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Natural In Conclusion: Works by Jason Lanka and Joe Meiser

 

Natural In Conclusion:
Works by Jason Lanka and Joe Meiser

Closing Reception:
Friday, July 3rd 7-11 pm

The boundaries between human and nature swell and retreat like an oceans tide. Technology and urbanization move us further away from nature, but yet we still yearn for it and try to fabricate it through these mediums. Is it natural for humans to recreate nature? Jason Lanka and Joe Meiser use their sculptures to exemplify the human condition and its dialogue with nature in the current cultural climate.

 

Artists Statements:

Jason Lanka:     

www.jasonlanka.com
Boundary; something that marks or fixes a limit (as of territory). The line that divides one area of land from another.  The space at which our culture comes in contact with the environment inspires my creative work. Much can be understood about the nature of how our society defines its role and place within the natural world by the observation of this boundary.

I seek to address the demarcation of our species’ relationship with the land. Am I of the land or in the land? Each piece made within a lineage of exploration has set out to answer this question. Our identity as people and a nation are so often defined by our place within our environment and how we view our relationship with the natural world.

Joe Meiser:    

www.joemeiser.com
Our human perceptions and faculties are limited, allowing us only a partial understanding of the world around us. Many of our questions about the true nature of things cannot be answered conclusively; and yet, humans have a fantastic tradition of explaining the unknown. These explanations can offer us comfort, and can make it possible to be at ease with a world which might otherwise overwhelm us. The human tendency to mythologize is both the subject and strategy of my work—while analyzing our compulsion to create metaphysical narratives, I simultaneously weave my own. Our physical bodies are limited and impermanent, and in humanity I observe a universal desire to transcend these limitations, whether it is through the cultivation of metaphysical beliefs, or the modification and augmentation of the physical body. The body feels quite permanent to its owner, but it is actually a temporary material object. Each owner of a body is well acquainted with, and necessarily bound up in the physical.

Friday, June 5, 2009

 

Art-in-a-box

UH's shoe-box exhibit proves that a giant world of creativity can fit in small packages

By Joleen Oshiro

POSTED: 01:30 a.m. HST, Mar 16, 2009

The scale of the University of Hawaii-Manoa's signature "10th International Shoebox Sculpture Exhibition" is at once deceptive and daunting. The sculptures are miniature -- shoe-box size -- physically, yet they embody boundless creative ideas and elicit the gamut of responses.

It's easy to get lost in the individual pieces, but a look up into the gallery will reveal the vast size of the exhibit itself: 141 works by artists from 31 states and 16 countries. Artists hail from Australia, Canada, Chile, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Japan, Korea, Norway, the People's Republic of China, Taiwan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and coast to coast of the United States.

"This represents the only continual exhibit that goes offshore," says Lisa Yoshihara, director of the University of Hawaii Art Gallery, where the triennial show originated in 1982.

UH professors Mamoru Sato and Fred Roster came up with the shoe box concept after pondering how to expose Hawaii to international sculpture. Because of the often large-scale nature of sculpture, bringing in works from across the ocean is problematic. "Shoebox" eliminated those challenges, and with the assistance of professor emeritus Tom Klobe, former UH Art Gallery director, the exhibit grew in stature internationally.

The exhibit will travel to Hilo, across the U.S., Korea and other locations.

The process of putting together this 10th exhibit spanned more than a year and entailed the efforts not only of Yoshihara's staff, but those of students as well. "The great part of anything that happens here is that it involves students," Yoshihara says.

UH's gallery allows students to supplement their education of making art with learning firsthand what it takes to put together a show -- everything from administrative duties to designing show catalogs and gallery design.

The show itself is half juried and half invitational. Sato, Roster, glass professor Rick Mills and ceramics professor Suzanne Wolfe served as jurors. Yoshihara relied on her colleagues' recommendations for some leads for unknown talent, and she herself searched constantly, even while on vacation.

"I went to Europe over the summer, and I visited galleries and followed up with those artists with strong work," she says.

In the end, out of 140 artists invited to participate, 78 replied, and their work represents every imaginable medium. Top international sculptors, including Ohio's Dorothy Gill Barnes, France's Bernard Calet, New York's Wenda Gu, Japan's Masafumi Maita and acclaimed Hawaii artists Satoru Abe, Esther Shimazu, Lori Uyehara and John Koga, comprise the lineup.

"For me it's rewarding to see the diversity," Yoshihara says.

Roster readily agrees.

"It's a labor-intesive exhibit but it's amazing once again," he says. "It's an insightful glimpse into what artists are thinking in different parts of the world.

"And it IS the work. We're not seeing it online. It's tangible. It's right from the artists' hands into our lives."

