Library’s Works with Words show in last week’s issue of the Scene, and I think it made me tune into words in other things I’ve been looking at. This was the case at Bob Durham’s show at Cumberland. I guess people consider Bob a photo-realist, although I’m not sure what that would mean today. If that label applies to Bob it’s because he paints figuratively with clear detail, and probably because of the quality of light in the paintings.

Bob has two kinds of work going. One is a series of paintings of sock monkeys, posed with props of various kinds, playing out a joke or a pun. Then he has paintings taken more from everyday life, usually portraits, often in a domestic setting. I prefer the portraits, but the sock monkeys are really popular. I think the portraits show his depth much more, and they have plenty of humor—not quite as obvious as the sock monkeys, but it’s there. Lately I’ve been thinking maybe I’m missing something, that the market has recognized the brilliance of these paintings. Certainly Dave Hickey would tell me that’s what to look for. Maybe these paintings stand out as a more distinctive body of work. For now, I will in a self-satisfied way insist on retaining my state of ignorance, and hold onto my preference for Bob’s portraits.

For me the show was dominated by the painting “Maestro,” which shows a middle-aged guy holding forth in a kitchen, standing over a bunch of shiny sauce pans, waving a spoon in one hand and holding a scotch in the other. I picture it as this guy, pretty well lit, whipping up his special dish, maybe gumbo or something, for a bunch of guests. It looks like he’s got every pan in the place out—a chef who is more energetic than efficient.

So you’ve got this guy engaged in a kind of domestic performance where he’s the center of attention for some clutch of unseen guests. But the real performance is Bob’s, who shows off and pokes fun at himself at the same time. Not only does he capture this particular male character in full flourish, but all those shiny metal plans give the painter a chance to show off his skill managing the reflections, like the bit of green reflected from the subject’s shirt. Photorealists made a career of hard, shiny surfaces, and the amount of metal here is practically a parody of the style and its pursuit of virtuosity. Of course, it goes back much further. Painters have always enjoyed showing off with reflective surfaces—look at the water goblets Pieter Claesz (this is "Still Life with Roemer, Tazza, and Watch" from 1636) preferred, the base covered with convex bulges that gave him even more surfaces to play with. The same pleasure in technique inspired other painters who took every chance they had to include delicate lace.

The painting has other tricks up its sleeve. This is where the words come in. In the foreground, the word PYREX is visible in clean red letters on a clear glass mixing bowl. But look at some other places where you would expect to find words—the labels on bottles of scotch and ginger ale. They are smudged, completely indistinct and illegible. You could argue that these bottles are blurred because they are more in the background, but the scotch bottle is positioned pretty close to Pyrex bowl. While the painting looks “photorealistic,” it really isn’t. Bob is varying it up when it comes to choices about what details to include, and how sharply to limn each one.

Just to confirm this artistic editing, turn to another painting, “12:01 A.M.” This one shows a broom propped up in a nook in that wall, next to a pair of woman’s shoes. The wall is rendered in a lovely mix of almost iridescent color and has the shadow of a chair hitting it. On the floor there’s a can, and the label shows a pumpkin, but the part of the label that would include the brand name and the name of the product (pumpkin pie filling?) is blank. No blurry words, but just an empty, blank white spot. The picture of the pumpkin tells you enough about what it is, so Bob leaves out the rest. The can convinced me, if there was any doubt, that the contrast between the blurred labels and the word PYREX in “Maestro” were not perspective effects, but explicit artifice.

It makes me think there are other ways this artifice would come out if I spent more time with the painting, or if I knew more about anatomical rendering.

The other thing I wanted to mention is John Donovan’s sculptures at the Renaissance Center in Dickson. Everything (I think) in this show is unglazed, just the red fired clay with some black soot smudges, which makes the pieces seem like archaeological artifacts. He has several warrior figures with the extended earlobes of pre-Columbian art brandishing spears, but wearing un-ferocious rabbit headdresses. Other pieces are outfitted with guns and modern weapons. Donovan uses all sorts of glaze techniques in his work, sometimes the opposite of this, thick and gooey like cheap tourist trinkets. I guess this isn’t the first time I’ve seen these unglazed pieces, but this time they made me more aware of how conscious Donovan is of the history of his medium. Ceramics have been around for a long time, into prehistory, and continue in use in our daily and commercial culture. It’s very common material, and it lasts, so it provides strong connections among human life across the ages. With Donovan it seems like all of that history of the material is present at one time or the other, and the material gives me a way of thinking about the long course of human history.

