November / December 2009

Main Gallery

 

David Teng Olsen

Installation

 

David Teng Olsen’s recent work is made up of colorful, stream-of-consciousness drawings that are done with gel pens and gouache on wood, paper and panel.  Although inspired by years of working as a scientific illustrator, all of the drawings were begun without any specific representational idea, so as to emphasize a responsive approach to drawing, and executed using a limited mark-making vocabulary.  They are then scanned into a computer, reconsidered, and executed as a grand-scale environment.  The end result is a space that evokes feelings of sentimentality for the activities and ephemera of childhood—puzzles, video games, stickers, and doodling—yet is, at the same time, distorted and strange enough to be unfamiliar and new.

Gallery 1

 

Andries Fourie

From the Heart of Darkness to the Rainbow Nation: South Africa Reinvents Itself

Sculpture and painting

 

Andries Fourie’s work explores memory, culture, and identity in a specifically South African context.  He is interested in the dynamic cultural blending that results from the contact between traditional, predominantly rural, African cultures and the Westernized modernity of the city.  He is also interested in how history and the past shape the way South Africans define and identify themselves today.

Galleries 2 & 5

 

Christina Karns & Gareth Spor

Observatory

Installation

 

Observatory merges intricate abstract paintings by digital artist, Christina Karns, with interactive viewing sculptures by Gareth Spor.  Visitors will be given the opportunity to step up to kaleidoscopes and magnifying lenses to peer inside and discover how the two-dimensional work has been reconfigured.  This collaboration explores the ways in which scientists and artists alike work to expand the ways in which we see and hence, understand our universe.

Gallery 3

 

Susan Sutton

Moment to Moment

Photography

 

Susan Sutton’s images represent moments that remind us that we are alive in a world full of wonder.  They capture those moments when, to the artist, objects appear numinous.  This notion of the numinous is essential to her work.  The word’s origin comes from the Latin “to nod.”  It is the nod of acknowledgement to the supernatural, mysterious aspects of the world, or, as some would have it, “God’s nod.”  To Sutton, these moments often occur at the end of the day, as the late light changes her sense of the world and makes ordinary objects extraordinary.  Susan Sutton’s photographs are her way of saying thank you for this brief time in which we are able to see.

Member’s Gallery (November)

Brooke Borcherding

Plastic Presence

Painting and sculpture

 

Plastic Presence is an exhibition that incorporates two months worth of one individual’s accumulated plastic scraps.  This body of work is a response to the physical forms and textures of the different types of plastic with which we come into contact on an almost daily basis.  Although aesthetically interesting and diverse, this detritus is invasive, frequently non-biodegradable, and harmful to the environment.  This notion is manifest in the net forms used in the work, which symbolize how we as a society are ensnared by items of convenience that, when discarded, wreak havoc on our world.

Member’s Gallery (December)

Paintings by Sandra Kay Bulley

 

Bulley is an Oregon artist who embraces the modern art movement. She states, "after trying several different painting mediums I finally found my niche in contemporary art which was quite liberating for me." 

Sandra employs various applications and materials in her work, but her pieces always consist of "color, texture, layering, movement, and a little drama."
 

December - Great Hall Installation by artists Kira Burge and Jessica Hickey "The Great Hall" is an installation questioning the value disparity between original art objects and economically accessible reproductions by critiquing the multi-million dollar endeavor that Scotland has undertaken to reweave "The Hunt of the Unicorn" tapestries.

Through the act of translation; taking digital images of the French tapestries and weaving them using a computer AVL Jacquard loom, Burge and Hickey have created wall hangings that give the viewer an impression of "The Hunt of the Unicorn" tapestries.

 

The woven wall hangings are installed in the Downtown Initiative of the Visual Artsí hallway, which has been transformed in a do-it-yourself manor complete with vinyl flooring and a new coat of paint simulating the space where the Scottish versions of the tapestries currently hang.

An opening reception will be held from 5-8PM on December 4th. Both artists will be attending to answer questions and speak about their work.