This review was found on The Star Bulletin in the May 5th, 2009 edition. Use the link below to view the online edition.

http://www.starbulletin.com/features/20090316_art_in_a_box_pt1.html

 

 

Sleight of Hand: Gallery5’s National Juried Craft Competition

 

Sleight of Hand:

Gallery5’s National Juried Contemporary

Craft Competition

Sponsored by: Plaza

 

Opening Reception/Awards Ceremony on First Friday Art Walk:

December, 5th 2008

 

Second Reception on First Friday Art Walk:

January, 2nd 2009

 

Exhibition Ends:

January, 15th 2009

Exhibition Jurors:

Kathy Emerson

Steven Glass

Natalya Pinchuk

 

Featuring Works by:

Mathew Isaacson

Gabriel Craig

Ryan Gothrup

Aaron McIntosh

Tom Alward

Andrew Montgomery

Mari Fray

Jessie Daniels

Elizabeth Perkins

Kathleen Kennedy

Katie Hudnall

Erik Wilhelmsen

Danielle Stevens

Jason Lanka

Elizabeth Kendall

Amy Weiks

 

 

Gallery5, dedicated to presenting thought-provoking and groundbreaking contemporary art, is holding its first national juried craft exhibition in an effort to bring  to Richmond world class craft-makers who aren't afraid to experiment in non-traditional media and re-invent the word "craft." The Worlds of craft and fine art are planetary neighbors, each with their own distinctive characteristics. The element of functionality has been recognized as the largest differentiation between the two. Craft objects can fulfill an active role that fine art objects often cannot. However, a bridge between these two worlds is forming, and the distinctions between the two are beginning to diminish. "Sleight of Hand" strives to highlight the ingenuity and experimentation occurring in contemporary craft that has begun to bridge this definition gap.

 

Craft-making is so easily pigeon-holed into traditional definitions. Ceramic bowls, glass vases, wooden figurines so often come to mind and are associated with the word "craft." The reality is that craft-makers are no different from fine artists in the respect that there will always be those pushing the envelopes, expanding on past trends, developing new trends, and utilizing and experimenting with new materials. Gallery5 views "Sleight of Hand"  as the perfect opportunity to open a large demographic to expand and reinterpret the definition of craft.

 

Exhibitors will be selected by a panel of three jurors. Included in the panel are Kathy Emerson, Steven Glass, and Natalya Pinchuk. The goals in the selection process  include:

 

1.    How does the craft-maker differ from other craft-makers?  What makes them unique?

 

2.    Is the craft-maker using non-traditional materials and/or techniques? If so, is it successful to its purpose

 

3.    If the craft-maker is using traditional materials or techniques, how has the craft-    maker expanded, altered, or progressed these traditional materials and techniques

 

About our Jurors:

 

Kathy Emerson is the Director of Quirk Galley. Quirk Gallery has a similar focus in which much of the work exhibit blends the disciplines of craft and art. Quirk features exhibitions of innovative work by both established and emerging American and international artists. Artists are chosen for uninhibited use of materials and forms, for juxtaposition of tradition and experimentation, and for refinement of vision and skill. One particular exhibit that represents this was a group of artists were asked to make art pieces out of small scale Atriums. Building a miniature atrium is a craft within itself however the artist were asked to go beyond that creating a whole sculptural installation as a fine art component.

 

 

Steven Glass is a successful internationally acclaimed craft-maker/artist living in Richmond. He holds a residency at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art and teaches at the Studio School. His work searches for the link between making and meaning blending the traditions of of both east and west. Since the beginning of his career as an artist his focus has been to transcend beyond the boundaries of tradition stating "Tradition comforts, it does not challenge...If we continue to tilt in the direction of intellectual rhetoric and marketing savvy, it will not be long before we see self-indulgent, vainglorious works supplanting those of superior skill and content."

 

 

Natalya Pinchuk is a Faculty member of Virginia Commonwealth University's Crafts Department. There she teaches the next generation of crafters, pushing them to become more the just craft makers but rather fine artists  by assisting students in developing concepts, personal direction, and the necessary skills and technical competencies to enable them to pursue a professional career. As an artist she creates jewelry utilizing a plethora of non-traditional materials. Her jewelry aims to create miniature artificial terrains, which rest within the landscape of one's body.

 

 

Friday, December 5, 2008

 

Review of Peninsula Fine Arts Center's juried biennial exhibition

Posted to: The Arts

NEWPORT NEWS

THE PENINSULA Fine Arts Center's juried biennial exhibition is always a much-anticipated forum for recent art. The net is cast wide for this show, so it is expected to bring news of developments in the fine arts beyond Hampton Roads.

