Des Moines Metamorphoses
I belly up to the bar of local hotel restaurant. This guy sitting next to me sizes me up and says, “You look too old for the music thing. So, you here for the bike show or the car show?” I explained that I was simply a local guy having dinner. My inquisitor looked disbelieving but quickly bonded with a band of biker brothers who had descended on Des Moines over Fourth of July weekend, pretty much selling out every hotel room in town and packing bars and restaurants. This is not your parents’ Des Moines. It isn’t even your teenaged brother’s Des Moines.
“I remember, because it wasn’t very long ago at all, when everyone left Des Moines on the Fourth of July. When there wasn’t much of anything to do here,” recalled architect Kirk Blunck.
Blunck takes pride in the changes. His renovations of historic East Village buildings have done more than anything else to attract visitors to formerly repulsive parts of downtown. Watching people file into Lucca, Kitchen Collage, Miyabi 9 and a dozen other bustling businesses in his buildings, Blunck declared a milestone.
“Having Steve Vail here is just a huge thing. It’s a major, major deal to have an international gallery,” he explained.
Steven Vail Fine Arts (SVFA) opened in February on the second floor of the Teachout Building. An exhibition of Jan Frank paintings followed by a show of prints by the artists in the Pappajohn Sculpture Garden placed SVFA many levels above other downtown exhibit spaces, at least by measurements such as the insurance value of inventories and artists’ renown with Google.
Vail’s next exhibit is by Not Vital (a real name), who is as avant garde as an artist can be. The 62 year old Swiss aristocrat lives much of each year in a mud and barbed wire hut in Niger next to a pile of waste from local butchers. There he cultivates his sense of smell, works with silversmiths on sculptures that sometimes look like instruments of torture, and casts cow dung. Vail has actually sold some of the latter for him. For his show at opening July 29 in Des Moines, Vital will exhibit more conventional art - a portfolio of lithographs.
Originally representing only Iowa artists, Moberg Gallery has readjusted its scope. It’s currently hosting an impressive exhibit of 16 “Visiting Artists.” Missourian Nick Naughton’s large wood cut prints document the toil of migrant workers in dramatic fine detail. Colorado painter John Hull peaks into the world of carnies and trailer park police calls. Sculptor Thomas Stancliffe’s freaky environmental reflections presage the Gulf oil disaster.
Things are also changing on a personal level for local artists. Many received big career breaks this summer. The National Academy Museum selected Phillip Chen's print "Lucky 8" for its Invitational Exhibition of Contemporary American Art. Painters Ignatius Widiapradja and Larassa Kabel were both signed by 101 Exhibit, an esteemed contemporary gallery in Miami, Florida. Their works are part of a show which runs through midsummer there. Kabel’s works also will travel to a 101 Exhibit in East Hampton, New York in August.
Painter Jeremiah Elbel won the second round of the Saatchi Showdown. His paintings are now displayed with those of 11 other showdown winners at the new Saatchi Gallery in London. Last year, over 400,000 visitors saw the Showdown finalists’ works, a record for a contemporary art exhibition in England.
Painter Alex Brown signed for a one person January show at Twig Gallery in Brussels, Belgium and also for a Frances Young Tang Museum show this September in Saratoga Springs, NY. Brown’s legendary New York City gallery Feature Inc also rebounded after a chaotic year of untimely expansion and retraction.
Sculptor Mitchell Squire won a residency at Maine’s Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, perhaps the most notable program of its kind. Alex Katz, Ellsworth Kelly, William King and Janet Fish are among its alumni. Squire is one of 65 participants selected this year from 2045 nominees worldwide. He also won a residency at Ox-Bow in Michigan. Joan Mitchell, Keith Achepohl, Claes Oldenburg, Ed Paschke and Miyoko Ito are Ox Bow alums.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Thursday, July 22, 2010
How to Sculpt a New Civic Image
As the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Garden (PSG) completes its debut season most of its skeptics have gone underground.
“I think that we’re already moving in this direction. The Principal River Walk project has two major sculpture works in progress. The Parks Department has completed one project by creating a sculpture map to downtown and they have another in the works that identifies, with consistent standards of identification, sculptures of note all over the entire metro area. I think the most important thing is to progress with a focus on maintaining an enhancement of quality,” he said.
Journalist Chuck Offenburger also thinks the Parks Department map will lead to more good things.