Nashville Visual Arts May 2-11

Happy Beltane everyone. There’s a lot going on, so I’m not going to get deep into everything. The Zeitgeist photography show will no doubt be very interesting, like the painting show, and it includes some people I haven’t seen in a little while.

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.

May 2

Centennial Art Center, J. William Barnes, Donald R. Murphree and Ken R. White Three painters from the area. Bill Barnes was art director at Sony Records and designed a lot of big time album covers; his paintings take up surrealism. Don Murphree looks like he might be the most interesting of the three, with realistic paintings of the people and totem objects of the south. Lots of motorcycles.

Renaissance Center: Southern Graphics Council Exhibition, John Donovan, Watkins Student Photography, Tuckessee Woodturners The Ren Center in Dickson packs up its gallery, display cases and walls yet again. About all the leading printmakers in the region are members of the Southern Graphics Council and the group has put together shows from its members at several galleries in Nashville. Donovan makes ceramic models of tanks, soldiers, Asian warriors, fortress houses, and so forth that riff on the social psychology of security, pop culture, and mass commercialization. He is represented by Zeitgeist, shows there regularly, and often figures in good group shows. Good for Armon Means to bring him out to Dickson. The Watkins photography students—not sure who’s included, but there were a number of photographers in this year’s graduating class. Finally, the Tuckessee Woodturners is a local group that meets in the Renaissance Center to take classes and do their work. Woodturning is one of those traditional crafts that maintains its solid roots in small towns in Tennessee with groups like this. This is what folk art looks like, and it’s a really nice counterpoint to the use of traditional techniques by an artist like Donovan. All of these shows will be up through June 7, but the opening reception is Friday night from 6-7:30.

May 3

TAG, Laurie Lipton and Emily Leonard. Small paintings and drawings by Emily Leonard, finely detailed graphite drawings by Lipton. Some of Lipton’s material quotes from early Renaissance painting, and the spirit of those classic art works runs through even more surrealistic ideas. Leonard makes lovely crepuscular images of forests and trees.

Arts Company, Jonathan Richter and McKelvey. This is a collaborative effort between painter Richter and writer McKelvey. Richter’s done a series of small portraits, to which McKelvey has added a couple of lines of poetry to imagine bits of narrative for them. The Arts Company also is still showing Aaron Brown’s paintings, very much worth spending time with.

Rymer, Greg Gustafson, Frank Milo, Teodora Pica Gustafson is from Memphis and paints landscapes with a monumental scale, with a sense of the broad sky worthy of someone from the Plains. From what I can see on-line, Pica has a couple of different stylistic approaches, some of the best of which is classic abstraction that has the feel and refinement of work from the years right after WWII.

Tinney+Cannon, Jennifer Cawley A lot of artists draw on cartoon and illustration tropes, but Cawley also has a hint of 60s pop art psychedelia. The more complex compositions integrate multiple panels of images and textures.

Twist, Brady Haston Haston continues his exploration of the graphic terrain of the contemporary city, translating it into prints, paintings, and drawings that read back the patterns in fragments and essential forms.

Estel, Pamela Sukhum and paintings by Sudanese refugee children. Sukhum is a painter who has worked with Sudanese children in refugee camps in Chad. This show brings together her paintings, art by the children from these refugee camps, and some of the art work produced by Sudanese refugees in Nashville. Sukhum’s colorful paintings perch on a boundary between abstractions and botanical and floral forms.