Everything depends on the juror, who gets to select from all submissions and award prizes to those who made it into the show. The judge this time around was Mark Richard Leach, executive director of the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, N.C. He's a heavyweight in North Carolina, having also been a founding director of the Mint Museum of Craft + Design in Charlotte.

This year, 177 artists from 19 states entered, and 84 artists from 16 states got in with 113 artworks.

Judging from his choices, this man has incredibly catholic tastes, incorporating works that come out of such diverse traditions as minimalism, pop art and regionalism. Leach doesn't seem to be pushing any particular direction, except perhaps a sense of good craftsmanship and a smart approach in regard to the various styles.

His top pick was ceramicist Laurie Gaethe of Ocean Springs, Miss., whose tabletop-scaled porcelain piece mixes figures from "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" that appear to have been created with a commercial mold. Since Gaethe made no attempt to disguise the mold marks, the idea of figurines must be presumed to be part of the content.

Appropriate to its title, "Dreams of Wonderland," the forms are fantastically blended. A monkey sleeps on the back of a rabbit; a saddled lion emerges from its chest, and a cat from its feet.

The show varies in tone from Gaethe's tongue-in-cheek irony to the Southern Gothic melodrama of Sarah Hazlegrove of Roanoke, a photographer who uses black-and-white infrared film to capture dim images of spooky spots.

In "Bus Stop I," Hazlegrove shot a collection of truncated trees with a bush of foliage softening the branch silhouettes. Each tree resembles a dramatically expressive figure, perhaps a Martha Graham dancer. When you finally discern that one of the trunks is a crucifix, the trees then seem like mourners.

Another photographer, Robert Silance of Pendleton, S.C., takes a cool, sharply focused approach in documenting the Southern rural landscape as graceful vistas being replaced by ugly roads and buildings.

There's a lot of strong sculpture and painting in the show. Jason Lanka's enigmatic "Leonard" seems to refer to the taming of the West. The artist was raised in Wyoming and wrote in his artist's statement that the piece is about boundaries. The large-scale, finely crafted work could be interpreted as bending a tree trunk to the will of man and locking it into a contraption.

In the same way that Lanka's design gives the illusion of a bent trunk, James Parker's humorous yet elegant sculpture "Seagulls in the Living Room" makes a concrete form appear as malleable as rubber.

http://hamptonroads.com/2008/10/review-peninsula-fine-arts-centers-juried-biennial-exhibition

Artists unite man and nature

The intersection where man meets the environment is a common theme in contemporary art. Site-specific installations (Christo), interventions (Robert Smithson), as well as traditional media probe the ways in which we and the forces of nature affect the environment. When done well, these works stimulate conversations and reactions, and might even propel us to act.

A small exhibition on view at The Cazenovia College Art Gallery touches on some of these ideas with varying degrees of success. Titled "LANDmarks: Beyond the Baroque Playing Field," the show is comprised of mixed media works by Kelly Hider, from Rochester, and Jennifer Pawo, of Binghamton, and sculpture by Jason Lanka, of Williamsburg, Va. Hider and Lanka effectively articulate visual connections between the man-made and natural worlds; but Pawo, whose inspiration is athletics, seems to be somewhere out in left field.

One might argue the clash of these two worlds was not the primary idea behind this exhibition; but it is so clearly communicated in Lanka's and Hider's works, it screams to be equally noticed in Pawo's . . . and it's just not there. Pawo states her ideas spring from her experiences as a Title IX athlete in baseball and her knowledge of art history. Her visual translation marries elements of op art and lyrical abstraction with sports statistics and events. This combination of disparate ideas is a challenge to express in the best of hands.

In "Gambling with BALCO," Pawo lists Pete Rose's batting averages from 1963 (170) to 1986 (52) in pencil and then responds in arcing lines of black ink and dime-sized splotches of acrylic paint. The visual reference to the athletic act is clear, but she sacrifices the aesthetic. Pawo's ideas are unique, but are they substantial?

Technique is generally under control in Hider's lyrical mixed media pieces, which clearly connect ideas of domesticity with the environment.

She recreates surface designs for wallpapers, linens and clothing dating from periods such as the Arts and Crafts movement and Victorian era and engages them as backgrounds for organic forms. In "Nebraska Tree," Hider delicately interweaves spindly black tree limbs with a rose and a turquoise surface pattern that floats atop a soft filigree of line. The piece coalesces into a quiet mediation on domesticity and nature.