“First, I’d say a detailed study should be done to identify and locate the most interesting existing sculptures around metro Des Moines. Of course there’s “Crusoe Umbrella.” But we forget some of the intriguing ones – like the tricycle rider in Merle Hay Mall, the tree carvings at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, some of the statues in the Iowa Hall of Pride, the string quartet at Drake, the stylized baseball outside Principal Park, the new Paragon Prairie Tower in the extreme northwest corner of the metro, those at the Art Center, the various military-related statues, some of the best church ones, those on the State Capitol grounds, some great ones in businesses (Mac Hornecker’s in the Iowa Farm Bureau headquarters lobby), and some good ones that might be accessible to the public at private residences.
“That could 1) make it possible to put together a new self-guided “Sculpture Tour” of the city, with occasional escorted tours. 2) It could also identify areas of the city that are really short of sculptures and may stir ideas of what new pieces could go there and 3) If we’re really paying attention to sculpture in Des Moines, that might lead to some new funding sources to commission new pieces – and one of the first ones we should get done is a big one by Sticks, since their headquarters is in Des Moines,” he said.
Sculptor James Ellwanger, who created several of the pieces Offenburger mentioned, agrees that new commissions could stimulate a positive image for the city. He’d like to see it result from a sculpture prize though. Noting that Chicago’s image as America’s greatest architectural city was boosted by the Pritzker Prize, he mused about a competition at the Iowa State Fair.
“They have a million visitors and lots of open space. They already have arts competitions and they’re moving those into a new venue. It would be a great place for sculptors to bring works,” he said.
Author John Domini likes the prize idea and adds that legislation requiring sculpture in new developments has worked imaging miracles in Portland, Oregon and New York City.
“The Portland legislation is called "1% for Art," and it's meant that even the city-center shopping malls Lloyd Center & Pioneer Place have eye-catching, mind-bending sculpture installations at all four entrances. Even parking garages have them, lightening the tomb effect. As for New York, Manhattan has recently grown full of sculpture in public, on block after block, park after park,” he noted.
Bustling every weekend with camera-laden visitors, the the garden park has become extraordinarily popular with locals and tourists alike. A bright happenstance during an economic recession, the New York Times even proclaimed the PSG a “cure from urban blight.” As its novelty ages and the value of free entertainment depreciates in a hopefully revived economy, now’s a good time to ponder what might be the city’s next move.
I posed the following question to some keen observers of Des Moines culture:
I posed the following question to some keen observers of Des Moines culture: “What can be done to capitalize of the Pappajohn’s largess to help Des Moines become known as “a sculpture town” rather than just a town with a downtown sculpture park?
Des Moines Art Center Director Jeff Fleming likes what’s already been done.
“I think that we’re already moving in this direction. The Principal River Walk project has two major sculpture works in progress. The Parks Department has completed one project by creating a sculpture map to downtown and they have another in the works that identifies, with consistent standards of identification, sculptures of note all over the entire metro area. I think the most important thing is to progress with a focus on maintaining an enhancement of quality,” he said.
Journalist Chuck Offenburger also thinks the Parks Department map will lead to more good things.
“First, I’d say a detailed study should be done to identify and locate the most interesting existing sculptures around metro Des Moines. Of course there’s “Crusoe Umbrella.” But we forget some of the intriguing ones – like the tricycle rider in Merle Hay Mall, the tree carvings at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, some of the statues in the Iowa Hall of Pride, the string quartet at Drake, the stylized baseball outside Principal Park, the new Paragon Prairie Tower in the extreme northwest corner of the metro, those at the Art Center, the various military-related statues, some of the best church ones, those on the State Capitol grounds, some great ones in businesses (Mac Hornecker’s in the Iowa Farm Bureau headquarters lobby), and some good ones that might be accessible to the public at private residences.
“That could 1) make it possible to put together a new self-guided “Sculpture Tour” of the city, with occasional escorted tours. 2) It could also identify areas of the city that are really short of sculptures and may stir ideas of what new pieces could go there and 3) If we’re really paying attention to sculpture in Des Moines, that might lead to some new funding sources to commission new pieces – and one of the first ones we should get done is a big one by Sticks, since their headquarters is in Des Moines,” he said.
Sculptor James Ellwanger, who created several of the pieces Offenburger mentioned, agrees that new commissions could stimulate a positive image for the city. He’d like to see it result from a sculpture prize though. Noting that Chicago’s image as America’s greatest architectural city was boosted by the Pritzker Prize, he mused about a competition at the Iowa State Fair.
“They have a million visitors and lots of open space. They already have arts competitions and they’re moving those into a new venue. It would be a great place for sculptors to bring works,” he said.
