More art from 080808

More great art from the show (in no particular order). From the top: Darlene Fuhst's "Infuriate" (the handle of each knife contains thoughtless or mean quotes that Darlene has been told or overheard about herself) and "Exterminate" (inspired by the roach Darlene found in her cereal one morning), Alexia Timberlake's "Bifurcate" and "Palpate" (two of 16 pieces hung together, each being plexiglass, wax, and several other constituents) , Deb Pagano's "Concentrate" (multimedia piece commentating on the overuse of prescription drugs in children)and "Salivate" (a multimedia piece commentating on the child pageantry circuit), AnnDouglas Pinckney-McCloud's "Commemorate" (a photo of a model of the General Lee), JJ Ohlinger's "Impersonate"(his vision of how George fixes himself up with Laura's eyeshadow and sings "Happy Birthday Mr. President" to himself after a long hard day of governing) , Michael Brodeur's 4 pieces "Urinate," "Salivate," "Menstruate," and "Ejaculate" (created from the bodily fluids they correspond with as well as other pigments), and Robert Urban's "Capitulate" (a commentary on the endangered status of the 4th Amendment).

Stay tuned!

I'll post more photos tomorrow--there was so much great art it's taking too long to post it all at once!

Pixelate and Devastate

These are my two pieces. On the left is "Pixelate", a loom-woven, black, white and grey bead portrait of my mother, which spans 5'5" tall, just as she did. Just behind the beadwork hangs a small pendant containing a photo of myself and my brother as small children. On the right is "Devastate", a solid blood-red, loom-woven bead piece who's thread stretches out in various haphazard directions and speaks to my overwhelming anger over her death from ovarian cancer. Behind the beadwork is a small copy of her death certificate.

Extirpate and Migrate

These are two of Eileen Powell's pieces. "Migrate" is composed of cement, metal, sand and plate glass "birds", both in flight and dead...a grim, yet exquisitely elegant statement about the millions of migratory birds who fly into high rise buildings each year. The clay pieces in the foreground are taken from molds of Hemlock trees which are dying at an alarming rate in Appalachia, and are expected to be gone in just 5 years. On the inside of each piece can be seen the impressions of the bark, and on the pedestal below is a partial map of the Appalachian trail, which puts the magnitude of this loss into sharp perspective.

Impersonate

That's me with Betsy Teter, one of the founders of the Hub City Writers Project as well as the hub-bub scene in Spartanburg (I don't really know Betsy, but I know her work--it was so great to see so many faces from Spartanburg at the show!). Behind her right sholder you can see JJ's "Impersonate", which is a Worholian portrait of George as Marilyn--classic!

Observing the work

Here are some folks looking at Judy Verhoeven's amazing collage "Pixilate" and JJ Ohlinger's cool suicide print (which I can't remember the title of at the moment--sorry, JJ!!). Just past JJ's print is Alexia Timberlake's gorgeous 16-piece mixed media installation, each individually titled.

Scenes from the 080808 opening

Above are some of the artists and other foks in attendence (including Deb Massa, one of the CAFfeine artistis in the show, and Kathy Justice, not in the show, but a spectacular artist herself). At the top of the photo you can also see most of Deb's installation of "bronzed" undergarments titled "Heavyweight, "Welterweight", "Lightweight" and "Upstate". Also visable are Molly Marin's sculpture "Bifurcate" (which, unfortunately here just seems like a couple of white squiggles hanging in space, which doesn't do it justice at all.) And, you can kind of make out my pieces on the back wall.

ate_eight_08 Show

The ate_eight_08 CAFfeine show was very well-attended and a lot of fun. This is the strongest show I have ever been included in--the caliber of the work was truly amazing, and there were a lot of new and interesting ideas in each room of the "gallery" space.

Each of the 14 artists created work centered around words that end in or rhyme with the word "ate", such as wait, pollinate, animate, migrate, immigrate, etc...

And many of my Spartanburg friends came by and my brother and his girlfriend came up all the way from Charleston! We had a great time at India Palace afterwards--they were generous enough to stay open late for us. (If anyone from India Palace happens to see this--many, many thanks for letting us come in after the doors were locked!!!)

I'll post some photos from the opening next.