Collected Knowledge. Robert Schefman. 2012. Oil on Canvas; 62 in x 84 in (Image courtesy of the artist.)

Robert Schefman’s new work opened at the Robert Kidd Gallery on May 12, 2012 featuring large illusionistic figure paintings that explore a variety of themes. With early beginnings in non-objective sculpture, Schefman continued on a twenty-year journey producing illusionistic painting and drawing. He paced himself with themes that can engage and intrigue viewers, while alienating others.

A series of large charcoal drawings with a figure or two in the foreground, and an oil fire on the horizon, has a surreal feeling. The immense amount of charcoal strokes in compelling compositions impresses one technically but leave the viewer wondering about the editorial statement. Dream like images carry with them content that seems to foreshadow an inevitable event. The bound figure enclosed in a block wall window suggests a kind of self inflicted torture or a Robert Mapplethorpe fetish, and the smaller paintings that reference board game clues feel less serious. Out of this journey come recent paintings that feel more personal by presenting the viewer with a narrative that can go in different directions based on one’s own experience.

Schefman may run the risk of limiting his story to a generation of people his own age but in the painting Collected Knowledge, a more compelling narrative unfolds. Multiple characters and older childhood toys leave the viewer left to wonder what exactly is going on. Without seeing the eyes of the barefoot figures it feels like a mystery. Perhaps he suggests living our society, moving at such a rapid pace of change, we all would like to figure out a way to preserve the nostalgic toy objects from our youth.

About two weeks before the opening I sat down with Bob Schefman and interviewed him about his work.

Robert Schefman in studio. (Courtesy Image)

Ron Scott: Where did your interest in art come from?

Robert Schefman: I have always been interested in art. I first got introduced to art by my brother but I did not have training until I went to college, where I was a pre-med student. Any artwork I did then, I was doing on my own.

I see that you did your undergraduate work at Michigan State University, what drew you to the University Iowa for graduate school?

Iowa was the first to grant an advanced graduate degree in the country and what attracted me was the man who ran the sculpture program was very well known, Julius Schmidt, who also taught at Cranbrook. Julius was in an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in the late 1950’s called “The Sixteen” with Youngerman, Kelly, Warhol, and Rauschenberg, so he was in very good company. They have a great tradition at Iowa. I went to Michigan State for my undergraduate work because they had a complete sculpture facility where I could make work that was sixteen feet long, rather than just working on a tabletop.

I know from your resume, you started out in sculpture. How did you move from these large minimalist sculptures to illusionistic figure painting?

The large non-objective pieces where taking me beyond the minimal pieces to these modular pieces where the form became a language. The forms themselves became a visual language. The language gave way to a concept and I wanted to be more specific, rather than metaphorical. To do that I wanted to expand the vocabulary of the form beyond these sheets of metal from a steelyard and I decided to invest in the figure. Some of the work was successful, and some was not. I did a sculpture for the Ancient Gates of Troy in Turkey, which was a phenomenal experience, so I moved to making figurative pieces, and then realized I wanted to connect more readily. The piece in Turkey was incredible but I wanted something more from it, so I tried it in illusionistic painting. Immediately, my work went in a new direction. I was able to go through that imaginary window to a space that was defined by me.

Are there any artists making illusionistic paintings that you particularly like?

If anything, I had always appreciated Philip Pearlstein. He was the closest thing to the abstraction of the figure, in the way things are placed on the page, or chopped off – the way he uses shape and form – it seems as though the figure and objects are incidental to the shapes and color is incidental but there is not a heavy content in Pearlstein and I was looking for more content.

From your resume and your work, it would appear that you have an interest in theater. Can you talk about that?

At the time I was doing sculpture, these were non-objective sculptures, I was working with dance companies in New York. Working in the dance theater did affect me. Also when I did these sculptures, there were dancers that would choreograph dance pieces around the sculpture’s concept. It became a norm working around the dance performers and lead to the influence of the figure. It was a kind of backdoor that made up a piece of the overall puzzle.

You seem to work on a series of paintings that are designed around themes? Can you talk about that?