Author John Domini likes the prize idea and adds that legislation requiring sculpture in new developments has worked imaging miracles in Portland, Oregon and New York City.
“The Portland legislation is called "1% for Art," and it's meant that even the city-center shopping malls Lloyd Center & Pioneer Place have eye-catching, mind-bending sculpture installations at all four entrances. Even parking garages have them, lightening the tomb effect. As for New York, Manhattan has recently grown full of sculpture in public, on block after block, park after park,” he noted.
Grandeur & Glamour: Lost & Found
Anyone with a cell phone is a cameraman today. So what does it take for a photographer to catch the eye of museum curators? This year’s Iowa Artists Exhibition at the Des Moines Art Center (DMAC) provides two very different answers. 
Ranked the #12 most watched musician on You Tube, Leslie Hall is a bona fide “ceWEBrity.” CNN profiled her. Wired.com reported 900,000 downloads during the launch period for her song “How We Got Out Version Two.” She was featured on a VH1 special of the 40 greatest internet stars. Hall recently completed her fourth national tour to rave reviews, has a Los Angeles booking agent and is in talks with HBO about her own show. Why is she still living in Iowa?
Ranked the #12 most watched musician on You Tube, Leslie Hall is a bona fide “ceWEBrity.” CNN profiled her. Wired.com reported 900,000 downloads during the launch period for her song “How We Got Out Version Two.” She was featured on a VH1 special of the 40 greatest internet stars. Hall recently completed her fourth national tour to rave reviews, has a Los Angeles booking agent and is in talks with HBO about her own show. Why is she still living in Iowa?“I am not appreciated here and I have a deep Midwestern need to earn hometown love. I also love cheap rent. In New York or Los Angeles I’d be a starving artist with a day job I hated. I can’t do that and I don’t have to do that in Ames. I have a big apartment and a car too. Besides, Iowa thrift stores and garage sales remain relatively un plundered,” Hall explained.
Garage sales and thrift stores are the mother lode of her art career. While a student in Boston, she photographed herself in each of 400 gem sweaters she had collected. She posted those shots on a web site and that became a internet sensation. Today she uses the web to sell her musical albums, original artwork, T-shirts, and a line of custom spandex outfits under the label "Midwest Diva." The best of her famous gem sweaters are now enshrined in a museum that also serves as a gay wedding venue.
“An artist today has to make a living any which way,” she said.
Hall began posing in second hand clothing for publicity at Ames High School. She entered the homecoming parade in a neck brace, a sparkling pink Goodwill gown and a tiara her mother had worn when crowned Miss Auburn 1970. The Ames Tribune ran Hall’s photo on the front page and that sparked her successful campaign to become Prom Queen. Hall had that stunt in mind when she began performing “large sized hip hop” to turn heads in Boston.
“It worked as a publicity generator. I dressed up in glitter and big hair and spandex and the media picked up on the act. People came to the shows and things just took off. That probably would never have happened in Iowa,” she explained.
Hall admits there are drawbacks to being a rap star in Iowa.
“The Iowa Dream is killing my music career. Back up singers keep pursuing that dream - having babies and moving away. They also experiment with weight loss fads and become sassy,” she complained.
“The Iowa Dream is killing my music career. Back up singers keep pursuing that dream - having babies and moving away. They also experiment with weight loss fads and become sassy,” she complained.
Hall’s gem sweater photos, including one dedicated to her “main dead man” (Elvis), are part of the DMAC exhibition.
Richard Colburn of Cedar Falls has spent years chronicling the effects of economic transitions in the Midwest.
“I came from Pennsylvania where the decline of the American steel industry effected so many lives. So, I started these projects interested in how that also effected the Iron Range,” he said.
In the DMAC exhibition, a Colburn series on closed schools reveals Midwestern ingenuity (schools converted into tornado shelters, private homes, fire departments, a City Hall, and haunted houses) as well as lost grandeur (empty swimming pools in once wealthy towns.)
“I wanted to photograph from the point of view of a student in the school, not like a realtor,” Colburn explained of his preference for close-ups and details.
In the DMAC exhibition, a Colburn series on closed schools reveals Midwestern ingenuity (schools converted into tornado shelters, private homes, fire departments, a City Hall, and haunted houses) as well as lost grandeur (empty swimming pools in once wealthy towns.)“I wanted to photograph from the point of view of a student in the school, not like a realtor,” Colburn explained of his preference for close-ups and details.