Not as effective, however, is Hider's sprawling piece titled "Traveling by Way of Constructed Vistas." The work, an oil and mixed media piece on paper, consumes the gallery's northern wall, running about 20 linear feet. The problem with the piece is in its visual rhythm, which abruptly stops and starts due to interruptions by dense swathes of black paint in the foreground. Hider has done some interesting things in this piece such as integrating photographic imagery and considerably extending her basic proposition, but I get the sense this is a work in progress, not fully thought out. I would love to see what Hider is doing in three to five years.

Finally, Lanka's mixed media sculptures truly define the boundaries where man and nature exist. He says he seeks "to address the demarcation of our species' relationship with the land," and asks, "Am I of the land or in the land?" He joins elements from old farming tools, a yoke and forged claws of hoes, items that bridge the divide between man and the land with natural materials such as tree branches. The works are well-crafted and articulate. Lanka also exhibits a strong gestural, charcoal figure drawing, titled "With Arms Like the Land," which is compelling as a life-size rendering, but would have been heroic had he taken a risk and made it larger than life.

These are three young artists at varying stages of finding their artistic voices. Time and a lot more work will tell if and how well they succeed.

Katherine Rushworth, of Cazenovia, is a former director of the Michael C. Rockefeller Arts Center (State University College at Fredonia) and of the Central New York Institute for the Arts in Education.

Artist’s statements sometimes demonstrate the gap between intent and execution. Nicole McCormick Santiago’s drawings and paintings are more clearly about narrative, allegory and public-private personas than Jason Lanka’s sculptures and series of bird drawings are about the boundaries between nature and culture, as their respective artist’s statements suggest. It is largely in Lanka’s materials and forming processes that the viewer feels the tension between the boundaries he speaks of.

Both artists currently teach at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg. And while both freely employ allegory and metaphor, they have opposing sensibilities. Santiago’s work is largely figurative and, as previously stated, narrative, while Lanka’s curious forms are more obviously symbolic. His are similar, in some ways—especially a piece like Tree House—to the work of Martin Puryear, yet not derivative and quite different from his in some respects.

Santiago’s oeuvre is represented by small, sensitive drawn and painted portraits, larger mixed-media drawings, and full-color paintings that are larger still. The mixed-media drawings, especially, possess a palpable sense of pathos. In their dramatic range of values in grisaille, their expressive pencil marks, and their drips and strokes, the pieces exude a moody psychological tension. Especially beautiful and evocative is Departure, in which the figure of what appears to be a child lies beside a coffee table in the fetal position while a man sits dispassionately on the sofa, legs crossed, in the middle ground, and the figure of a woman retreats into the background.

In the paintings, Santiago repeats the iconography of a dog, a doll, a piñata, a lamp, a pink dress, and a diet soda cup in interiors with as much presence as the other elements. With a jarring and sometimes garish color palette, often from an elevated viewpoint, Santiago taps into an undercurrent of domestic despair and unsettling stress amidst the utterly mundane. Naptime No. 2 depicts a dog curled up asleep on a bed, large because of his extreme foreground position. Just behind him, a woman in profile sits knitting a red scarf. Beyond her, a baby in a playpen cries inconsolably, reaching out for her. But she doesn’t look up. In the background, the backlit silhouette of a man stands unmoving in the doorway. Each actor in this scene seems to occupy his or her own plane of existence, removed and remote from the others.

Lanka’s five sculptures and sculptural installations are ambiguous, yet clearly loaded with meaning. They are evocative, yet perplexing, in their forms and combinations of media. At once crude and beautifully crafted, they leave viewers searching for understanding in the spaces between wood, sisal and band saw blades.

Across the back wall of the gallery, Terra Intaglio features 25 approximately six-foot tall needle forms carved out of pine. Each point is resting on the floor, and each eye is held in place by an iron stake in the wall. Nearby, two photographs depict the pieces in situ, lining a road and following the topography of the land across a field. The term "intaglio" refers to a design that has been carved into a surface, while "terra" refers to the earth. In particular, some methods of intaglio printmaking specifically require a needle. The meaning of this sculpture seems to have something to do with the way we, as humans, carve our marks into the earth.

Ishmael is a large installation made of a wooden apparatus braced against the wall and held in place by a steel cable. Its shape is reminiscent of an oil derrick. Inside it, rope is wound onto a spindle. From there, the rope drops to the floor before trailing across the gallery to the opposite side where it is tethered to two red plastic gas cans and a steel anchor. Since, according to Islamic teachings, Ishmael is known as the first prophet of Islam, an ancestor of the Arabs, who barely escaped a sacrificial death at the hands of his father as instructed by Allah, the piece seems to be about American dependence on foreign oil.

With work that is ripe for interpretation, visitors are assured an emotional, psychological and intellectual work out.