Zeitgeist, Dialogue 2, Photography The second in Zeitgeist’s medium-specific and media-bending shows, this one covers photography. It includes Norwegian Bjorn Sterri, who had a great series of photos of himself and his family, creating a moody sort of quasi-narrative; Caroline Allison, a keen observer of overlooked landscapes; David Wright LaGrone has done challenging work that deals with semiotics and would be a good addition to the Library’s works with words series; Hans Schmitt-Matzen’s work often crosses back and forth between painting and photography. And it’s great to see the Scene’s photographer Eric England in a gallery context. The other participants are Jimmy Abegg, Stephen Alvarez, Todd Baxter, Fred Clarke, John Folsom, Peter Monroe, Nancy Rhoda, Simon Roberts, Katherine Slingluff, Mark Tucker. This installment’s panel discussion will take place on Tuesday, May 13.

Hume-Fogg Student Art Show to benefit Lost Boys Foundation. A Hume-Fogg senior has organized this one-night show, inspired by internships at the Arts Company and the Lost Boys Foundation. The show will be open from 6-9 at 226 3rd Avenue North, the old Federal Reserve Bank building, next door to the Stahlman Building. Sales of the art work will benefit the Lost Boys Foundation.

May 4

CRAFT: A Creative Community A group of local artists/artisans, bringing Nashville into the world of DIY crafts, holds its first monthly sale/fair of the new year in the parking lot of Lipstick Lounge from 11-5 on Sunday.

May 9

Frist Center, Tiffany by Design. An exhibit of Tiffany lamps.

May 11

Nashville Ballet, Jason Facio. An exhibit at the Nashville Ballet’s headquarters in Sylvan Park. Much of Jason’s work seems to be figurative, sometimes based on scrap wood or even doors. There’s a reception from 3-5 on Sunday the 11^th, and the space is open 10-5 Monday-Friday.

Announcements

Studio B Gallery. This is a new gallery on 12^th Avenue South, although it might be in space that’s been used previously as a gallery. The inaugural show opened maybe this last week, and it features Moses Hoskins, an abstract painter from New York.

TSU request for proposals

Got this announcement from Jodi Hays at TSU

SHIFT PAUSE PLAY

Tennessee State University art spaces are administered by the Art Department are located in Elliot Hall on Tennessee State University 's campus, minutes from downtown Nashville . The Hiram Van Gordon Memorial Gallery regularly houses faculty and student shows and a wide variety of temporary exhibitions. The Space for New Media will house innovations in digital media, new media, video and electronic arts by African Americans as its mission. Programming of the Hiram Van Gordon Memorial Gallery will mirror the programming for the adjacent the Space for New Media.

Recognizing the historical precedence of working with immediate communities to affect positive change (e.g. the civil rights movement) the Hiram Van Gordon Memorial Gallery invites Nashville-area artists, collectives and curators to submit curatorial proposals for summer exhibitions (June-July) that support existing programming missions. In keeping with the mission, the Hiram Van Gordon gallery encourages proposals from artists and curators with diverse backgrounds.

In 2009 the theme is SHIFT, all proposals must include a written statement detailing how the proposed exhibition supports the existing programming vision. Please read information provided on the TSU Gallery web site before you organize and exhibition:

http://www.tnstate.edu/gallery/newmedia.html.

Artists (2-3 person), collectives or curators interested in exhibiting in the Hiram Van Gordon at Tennessee State University should send the following:

• one page proposal detailing exhibition and how it supports the existing programming (for 2009: SHIFT for 2010: PAUSE for 2011: PLAY)

• resume, statement, and bio (all limited to one page)

•10-20 images of recent work in slide or digital format

-Slides should be labeled with name and number that corresponds to an image list with title, date, medium and if brief description of work (if applicable)

-CD should contain a pdf file that includes all images. Provide a paper copy of image list.

•SASE For return of materials (if requesting materials back)

•$10 processing fee

• Deadline is August 1, 2008 for 2009 consideration

Submit materials and questions to:

Jodi Hays, Director/ Hiram Van Gordon Gallery and Space for New Media

Department of Art, Tennessee State University

3500 John Merrit Blvd., PO Box 9562

Nashville, TN 37209

615.963.1599

Die Gedanken Sind Frei

Thoughts are free, who can ever guess them?
They just fly by like nocturnal shadows.
No one can know them, no hunter can shoot them,
with powder and lead: Thoughts are free!