Colburn and Hall’s works debut June 11 along with those of sculptors Josh Black, Daniel Weiss and Jim Shrosbree, painters Micah Bloom, Megan Dirks, Laura Farrin, Larassa Kabel, Teresa Paschke and Kristin Quinn, installation artists Nathan Morton and Benjamin Gardner, and ceramicist Ingrid Lillgren.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Des Moines’ Festive Season
Picasso mused that artists are children who never grow up, a metaphor encouraged by the school like calendar on which the traditional arts keep time. As if air conditioning had never been invented, the art world still closes shop and heads for the hills and beaches at the first utterance of the phrase “It‘s not the heat, it‘s the humidity.” For centuries, summer art festivals have been held almost exclusively in resorts from Salzburg to Spoleto, and Newport to Carmel. Yet summer has become prime time for the fine arts in Des Moines where reputations have been built against the winds of tradition.
With little more than the sheer force of their personalities, Maestro Robert Larsen and the late Mo Dana created two summer festivals of national repute in Central Iowa‘s unlikely fields of dreams. Like corn, Larsen’s Des Moines Metro Opera thrives in heat and humidity, drawing the tassel of star singers, on summer break from the cultural capitols of the world, to the silk womb of Indianola. The Des Moines Arts Festival grows every year and now fills the city’s hotels and restaurants with eager shoppers from near and far. These two festivals have persuaded itinerant artists to pitch their tents in the farm belt summer and convinced locals to support those artists with endearing enthusiasm.
This year for the first time, both festivals play on after their guiding muses have handed off their batons. DMMO’s first season without Larsen will feature “Figaro,” “MacBeth” and “Susanna” - from the formula of one comic, one tragic, and one modern opera that Larsen developed to win respect for his corn belt company.
Together these two festivals transformed the image of summer in Des Moines while inspiring other notable festivals. ArtFest Midwest and Iowa Sculptural Festival now have followings of their own. Festivals also inspired brick and mortar institutions to bump up their summer programs. Des Moines’ gallery scene has grown exponentially since Art Fest began. Only Kavanaugh and Olson-Larsen galleries are still around from those days. The latter provides its annual Summer Landscape show showcasing popular John Preston, Bobbie McKibbon, Dennis Dykema.
Summer also dances in festive light at Central Iowa’s main museums. Minimalist sculpture will glow at the Brunnier Art Museum and Iowa artists of all media, from hip hop to photojournalism, will dazzle the Des Moines Art Center in the 2010 edition of its Iowa Artists exhibition. The city’s burgeoning metal and gem art galleries (Susan Noland, Elements and 2Au) have also been busy working with odd stones with magical properties - freaks of nature set in metals too durable to succumb.
Calendar (*APT* indicates a special Art Pimp tout)
Recurring Events and Family Attractions
Thursday Night Art Walks in downtown Newton
First Friday Art Walks, Fairfield Town Square
Third Wednesdays of the month, Art Walks on Iowa State University campus.
Special Events
Festivals
Des Moines Metro Opera 38th Summer Festival (Simpson College, Indianola, http://www.desmoinesmetroopera.org/)
June 4
Cabernet Night Live
An evening of standards and show tunes mixed with musical favorites from Broadway and American opera presented by DMMO’s talented Apprentice Artists. Hors d’oeuvres and drinks round out this evening of great entertainment at the Temple for Performing Arts. $50.
June 16
Threads & Trills Costume Show and Luncheon 12 p.m. Holiday Inn & Suites, Jordan Creek
A sneak peek at the costumes from the upcoming season’s operas while enjoying arias and duets sung by principal artists from each show. Lunch is included with the purchase of a $40 ticket.
June 17 (twice) & 19
Peanut Butter & Puccini Family Opera Adventure, 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Blank Center
Kids and adults take backstage tour of the opera. Learn about wig and makeup application, lighting, etc. $10 includes lunch. *APT*
June 19 - Ju1y 12
The 2008 Season *APT*
“Marriage of Figaro” by Mozart (June 25, July 2, 10 & 13 with 7:30 curtainsJune 27 & July 18, at 2 pm )
An opera adored equally by critics and audiences, this buffa was written at the height of Mozart’s career. DMMO’s performance, the debut for conductor David Neely will bring back two audience favorites, Larsen’s student Craig Irvin and Sarah Jane McMahon.
“MacBeth” by Giuseppe Verdi (June 26, July 6, 9, 14 & 17 at7:30 and July 4 at 2 p.m)
No one ever called MacBeth light and Neely recruited big voices including DMMO favorite baritone Todd Thomas, Acclaimed bass baritone John Marcus Bindel and off beat specialist Brenda Harris.
