Last post, my dears

ART SEEN ASHEVILLE

April 14, 2008 – March 8, 2012

Thank you for visiting.

Below is a list of sites I recommend to keep up-to-date on Asheville art events and artists:

MountainX.com
blog.riverartsdistrict.com
pollinateasheville.com
avlarts.com

thegutterartcritic

I will continue to provide updates on my writing and painting projects, which you can read at ursulagullow.blogspot.com


Art never expresses anything but itself. ~Oscar Wilde

Asheville's smART Space residency program

photo by Max Cooper
Last November, Melissa Terrezza, Sean Pace and Jeremy Russell became the first artists to be awarded a residency through the city of Asheville’s newly created smART Space program — the brainchild of Diane Ruggiero, Superintendent of Cultural Arts. For 90 days, the artists are allowed around-the-clock access to the 2,100-square-foot space on the ground level of the Pioneer Building, and are given a $1,500 honorarium. The public is invited to drop in on the artists while they work, and on March 2, a closing reception will be held for the community to witness the fruits of their combined creative efforts.

Read more about the artists' projects, the smART Space program, and how to apply as an artist for a smART Space residency: Asheville gets smART Space; Mountain Xpress 2/14/12

Art on a cart has grown up

I've written about The Easel Rider before, but this UNC-TV video has really affirmed my faith in this program. Funded with city dollars, the Easel Rider requires less resources to operate and can potentially provide greater outreach than traditional "recreation center" programs.

Another innovative aspect is that the Easel Rider can accommodate a variety of artists and media thanks to the help of new media artists Mark Koven and Gene Felice who outfitted the van with some state of the art digital electronic equipment.

I'm not sure how many other cities in the US have implemented programs similar to Easel Rider, but I hope people can look to this production as an example of inspired and resourceful city spending.

If you are an artist/writer/performer who would like an opportunity to utilize the Easel Rider, follow this link for more information

Reflections on Pat Passlof

photo by Alice Sebrell

When Pat Passlof enrolled in a summer painting class at Black Mountain College in 1948 she wasn’t sure who the instructor would be. She was 20 years old and had recently seen an exhibit by the not-yet–known painter Willem de Kooning that had left a profound impact on her. Somehow she had feeling that de Kooning would be teaching that summer, and she was right. Passlof ended up studying with de Kooning at the avant-garde art school and even rode the train back up to NYC with him once the class commenced. This would be only the beginning of her lifelong journey as an artist.

Thoreau

Passlof passed away November 13, 2011 at the age of 83, and due to her affiliation with Black Mountain College, a selection of her life’s work will be exhibited this year at the Black Mountain College Museum and Western Carolina University Fine Arts Museum simultaneously from January 26 – May 27. A committed artist, Passlof left behind an extensive oeuvre of paintings, and the exhibit will contain work she produced throughout her life -- including one of the paintings made at Black Mountain College. “She really wanted to focus on her latest works, “ says Alice Sebrell, program director at BMCM+AC. “She considered them to be the most mature and successful of everything she’s done.”

For more on Passlof, read Portrait of Passlof which appears in the Jan 2012 issue of Verve Magazine.

Hawthorne

On a personal note: The best part about my work as an arts writer is that I get to meet all kinds of interesting people and have great conversations about the creative process, materials, the art world, etc. I always come away with new tidbits of knowledge and fresh perspectives that I can apply to my own work.

Last month when I set out to write the profile article on Passlof for Verve Magazine I didn’t expect the whole experience to be as moving as it turned out to be. I met with Connie Bostic and Alice Sebrell of the BMCM+AC and they shared their personal insights on Passlof and their impressions upon visiting her in her studio in NYC. (“There was paint everywhere. There were coffee cups everywhere. It was just a mess! It was perfect,” Connie recalled.)