I think what I want, and what makes me happy,
but always discreetly, and as it is suitable.
My wish and desire, no one can deny me
and so it will always be: Thoughts are free!

And if I am thrown into the darkest dungeon,
all this would be futile work,
because my thoughts tear all gates
and walls apart. Thoughts are free!

So I will renounce my sorrows forever,
and never again will torment myself with some fancy ideas.
In one's heart, one can always laugh and joke
and think at the same time: Thoughts are free!

I love wine, and my girl even more,
Only I like her best of all.
I'm not alone with my glass of wine,
my girl is with me: Thoughts are free!

This is the text of an old German song from an Yvonne Buchheim video I saw at Cheekwood today. The song’s been banned a few times in its history, most notably during the Third Reich. In the video Buchheim sings it (except for that last verse, which kind of gets off point, but that happens with old songs) surreptitiously on the streets of Tehran. My first thought seeing the video was this is my wife’s theme song.

Maria did some research on it and found some predictably unsavory parties have adopted the song (Larouchies, some sort of right-wing German group). Again, that’ll happen with a song. But she also found this video of Pete Seeger singing it, and if it’s OK with Pete, it’s OK. But go to Cheekwood and hear Buchheim’s version.

It's reassuring, inpsiring to find such profoundly anti-authoritarian words in such an old song. It shows how deeply rooted is the desire for human autonomy.

BTW, Maria and I weren’t the first people in Nashville to decide to blog about this. That honor goes to Jason Kirk.

And another. I think Pete Seeger is singing this translation of the lyrics, which are not as literal as the ones above, but they are pretty much what Buchheim uses as the subtitles for her video:

My Thoughts Are Free

Die Gedanken sind frei
My thoughts freely flower.
Die Gedanken sind frei
My thoughts give me power.
No scholar can map them,
No hunter can trap them,
No man can deny:
Die Gedanken sind frei!

I think as I please,
And this gives me pleasure.
My conscience decrees,
This right I must treasure;
My thoughts will not cater
To duke or dictator,
No man can deny:
Die Gedanken sind frei!

And if tyrants take me
And throw me in prison,
My thoughts will burst free,
Like blossoms in season.
Foundations will crumble,
The structure will tumble,
And free men will cry:
Die Gedanken sind frei!

Neither trouble or pain
Will ever touch me again.
No good comes of fretting,
My hope's in forgetting.
Within myself still
I can think as I will,
But I laugh, do not cry:
Die Gedanken sind frei!

Nashville Visual Arts Events April 17-26

I’ve plugged the Faith Wilding lecture at least once before. Major figure. Go hear what she has to say. Maybe a bigger deal is the new Bob Durham show. His last show at Cumberland was really good, a lot of the images have stuck with me. He paints allusively, sometimes cracking jokes, always with at least a humorous undercurrent, and a lot of it has a subdued libidinous energy.

In addition to the shows listed below which have openings in the next couple of weeks, Estel is opening a show of paintings by Pamela Sukhum and some Sudanese refugee children she has worked with. The opening reception is coming on May 3, for First Saturday, so I’ll list it then also.

As always, if you have an email list of your own, feel free to forward this. And let me know if I missed anything or got dates mixed up.

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.

Apr. 17

Faith Wilding lecture, Watkins. Wilding has there for the birth of Feminist art, part of the West Coast scene in the early 70’s—a student in the Feminist Art Program at CalArts, one of the participants in Womanhouse. She’s now chair of the Performance department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and part of the subRosa feminist art collective. She also has connections to several Nashville and Watkins associated artists like Amanda Dillingham, Kristi Hargrove (I think), and Barbara Yontz. Her lecture will be at 6, with a reception to follow.