“Susanna” by Carlisle Floyd (performances June 25, July 2, 10 & 13 at 7:30 and June 27 & July 18 at 2 p.m.)
The Bible’s apocryphal tale of Susanna and the Elders is reset in Appalachia. Home girl Beverly O'Regan Thiele (debuted at DMMO as Abigail in The Crucible) returns to sing the title role and Joseph Mechavich conducts in his DMMO debut.
July 15
“Stars of Tomorrow” Concert, (Sheslow Auditorium, Drake University). *APT*
DMMO's Apprentice Artists perform arias and ensembles at Sheslow Auditorium. $20 and $10
May 31, June 6, 9, 12, 17, 19, 26, 30 July 3, 7, 10, 15, 17
“Apprentice Artist Program Performances,” times vary, at Lekberg Hall, Des Moines Social Club, and Sheslow Auditorium
The troupe performs scenes and entire acts from both popular operas and rarely seen works. Most performances are free!
Iowa Sculpture Festival, Maytag Park, Newton, http://iowasculpturefestival.org/ $2
June 12-13
The 8th annual event brings big bronze and steel art to Maytag Park for a hands-on experience of meeting artists, picnicking, swimming and watching comedians, magicians, balloon animal makers, etc. $1 and $2.
Des Moines Arts Festival, Gateway West, http://www.desmoinesartsfestival.org/ Free
June 26 - 27
A festival grand enough to inspire copycats, critics and loyalists, plus national rankings. We’re Number 5! And, yes, someone does actually rank art festivals, according to sales. The three day, free event brings 185 national artists of all media, and 24 emerging local artists, to the river banks of downtown Des Moines. Plus, there’s enough food and music to turn shopping into a mega-event and source of civic pride.
ArtFest Midwest, Varied Industries Building at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, http://www.artfestmidwest.com/ Free
June 27 - 28
Piggybacking on the big shoulders of DMAF, the eighth annual “Other Art Show,” boasts lots of demonstrations (glassblowing, pastel portraits, lampwork jewelry, pottery etc.) plus free parking and regional chauvinism. Over 210 artists will be showing, with approximately 40% from Iowa and 90% from the Midwest. The fest is now calling itself the “largest fine art show in Iowa.”
Art Stop
Sept. 10-11
The fourth annual shuttle bus tour of Central Iowa’s art galleries, studios and museums.
Galleries
Ongoing
Art Dive, 1417 Walnut St., http://www.artdive.com/
Des Moines alternative gallery plans alternative exhibitions. Be surprised.
2AU, 200 Fifth, West Des Moines
Beach boys of Ipanema and mermaids of Tahiti mix it up with Tanzanian gems this summer.
Des Moines Social Club, 1408 Locust, Ave. http://www.desmoinesocialclub.org/
Circus, wrestling, tai chi, akido, theater, belly dancing and other acts of sociability make the club’s Instinct Gallery the most alternative to alternative in town.
Finder's Creepers, 515 18th St. http://www.finderscreepers.com/
Alternative to alternative.
Kavanaugh Gallery
131 5th Street West Des Moines, 279-8682, http://www.kavanaughgallery.com/
Specializing in purchase estate collections, there’s no telling what you might find here.
Steven Vail Gallery, 500 E Locust St.
Focuses on late 19th century, and 20th century European and American art. Open by appointment only.
Susan Noland Studio Gallery, 902 42nd St.
The psychological properties of gems are front and center in this master goldsmith‘s repertoire.
Limited Engagements
Olson-Larsen Galleries, 203 Fifth, West Des Moines, http://www.olsonlarsen.com/
Through July 31
“Larassa Kabel"
Realist painter *APT*
“Small Works Exhibit” by various gallery artists
Museums
Through March 2011
“Pieces of Self: Identity and Norwegian-American Quilts”
The exhibition will highlight the ways Norwegian Americans have expressed gender, family, community, religious, and ethnic identities through quilt making.
With little more than the sheer force of their personalities, Maestro Robert Larsen and the late Mo Dana created two summer festivals of national repute in Central Iowa‘s unlikely fields of dreams. Like corn, Larsen’s Des Moines Metro Opera thrives in heat and humidity, drawing the tassel of star singers, on summer break from the cultural capitols of the world, to the silk womb of Indianola. The Des Moines Arts Festival grows every year and now fills the city’s hotels and restaurants with eager shoppers from near and far. These two festivals have persuaded itinerant artists to pitch their tents in the farm belt summer and convinced locals to support those artists with endearing enthusiasm.