I do not set out to do a series. It is more like taking an idea and exploring where you can go with it. It is not like I start out to do a certain number in a series. It is more about trying to see what kind of possibilities you can get from that – right? It is taking an idea and seeing where it goes. There is overlap from one to another. I head off in one direction, and then something opens up a new area. The focus is not on the material or the physical technique. I am not talking so much about painting, rather I am using paint for my purpose. It is manipulated by my own hand and it will do whatever I ask it to do. The paintings do travel and they go where they go. But, yes, I do develop a subject and then go on to another.

Where Do The Robots Go? Robert Schefman. 2012. Oil on Canvas; 30 in x 40 in (Image courtesy of the artist.)

How would you describe your process?

People, photography, fantasy, research – everything in the work has invested personal meaning. It is not randomly put together. In any of these paintings, I am trying to get to something specific. The viewer will bring to the work their own information, which goes without saying, but for me, to assemble these images, there is a long process. The process starts with an initial idea, and it could be a character, or a stack of letters. It is very personal. I started to think about letters from my father, and asked myself will letters exist in the future. In the new painting, Collected Knowledge, these documents are personal history. I have used early photos from the late 1800’s. It makes me think about the format of information and how it has changed. I am seeing dropouts in my digital information and when I look at slides from the 1960’s that still exist, and actually they have more information than my digital information. If it all ends up in some shoebox, are they going to be able to read that? The formats keep changing. So personal history is history and I do not think the future will be the same. That brings up other things that are disappearing, like the mechanical world. It is disappearing from the American manufacturing scene, and so I choose the Robot – which are not Robots at all but rather pressed tin mechanicals from the 1950’s. They are just a mechanical fantasy. My research took me to places where I could find these objects from collectors. There are precious letters, precious photographs, and precious objects that I use in the work. When it comes to the process of developing the figurative images, for that I turn to my sketchbook, and there is no filter. After many drawings, I start to put pieces together. I use models, but the process is assembling in a traditional way, like Manet, who would take the models in the studio and then use the open air on the lawn and combined them. That is my process.

A local art critic, Vince Carducci, described your work as prosaic allegory. Does that work for you?

It is a fair description. Why not? Sometimes they are allegory, as for prosaic, I will leave that to someone else. The images that I choose mean something to me. It is easy to dismiss illusionistic work because it is traditional. I went out of my way to choose illusionistic figure painting to see if there is something that I can reinvest in it. So if you want to say prosaic because it is common, then maybe that is right, sight is what we all have in common. Inventing an allegorical figure representing a modern condition is hardly prosaic. Using the images out of magazines and newspapers for source material defines prosaic. That is now common response and practice. I hope viewers give as much consideration and time to works done in illusion as they do to works coming out of the academic modernist tradition.

In some of your earlier work, you seem to want to address contradiction. There is a nude woman holding a cloth covering a male, or there is a nude male hiding female genitalia? What is that about?

Sure, and if you look into a lot of my earlier work, you will find that kind of black humor. That series that you mention is a series on censorship. Having been censored a number of times and having work covered, or pulled down, it was something I was thinking about. So, I was looking double standards in America and homophobia and how you can do anything you want with a female body and you can not do anything you want with a male body. If you have an image of a penis in the work, you are going to get some push back from a very homophobic America. For me the worse part of this is when you start to second-guess yourself. That is not good.

Kings of Industry. Robert Schefman. 2011. Charcoal Drawing; 40 in x 60 in (Image courtesy of the artist.)

Do you consider yourself a Detroit artist?

I have lived in Detroit, I have lived in New York, and I have lived in Iowa. Am I a Detroit artist? Yeah, I am at the moment. I have been here twenty years. It is relatively meaningless. When I am asked, I say I am a Detroit artist and I am proud of that.

Do you know where the work is going?

Do I have it planned out? No more than what is in my sketchbook but in these paintings there is a new direction, in part because I have taken a leave from college teaching and have been able to work full time in the studio.

The Robert Schefman exhibition runs May 12 – June 23, 2012.

Robert Kidd Gallery is located at 
107 Townsend Street, Birmingham, MI 48009.

Music Box. Dave Cole. 2012.

During a visit to see Dave Cole’s The Music Box at the Reinberger Galleries at the Cleveland Institute of Art, I found the closest bench just a few feet from the door, unloaded my bag and organized my materials. As one of the few people who reads every single piece of text in an exhibition before taking a closer look, I stayed at that bench reading through all of Gallery Director, Bruce Checefsky’s introduction to the exhibition. While glancing up at the massive 13-ton machine, a Caterpillar Vibratory Asphalt Compactor, I read the details of how Cole and his assistants gutted the CAT and replaced the front compactor with a cylinder spool to make music.