April 18

Dan Steinhilber, Yvonne Buchheim, and books by artists, Cheekwood. Cheekwood is opening three shows this weekend. I stumbled into Steinhilber’s work in DC a couple of weeks ago—his gallery happened to be showing his work, and he’s got a big piece on view at the Hirshhorn. He’s one of these people who make sculpture out of overlooked waste material. The piece at the Hirshhorn was a monumental column made by hooking together dry cleaners’ hangers, the metal ones with white paper in the space inside the hanger. The hangers were tipped up, so he could change orientation and create separate bands on the column. He does a lot of stuff with packing peanuts, and I think all the pieces at Cheekwood use this material. The best thing at the G Fine Art show in DC was a separate room, illuminated by nearly dark fluorescent bulbs, 6 hanging from the ceiling, and then a bunch arrayed on a wall. You were invited to grab the tubes, which made them brighten up a bit. The panel of bulbs flickered randomly, like scratchy black and white movie film. Like I said, I don’t think there’s a piece like that in this show, but the work with peanuts has a similar mystical quality—it’s all about voids, the space left behind and the space between. Seeing the unseen. That sort of thing. The video galleries are given over to an installation by Buchheim, a German artist who did video of Nashvillians singing old work songs passed down through their families. I hadn’t tracked on this project, but it sounds very cool, and a departure for the video program, which I don’t think has had work done for a show at Cheekwood. And in the Post-45 gallery there’s an exhibit of artists books by big names like John Baldessari, Kara Walker, Diebenkorn, Motherwell.

Althea Norene, Senior Thesis Show, three squared studio in the 427 Chestnut Building. Norene is a photographer, and her thesis work is about relationships with men, “past, present, and future,” with an eye to a day when gender roles are constructed more loosely. The opening starts at 5:30.

Bharatanatyam dance, Malini Srinivasan, Sri Ganesha Temple. Ms. Srinivasan is a practitioner of the dance form that Monica Cooley performs and teaches here in Nashville. This visiting artist is based in the New York area, but logged a lot of time studying and performing in Chennai. The concert starts at 7:30.

April 19

Jayalakshmi Santhanam, Srti Ganesha Temple. This Carnatic singer from Chennai brings with her 40 years of experience. In Indian music, experience seems to count for a lot—technical mastery is as much a matter of control as vocal strength, and the expressiveness deepens with time. This is an afternoon concert, starting at 3:00.

Drawings by Sculptors, LeQuire Gallery: Mike Andrews, Olen Bryant, Ted Jones, Alan LeQuire, Scott Wise, Murat Kaboulov And Victor Schmidt. I’ve enjoyed LeQuire’s drawings quite a bit. Some of them are light and fluid, like Cocteau. The other sculptors here include Bryant, a long-time local artist who works with simple shapes marked by small details—drawing makes sense as a part of that practice. The inclusion of Kaboulov is part of LeQuire Gallery’s ongoing relationship with contemporary Russian artists—if you haven’t tracked on this, they regularly feature Russian artists. Reception from 6-8.

April 22

Sewanee Senior Art Majors show. Under the guidance and incitement of people like Greg Pond, Pradip Malde, and Julie Puttgen, the students at Sewanee seem to be a lively bunch. You would see their work sometimes when the Secret Show was running the 310 Chestnut space, and they seemed to be cousins to the Watkins students in spirit. The opening for their senior show up in Sewanee is at 4:30 and it runs through May 10.

April 24

TSU Senior Thesis Show. The BFA students at TSU made strong contributions to the Frist Center’s show of local art students and recent graduates. It seems to be good things going on in this program. This would be an obvious way to find out. The reception is from 3-5.

April 25

Abby Whisenant, Patricia Earnhardt, Max Haught, Senior Thesis Show, Watkins. And Graphic Design show. Abby’s been on my radar screen for a while as much for her activism as her art. She’s been very involved in grassroots efforts in the most ravaged neighborhoods of New Orleans, and has shown her photography regularly. Her photography and her activism often converge—I remember a series she did from a protest in DC, I think it was for World Bank or IMF meetings. She trying now to get support for a project working with students at Stratford High School. Earnhardt and Haught are both from the Fine Arts department.

April 26

Bob Durham and Tom Judd, Cumberland Gallery. Bob’s a great painter, figurative and sly. Art historical allusions in his work pervade his compositional sense, not sticking out as quotes. I think it’s been 2 years since his last solo show, and he’s one of the people in town where I want to see what he’s done since the last show. He’s paired with Judd, a painter working on recycled fabric samples and wallpaper.