After the meeting, Alice sent me home with an envelope stuffed full of newspaper articles, gallery catalogues and Passlof's own writings. I read everything voraciously -- completely enthralled by Passlof’s straightforward statements on painting and art. For example, Passlof once declared that art should contain “no message, no politics, no political correctness, no ideas, no conformity.” Concerning painting, she wrote: "Find ways to ‘listen’ to your painting, and small visual events will occur…”

I was also impressed by how Passlof's life seemed to be as exotic as it was commonplace. She and her husband, (painter Milton Resnick) each renovated synagogues in the Lower East Side as studio spaces; she taught painting at CUNY Community School of Staten Island for 39 years, retiring in 2011, and continued to produce work until her illness would no longer allow it.

As a painter I am greatly anticipating Passlof:Selections. What a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the work of such an impressive woman who made her art her life.

Visit blackmountaincollege.org for more information about Passlof:Selections 1948-2011.

Exhibit: Severn Eaton at PUSH Gallery

See What Inspired Me is the title of Severn Eaton's newest exhibit at PUSH Gallery in downtown Asheville. Known for his narrative paintings that reflect on the cultural milieu of neoliberalism, Eaton's new show heralds his familiar anti-consumerist perspective but contains no paintings. Instead, Eaton uses images and slogans cut from billboard advertisements to create an environment that is sensationally grotesque. At this close range the onslaught of bright colors and pixelated food is both horrifying and fascinating.

In the middle of the room two life-sized human forms made out of clear packing tape are connected to a box and breathe in and out when activated -- literally deflating and inflating each other. The kinetic rigging of this sculpture is pretty amazing and lends a compelling interactive element to the show.

Pop into PUSH Gallery and Skateshop at 25 Patton Ave and see for yourself before the show comes down later this month.

Read Kyle Sherard's review for the Montain Xpress: See What Inspired Severn Eaton

Visit www.severneaton.com to see more.

Chaos in Berlin

In April 2007 I spent two weeks in Berlin with my friend Sebastian Collett. We stayed at a squat called Tuntenhaus, went to a couple of raves, rode the subways, looked at art, etc. I also went to the craziest dance performance somewhere in East Berlin where we were blindfolded and then made to interact with the dancers. I loved all the graffiti, the Turkish food, and the way people are so candid and yet so guarded.

While I was there I filmed some of the sights, and interviewed a few artists, and when I got back to the states I used the facilities at the now defunct public access station, URTV, and put together this video. The sound quality of the interviews is quite atrocious, but the music -- by Sys-hex, Glossolalia and Pomme de Terre -- is pretty keen.

Link to video: Chaos in Berlin

One of the people interviewed is a choreographer, Tomi Paasonen. Check his work here: www.paasonen.com

Happy Holidays

The New Materiality at The Asheville Art Museum

Tim Tate; Burned but Not Forgotten

Artists respond to technology’s ubiquity by combining traditional crafting methods with electronic media. The New Materiality, a traveling show curated by Fo Wilson of The Fuller Craft Museum, assesses the boundaries between the handmade and the automated, the traditional and the contemporary. Among the work presented: Videos of oak trees embedded into a classically crafted wooden table, jewelry constructed from pixelated low resolution images of gems, woven tapestries depicting the sound waves of hand-operated and mechanized looms, and hand-blown glass vessels ornamented with cast glass encasing mini videos that pay homage to books.

Donald Fortescue and Lawrence LaBianca; Sounding

There are a few glitches in the presentation: some batteries need recharging, and not everything is operating at its fullest capacity, though from a certain perspective this points to a larger issue regarding electronic technology’s fragility and current dependence upon finite resources. Still, considering the multifaceted creative legacy of Western North Carolina, this exhibit is very relevant to the local dialogue of contemporary art and craft, and is worth seeing. Kudos to the museum for exhibiting new media.

Read more: Art Bets Mtn Xpress Dec 14

Through March 18 at the Asheville Art Museum. $8 for nonmembers. Free every first Wednesday from 3 to 5 p.m. www.ashevilleartmuseum.org