When my friend, who like many people prefers to look first then read, moved closer to inspect Cole’s work, she triggered the motion-activated spool, which spilled out sound. This unexpected outburst of disturbing and disquieting music floored me.

Intrigued, I positioned myself in the potential path of the CAT with its compactor—I mean, its music-maker—rotating towards me emitting sound and seemingly closing in on me. The music, an ominous version of The Star Spangled Banner, felt just as heavy as the 13-ton machine. The CAT remained on its base as the rotating spool moved freely but the combination of the industrial and auditory weight made the CAT both threatening and disarming.

My thoughts immediately resonated with the awesome power of the CAT and that of the United States, embodied by The Star Spangled Banner, our country’s song of allegiance, pride, and bravery. Considering how any power has the potential to be dangerous or menacing, I connected the potential danger of the CAT with the potential danger of the policies of the U.S. at home and abroad. I would not call myself a very political person but David Cole certainly is.

His body of work consistently blurs the line of the industrial and domestic as well as the political and benign. Cole constructed an American flag entirely from bullets and bullet fragments in 2008 (Bullet Flag). In the same year, he fastened two loaded 12-gauge shotguns onto a wall as sewing needles to create a blanket, Knitting with Loaded Shotguns (Safeties Off).

The commissioned Music Box does not digest easily. Avoiding an easy message or even an easy to listen to sound, Dave Cole poses the challenge of critical discourse to the viewer.

The show, Scale + Form, also features a retrospective of sculptures by Barbara Stanczak, a prolific artist who taught at CIA for over 30 years. The show runs through May 19th in the Reinberger Galleries.

Music Box. Dave Cole. 2012.

The Reinberger Gallery currently plays host to something quite different. The giant working Music Box by Dave Cole seems unlike anything else ever to have graced the gallery. Dave Cole, a contemporary artist known for pieces examining American culture, hits home with a modified CAT roller-compactor pinging off the Star Spangled Banner. Two identifiably American elements come together in a big way, in the sense of the size of the piece and the uncontrollable volume of the music. The sculpture expresses an underlying ideal of American culture with patriotic and rustic rudiments.

On opening night approaching the entrance to Reinberger one could hear something out of the ordinary but that certainly did not prepare the viewer for what lay ahead. The roller-compactor, a story tall motion sensitive piece, takes up a good portion of space and the loud noise it makes shakes the rafters. The experience of seeing this machine in the middle of a white walled gallery, accompanied by the music and the effect it has on the space, leaves one awestruck. The roller, a large-scale version of a music box that many could recognize from childhood, has large steel pins protruding from the cylinder. The usual single steel comb with tuned teeth transforms into a set of individual metal teeth plucked by the massive steel pins. The whole piece, lifted off the ground in order to not simply roll away, plugs into a socket on the floor.

I got a chance to speak with Cole about his piece, and the man commands as much interest as his work.

Robin Miller: What were some of your inspirations to make the giant machines that are your work, especially the Music Box?

Dave Cole: I have loved these machines since I was a little kid. Really, there is not any sarcasm in my choice of materials; I really do just love these big trucks. Plus they are so ubiquitous, so accessible, that it gives the viewer a starting point to begin engaging with the work. I see so much art that appears to try to validate itself by being either offensive or intentionally obtuse. I guess I just got tired of art that makes folks feel bad about themselves for not knowing enough about art.

Can you talk about the strong message of America and the homespun your pieces give off? Are they a comment on certain values of the country?

As for the theme of America, and, more specifically, American-ness, I think that is mostly just me making things that express how I see the world. Me trying to negotiate the contradictions inherent in figuring out what it means to be whom and what I am. I mean, the four branches of my family came here over three centuries from four countries, all to escape religious persecution. My grandfather was a traveling salesman with a seventh grade education, yet I get to make art for a living. It would be absurd for me not to be grateful every day to have been born where and when I was. At the same time, I am an educated person, and aware that there are things done in my name as an American that I find inexcusable. By holding both of those truths at the same time, and for me, making things that express some small part of that experience, somewhere in that ferment of contrasting truth, is the thing that I hope my work communicates.