And taking place out of town…

Lesley Patterson-Marx has a show at Murray State University in Kentucky, if you’re looking for a day trip out of town. I should have mentioned it earlier—it closes the 21^st, which would be Monday. Here’s the gallery hours from the Murray State website

Gallery Hours Monday - Friday 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m
Saturday & Sunday 1:00 - 4:00 p.m. Closed university holidays

Chris Scarborough is having his first solo show in New York—drawings at Foley Gallery (547 W 27^th Street). The show opens tomorrow, runs until May 31. Congratulations Chris. I am going to be interested to see if the Times and others pick up on this. It seems like a definite possibility given his work, but I realize there is hierarchy in the Chelsea galleries that I understand only in a rough way.

Herb Williams is being featured in a group show in DC called the End of Nature at the Warehouse Gallery (it’s part of the Warehouse Theatre complex on 7^th, near Chinatown). It includes a big piece by him, a bunch of crayon wallflowers. He also designed a Hatch Show Print poster for the show—we see these all the time, but no such luck for the benighted souls in DC. Herb also was profiled in American Airlines’ in-flight magazine, and he’s in negotiations on some other stuff that I’ll hold off broadcasting until it becomes definite.

Nashville Visual Arts Events Apr. 5-6

I’m just going to cover the first weekend things. There’s a bunch of stuff next week, and Faith Wilding is coming to talk at Watkins on the 17^th.

I got word this week that Matt Mikulla has closed his gallery and studio in the Arcade. That’s really too bad. He was a very strong part of the community there, and he was doing interesting things. I’ve added his website on my list here, go visit him. He’s going to keep going with his photography, and I suspect he’ll do well getting his work out there through the web.

As for the openings this weekend, I’m particularly heartened that Rymer has picked up Susan Maakestad from Memphis. She’s on faculty at Memphis College of Art, a fine painter. I first saw her work at the Tennessee Arts Commission, and I wrote an essay for a show she did at Rhodes College in Memphis.

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.

Apr. 3

Sarratt Gallery, Rachel Simmons. I know, this opening has past, but the show is up for a while longer. Simmons’ art casts creatures of the deep sea as strange, fantastic, almost gothic forms.

Apr. 5

Ruby Green, The Axe and The Spade, Jonathan Bouknight, Adam Davis, John Trobaugh. The title of this group show refers to a Native American test which determined the gender role of children—male, female, or a third gender—I don’t know, but I suppose this was one of the inspirations for Ursula LeGuin’s The Left Hand of Darkness. These guys do stuff with gender signifiers, and apparently also redefine the exhibit space, which often makes for the most interesting exhibits at Ruby Green.

TAG, Vadis Turner. This looks like a lot of fun. Vadis Turner makes boxes of candies and confections out of cloth and beauty products, femininity gone amok. Among the highlights of her biography is that she’s a graduate of Harpeth Hall, and apparently still processing that experience.

Arts Company, Aaron Morgan Brown and Rod Daniel Brown (no relation to gallery owner Ann Brown) paints very complicated, sophisticated images, lots of layers, tricky perspective effects that he get from the smallest moves. Rod Daniel had a career as a television and film director, but he was also taking photos on the road—this exhibit B&W photos, a lot of buildings and landscapes in the West.

Rymer, Evoke, Viviane Case-Fox, Susan Maakestad, Linda Prud'homme, and Martin Saint-Laurent I’ve linked to an entire essay on Susan’s work, so I’ll leave it at this. She’s showing at Rymer with three other painters who seem to cover a lot of ground stylistically between them.

Tinney-Cannon, Sherrie Love Bohlinger Love Bohlinger is from Montana and paints a lot of western themes—horses, buffalo, and of course the landscape—in dreamy, vivid colors.

Twist, Rachel Clark A series of small paintings arrayed on a grid, running humorous variations on decay and waste.

Apr. 6

CRAFT: A Creative Community A group of local artists/artisans, bringing Nashville into the world of DIY crafts, holds its first monthly sale/fair of the new year in the parking lot of Lipstick Lounge from 11-5 on Sunday.