What does the use of the big machines (the steamroller in this piece) bring to your work that you could not if you were using anything else?

The scale and power, the sheer wonderment inherent in what those machines are, it is just magnificent. It is precisely that sense of awe in the face of power that is so meaningful to me.

Music Box. Dave Cole. 2012. (Installation Shot)

What was the process like in getting the steamroller donated to you?

The credit for that really goes to Bruce Checefsky at CIA. He was able to begin a relationship with Ken Taylor at Ohio CAT. Ken proved receptive to the idea, and so I came out to discuss the project further. Ken really jumped right in, he was excited about the piece, and before I knew it a full size roller-compactor was being delivered to my studio.

[In his studio, Cole disassembled and reassembled the roller-compactor, getting ready to be able to reassemble it in the Reinberger Gallery with help from his assistants.]

Is Cleveland the most ideal place for the Music Box to be debuted?

Absolutely. I could not imagine a more perfect city for the piece. All of the ferment alive in the work is represented here, from a legacy of heavy manufacturing, to trying to come to terms with a post-industrial identity, to the aesthetics of the place, to it being the birthplace of rock and roll. Perfect.

Is there anything new that you are working on? Any more homespun things done or expressed using American machinery?

Well… I did recently figure out how to tune jackhammers to play specific notes, and I am kind of wondering what a player piano made from three dozen tuned jack-hammers might sound like. There is also the plan to teach a backhoe to do a hand-stand on one of its out-riggers. Do not forget the long-term plan to build a mobile using eight fully functional vintage pickup trucks.

The show, Scale + Form, also features a retrospective of sculptures by Barbara Stanczak, a prolific artist who taught at CIA for over 30 years. The show runs through May 19th in the Reinberger Galleries.

Above and Beneath. Jennifer Omaitz. 2012. Acrylic on Canvas over Panel, 48 x 40 in.

A recent exhibition by Jennifer Omaitz, Above Ground, Beneath the Surface, at 1point618 Gallery in Cleveland, demonstrates a unique understanding of space and depth.

Omaitz holds an MFA from Kent State University and a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art. Her work contains layers, not only in the literal sense but also in the many ideas behind it. She works with ideas from the histories of abstraction, architecture, landscapes, natural disasters and tactical responses to painting.

The accumulation of layers creates a strong architectural sense of depth. Previous sculptural work captured these ideas of depth and color relation. In this return to painting, she flawlessly combines these ideas in a two-dimensional form. She also expresses abstract ways of paint mixing in layers that, in some pieces, express differing senses of depth and space.

Pandora’s Box. Jennifer Omaitz. 2012. Acrylic on Canvas over Panel, 48 x 40 in.

In the works Above and Beneath and Pandora’s Box, she uses perspective to express space, creating a spatial relationship through the utilization of contrasting sharp and flowing edges indicating inside and outside.

In Geode and Walking on the Moon, she expresses a sense of a figure ground relationship. ‘Geode’ displays a dimensionality to the figure with fracturing edges made by painterly techniques, while ‘Walking on the Moon’ possesses a stronger indication of the ground with the figure being more of an object floating in space.

Her show indicates ongoing exploration of her inspirations, fueled by a strong sense of depth and understanding of painting. Absent pre-planning, she simply begins and reacts to the paint when necessary.

Walking on the Moon. Jennifer Omaitz. 2012. Acrylic on Canvas over Panel, 48 x 40 in.

We Love Letterpress. Ben Bruns (left) Kristin Jastram (right)

What happens when a German IT professional hears a podcast about the ancient technology of moveable type? In the case of Kristin Jastram a new obsession began that prompted her boyfriend, Benjamin Bruns, to purchase a letter press lesson from Zygote Press in Cleveland, Ohio for her Christmas present in 2010. On a normal day the story would stop here but Kristin’s passion grew into a new website devoted to letterpress called, weloveletterpress.com. It serves as a central location for all things letterpress showcasing letterpress work from around the world. More than 120 studios have presented their work on the site. Kristen and Ben did not stop with a website. In cooperation with Kickstarter and Zygote Press the exhibition We Love Letterpress – Your Exhibition opened on April 20, 2012. The exhibit features prints from studios in the United States, United Kingdom Australia, Switzerland, Germany, and Canada.

Before Kristen and Ben return to their home in Hamburg, Germany later this May, I sat down with them to talk about this remarkable journey.

The exhibition runs through May 19, 2012.

Zygote Press
1401 East 30th Street
Cleveland, OH 44114

Jimmy Kuehnle: Why did you come to Cleveland? Was it art related?

Kristen Jastram: Not at all art related but rather work related. We both used to work and I still work at an IT firm. We are here for an 18 month rotation. To be honest, this whole thing would not exist if we were still in Germany because letterpress is so much bigger here in the States in comparison to Europe. There is a kind of revival going on here in the States. It is something that we explored here that does not exist in the same way in Germany.

Ben Bruns: We were lucky to find Zygote here in Cleveland.

K: Because something like that [Zygote] does not exist in Hamburg, where we are from.

Did you have a previous interest in the arts?

K: Yes, and what brought us to letterpress was a design podcast published by Gestalten, a German publisher of creative books. They offer an English language podcast every other week.

B: You can find them on iTunes.

K: They interview creative people from every field you can imagine. People from car design, architects, painters – really every kind of topic. One day in October 2010 they had a podcast about Studio on Fire, a big letterpress studio with great work. The circle closes since they sent us work for this exhibition. When I saw this podcast it was really the “ah ha” moment. I never heard about letterpress before in my life but I saw that and I was totally fixed that second. I told Ben that I needed to do some letterpress printing.

What is it about letterpress that attracted you? You saw the podcast but not everyone starts a website after hearing a podcast.

K: That is a very good question. I think one really good thing is that letterpress is so old and traditional but you can do so many cool new things with it. So it is really a combination of bringing this old traditional craft into the new modern design world. Mixing these two things. If you feel the paper and really feel the embossing of the print, that is what makes it different. You feel that this is actually crafted and not a digital print for example. It is the imperfection of them as well. Every print will be different a little bit different. You will not achieve the same result every single time. Every print you do will look a little different – that makes it special.

Hip Hop Godesses. Derek Turk.

Is it the process or the experience that is important?

K: I think it is both. I think you really see the time people spend creating these things and I think that makes the difference. It is not only about the printing.

You got her a present to take a class at Zygote? When was that and how did it work out?

B: December 2010.

K: You can imagine. I saw this podcast and from that day on I talked about letterpress all day and night.

B: It was an easy present for me. I thought, “We need to find a place where you can take lessons.” And I was blessed with Zygote.

Did you take a class?

B: No, I did my first print last Saturday, together with her. We went to one of the studios that participated in this exhibition. They are in Salem.

K: They are almost two hours from here and you can see their print around the corner of Chandler and Price. The studio is called Cranky Pressman (www.crankypressman.com) and they were kind enough to make our new letterpress business cards, so we visited them.

B: Chandler and Price was actually located here in Cleveland and they were a manufacture of letterpress printing machines.

Chandler and Price

It seems that the internet facilitated a lot of this exhibition. How do these old and new technologies relate?

B: I think there is a kind of shift from the old letterpress printing studios who were only printers. They got the designs and they only did the printing. Now it is getting more like a fusion of printing studios and designers. They actually do the design and they do the printing. They like both aspects of this work and they do not see themselves as only services for designers to print stuff. They design on their own and work directly with clients.

K: We really see our mission in bringing letterpess to people that do not have a letterpress studio right around the corner. Having this shift in mindset that instead of just going to the nearest shop no matter how good or bad or what topic the shop specializes in but rather using the internet as a source to see what letterpress studios around the globe really offer. Then you can pick the studio that you like, that reflects your personal style, has the right feeling. These days you can ship prints anywhere.

B: If you order something in the UK it is not big deal to send it wherever. We have on our website, studios from 12 countries, mainly the US but also Germany, Switzerland, UK, Netherlands, Belgium, India, China, Australia, Brazil.

Besides just loving it so much, why did you start a website? And how did the exhibition start?

K: Actually, when I started printing here at two workshops at Zygote. I did what people do these days, I just googled all kinds of questions that I had. I saw a lot of resources but nothing really structured and there is not the one place that you go to if you have any letterpress related questions. There are many communities, many websites technically orientated but not the one site where you can see all the nice designs and really have an overview. We saw that missing piece and thought, “Wouldn’t it be great to create something that would be useful for someone like me looking for that information.” That’s how it started. If you really see a need there might be other people that have the same need.

B: Actually the idea of this kind of exhibition started with plans for a Kickstarter project a few years ago. We planned to do something back in Hamburg but it didn’t go so well and we did not raise the money necessary to pull it off.

K: We also did not have a subject, that was the main problem.

B: We had no subject. We said, “Send us what ever you want to.” We had no place. We only told artists, “We will show your art, somewhere, at some point in time.” It was not really specific that was the main problem. Now we have the kind art we want to exhibit, letterpress, we have a place, Zygote, and we have a a time, now. It is much more specific.

K: We really saw the opportunity with the letterpress community, that is very precise, it has some boundaries. It is not like any kind of art. There are a specific number of studios to really try the concept one more time.

What do you think about the project so far?

B: We are very excited to see how well the whole project is running. It was tough to get the whole project sponsored by Kickstarter because it is not like putting something up at Kickstarter and then suddenly you get hundreds of people who want to give money to your idea. We had to do lots of legwork in terms of approaching all kinds of social media, approaching all kinds of printers and studios but in the end we collected $1900 and our goal was $1000.

K: The people were really excited about the project. That was great.

B: The funny thing is, even after the Kickstarter project ended, over the last few months studios approached us asking if they could still participate even though the Kickstarter project had ended. So we asked them to participate.

Don't Look Back. Henry + Co

Is Zygote the only time the physical prints will be together?

K: On exhibit is only one print of each piece and we will not only sell them here but also at the same time will launch in a virtual format so people will be able to buy all these prints online as well to, again to give it a more international feeling. Some of these prints are editions. We have number 3 out of 50 but many are individual as well.

Will the weloveletterpress.com site be a life long obsession?

K: I fear so.

B: Our next project that has already started is a catalog for wedding related products. Right now we are working together with nine print studios who are interested in participating in this catalog. We are waiting for their submissions but we will layout and publish as a pdf online.

K: The goal for that is to show people the possibilities for letterpress, modern, small, unique boutique letterpress studios that setting up very beautiful wedding invitations for brides to be, like me.

Are you guys getting married? When is the date?

Ben and Kristen: Next year.

Congratulations. Where are you headed next?

K: Exhibitions like this, we really see going on with something similar in the UK next year or maybe in Australia. We are leaving at the end of may. And we are going back to Hamburg, Germany.

B: I would like to something like this again and now we have contacts all over the world. It is not impossible now to find a place like Zygote and show them this is what we did in Cleveland. “What do you think? Would you like to support us or be the next place we host this kind of exhibition?” It’s not something that you do every few months but perhaps yearly.

Link to the podcast that started it all – http://www.gestalten.com/motion/studio-fire (Be careful. Viewing this podcast may cause you to create a website and host an international art exhibition.)

The Young Person's Urban Occupational Primer: Detroit. Stephen Schudlich. 2011. (Paint Creek Center for the Arts)

One almost always thinks of humorous art in a detrimental sense. Humorous art, usually striving for seriousness, often appears laughable in the manner of an elderly drunk dropping his pants in public. Art and absurdity have a fraught relationship for artists who spend so much of our careers trying terribly hard to be taken seriously. We tend to funnel what gravitas we can muster (not much, in the U.S. at least) into our work, just to have something to grab onto that does not double as somebody’s idea of a joke. Historically, humor has not been a popular hook for fine artists, although Dada, Pop Art and Postmodernism take up the cause. The Dada movement, maybe the best example, used humor as a tool of dissent. Fortunately, a few among us understand what a great exploration of culture and subject humor can foster.

Last month Ryan Standfest, a Detroit-based artist whose work mines the profound root of failure, curated an exhibition at the Paint Creek Center for the Arts in Rochester, Michigan, Eye Teeth: A Satire on the American Way of Life. As a medium for political commentary, humor perfectly tips such work away from being propaganda, sapping it of its ideology while holding up a deceptively light-hearted critique. Eye Teeth offered coloring books for urban children (featuring murder and house fire scenes) and Motor City Panhandler All Stars trading cards by Stephen Schudlich. Each engaged the theme of urban blight (Detroit sees a lot of art about that) in a way no less disturbing for being hilarious. The show revealed how powerful poking fun at heinous political and social institutions including war, instant celebrity, and alcoholism can be when elevated to the craft and subtlety of really good art. The show stood as an accurate manifestation of a passage in Standfest’s artist statement describing his own work, “They present a model of flawed, decentralized consciousness – an incongruous and absurd universe resulting from misperception.”

Olympia. Michelle Morris. 2012.

Misperception can uncover many truths, especially in the world of socially lauded standards of beauty and physical perfection. Along with Standfest, Michelle Morris, another Detroit-based artist utilizes humor in the world of absurd societal norms. With a fascination for media and its various overlapping discourses, Morris constructs collages of dismembered clippings from weight-lifting magazines, hyper-articulated biceps, abs and other oily, tanned male body parts at their bulkiest. Reassembled seemingly at random in the finished work, the body parts become twisted, many-limbed, mutant life forms that manage to be both seductive and grotesque. Morris aims to create beautiful work that dissects beauty, and the kernel of her interest in physical beauty lies in shame. The extremes people willingly endure in the pursuit of their idea of perfection find root, in Morris’ work, from shame of the natural body. The bloated, energetic collage forms represent obsession with arbitrary and questionable ideals as well as the absurd vanity involved. Striking a fine balance in her work, Morris consciously presents a virile but deeply skewed confidence as she simultaneously takes pride in its beauty while critiquing it. The seriousness with which the work presents itself increases its sly sense of humor.

Bea Nettles. Akron Art Museum. April 12, 2012.

Ah Bea Nettles… When I first arrived to the Akron Art Museum, I went up to the gallery to view her work and was immediately drawn to her Life’s Lessons, A Mother’s Journal; I always have a pull to art that has some sentimental backing and I thought that was what I would like most about Bea and her endeavors.

Throughout her lecture (given Thursday night, April 12th) while I intended on note taking, I constantly found myself fixated on listening to her. She has a very calming tone to her voice like most mothers do. Her work is very personal. The desire and possibility for Bea Nettles to share it with the world, was equally an honor as it was for the audience on Thursday night to hear from Bea herself.

She introduced her work chronologically, beginning with her youthful twenties. In her early work we catch glimpses of Bea as a young women with long brown hair, parted down the middle; I promise you, throughout the lecture, that was the image we all saw of her for the extent of the evening. “I still feel twenty-three,” Bea says “… and then I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror.” The soul of Bea Nettles and the inspiration for her work is timeless.

Speaking of time, Bea’s art (whether she meant to or not) is almost a direct reflection of where she was at in her life. Mountain Dream Tarot Cards were done in the 1970’s and were actually the first-ever photographic tarot cards made in history. Escape was her first major sequential work. As a young artist she moved to the city and often felt lonely and trapped in her new lifestyle. The series expresses her feelings as well as how she coped.

Life’s Lessons, A Mother’s Journal began just as soon as Bea was able to figure out what it was that she wanted to share and express as a young mother. Complexities was next. This collaboration of photography and text (which Bea usually incorporates into her work) is about what it is like for a woman juggling professionalism as an artist and teacher, as well as being a mother and wife. She also produced a second deck of cards that dealt with womanhood. While Mother Nature slowly crept upon her young daughter, Bea created a twenty-eight-card deck as a humorous way to deal with the life long cycle.

Other works include Flamingo in the Dark, Knights of Assisi, The Skirted Garden, String of Hearts, Turning 50, and many more. Bea Nettles used and array of peculiar photographic techniques through out her work: multiple negatives, multiple exposures, dye transfer, light sensitive paint, 16 x 20 pinhole camera, photo etchings, photo sewing, Polaroid camera, Instamatic camera.

To the viewers who are unfamiliar with such techniques, Bea’s work may seem a little out there. But the moment you sit down and read through the work in its proper context, you realize she is just like any other woman dealing with the world’s trials… and has this beautiful and unique way of showing it.

Being able to hear from Bea herself is what really made all her work come together for me. The only unsettling feeling I have towards the museum’s exhibition is that when you only see pieces and parts from a collection, it takes away from the work as a whole.

What a pleasure it was to have Bea back in Akron!

TOPHOGRAPHY

TOPHOGRAPHY, Heights Arts’ latest show’s title playfully nods to its medium and subject matter: photography and topography, or the natural world in a general sense. The exhibition highlights five Northeast Ohio artists whose relationship with the camera and their subjects gives us varying degrees of immersion into each artist’s tophography. While some photographers transport us into the natural world, others give us a glimpse of their experience.

Philip Brutz offers one of the most immersive experiences while looking through his stereoscope, made from two Hasselblad cameras with aligned focuses and shutters. Looking through the stereoscope at lush forest images transports us into Brutz’s experience, from the fullness of the growing season to the quiet stillness of winter. The enormous sense of depth in each image, care of the stereoscope, seemingly engulfs the viewer in this fecund space.

G.M. Donley’s 360-degree photographs remind rather than transport. They serve as visual maps of a hike, a walk, or a ride. Overlapping frames from 8 exposures of 120 film create a panoramic effect. The descriptive quality of each roll manifests through specific titles and textual signposts. One series of overlapping photographs features “Mt. Lincoln” and “lunch” inserted as both labels and moments in time. They function, in a way, as keepsakes for Donley of a remarkable hike on Mt. Washington or a more ubiquitous experience: a commute, which exhibits the urban landscape of stop signs and electric lines.

Matthew Fehrmann sits us on the back of his motorcycle as he transverses a large swath of the continent, north to Alaska and south to Mexico with memorable stops in the American West. Images of the road feature prominently and represent the excitement of the unknowing and the will to explore. Fehrmann makes us want to leap out of our daily lives and go on an adventure in the vast and magnificent American landscape.

A human element is important in the work of Nancy McEntee, who features her daughter in the Ireland countryside in a series of both color and black and white photographs. Her daughter’s presence in each photograph evokes a mystical quality when coupled with the seemingly solitary landscape. She exists as if conjured by the land itself. The effect is not only magical, but playful as we watch our muse take a nap in one photograph only to wake up and shield her face, as if playing a game, in the next.

Michael Weil leads us on an aerial journey from seat 9A, providing us with striking views of the American landscape, right down to the yellow stripes on the tarmac. From rocky topography to the clean, green squares of planted fields, Weil reminds any (in)frequent flyer that the view from 30,000 miles truly is awe-inspiring. The views from just feet above land have a crispness to them that evokes the lines and forms from miles above, and Weil makes even a tarmac exciting.

With five photographers each with unique perspectives into the natural world and approaches to the medium, TOPHOGRAPHY rewarded those who caught it.

Akron Artwalk. April 2012

Personally participating in, hosting one of the locations on the Akron Artwalk for the first time, as well as seeing Akron citizens still curious and interested in the art happening in their town felt refreshing. From senior citizens, to young mothers introducing their children to art, the turn out for April 2012’s Artwalk was not too shabby.

The free trolley appeared in front of each stop every fifteen minutes and conveniently continued into the ten o’clock hour. Approximately fourteen locations were included in this month’s Artwalk including the Icehouse Complex, Summit Artspace, and Rubber City Clothing.

The Akron Artwalk is made possible by Akron’s artists, the citizens, the Downtown Akron Partnership, Summa Health System, and 89.7 WKSU.

Cindy Sherman. Untitled # 96. 1981

Christie’s is proud to offer an acclaimed masterpiece by Cindy Sherman consigned by the Akron Art Museum, Ohio. All proceeds from the sale will be directed to the museum’s acquisition fund to allow for future strategic purchases that will augment the core of the Akron Art Museum’s strong Contemporary collection.

Akron Art Museum has a longstanding commitment to Sherman’s work, having organized her first major exhibition in 1984. Cindy Sherman’s Untitled #96 is recognized as an icon within her career to date. Another example of this image was sold at Christie’s in May 2011 for $3,890,500, which represents not only a world auction record for Sherman, but also a world record price for any photograph at the time.* The work from the Akron Art Museum is a vintage print in excellent condition and will have a pre-sale estimate of $2,800,000 – $3,800,000.

Viewing of the work will take place at the New York’s Museum of Modern Art, May 4th- May 8th and will be auctioned May 8th at 7:00 p.m.