This year for the first time, both festivals play on after their guiding muses have handed off their batons. DMMO’s first season without Larsen will feature “Figaro,” “MacBeth” and “Susanna” - from the formula of one comic, one tragic, and one modern opera that Larsen developed to win respect for his corn belt company.
Together these two festivals transformed the image of summer in Des Moines while inspiring other notable festivals. ArtFest Midwest and Iowa Sculptural Festival now have followings of their own. Festivals also inspired brick and mortar institutions to bump up their summer programs. Des Moines’ gallery scene has grown exponentially since Art Fest began. Only Kavanaugh and Olson-Larsen galleries are still around from those days. The latter provides its annual Summer Landscape show showcasing popular John Preston, Bobbie McKibbon, Dennis Dykema.
Summer also dances in festive light at Central Iowa’s main museums. Minimalist sculpture will glow at the Brunnier Art Museum and Iowa artists of all media, from hip hop to photojournalism, will dazzle the Des Moines Art Center in the 2010 edition of its Iowa Artists exhibition. The city’s burgeoning metal and gem art galleries (Susan Noland, Elements and 2Au) have also been busy working with odd stones with magical properties - freaks of nature set in metals too durable to succumb.
Calendar (*APT* indicates a special Art Pimp tout)
Recurring Events and Family Attractions
Thursday Night Art Walks in downtown Newton
First Friday Art Walks, Fairfield Town Square
Third Wednesdays of the month, Art Walks on Iowa State University campus.
Special Events
Festivals
Des Moines Metro Opera 38th Summer Festival (Simpson College, Indianola, http://www.desmoinesmetroopera.org/)
June 4
Cabernet Night Live
An evening of standards and show tunes mixed with musical favorites from Broadway and American opera presented by DMMO’s talented Apprentice Artists. Hors d’oeuvres and drinks round out this evening of great entertainment at the Temple for Performing Arts. $50.
June 16
Threads & Trills Costume Show and Luncheon 12 p.m. Holiday Inn & Suites, Jordan Creek
A sneak peek at the costumes from the upcoming season’s operas while enjoying arias and duets sung by principal artists from each show. Lunch is included with the purchase of a $40 ticket.
June 17 (twice) & 19
Peanut Butter & Puccini Family Opera Adventure, 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Blank Center
Kids and adults take backstage tour of the opera. Learn about wig and makeup application, lighting, etc. $10 includes lunch. *APT*
June 19 - Ju1y 12
The 2008 Season *APT*
“Marriage of Figaro” by Mozart (June 25, July 2, 10 & 13 with 7:30 curtainsJune 27 & July 18, at 2 pm )
An opera adored equally by critics and audiences, this buffa was written at the height of Mozart’s career. DMMO’s performance, the debut for conductor David Neely will bring back two audience favorites, Larsen’s student Craig Irvin and Sarah Jane McMahon.
“MacBeth” by Giuseppe Verdi (June 26, July 6, 9, 14 & 17 at7:30 and July 4 at 2 p.m)
No one ever called MacBeth light and Neely recruited big voices including DMMO favorite baritone Todd Thomas, Acclaimed bass baritone John Marcus Bindel and off beat specialist Brenda Harris.
“Susanna” by Carlisle Floyd (performances June 25, July 2, 10 & 13 at 7:30 and June 27 & July 18 at 2 p.m.)
The Bible’s apocryphal tale of Susanna and the Elders is reset in Appalachia. Home girl Beverly O'Regan Thiele (debuted at DMMO as Abigail in The Crucible) returns to sing the title role and Joseph Mechavich conducts in his DMMO debut.
July 15
“Stars of Tomorrow” Concert, (Sheslow Auditorium, Drake University). *APT*
DMMO's Apprentice Artists perform arias and ensembles at Sheslow Auditorium. $20 and $10
May 31, June 6, 9, 12, 17, 19, 26, 30 July 3, 7, 10, 15, 17
“Apprentice Artist Program Performances,” times vary, at Lekberg Hall, Des Moines Social Club, and Sheslow Auditorium
The troupe performs scenes and entire acts from both popular operas and rarely seen works. Most performances are free!
Iowa Sculpture Festival, Maytag Park, Newton, http://iowasculpturefestival.org/ $2
June 12-13
The 8th annual event brings big bronze and steel art to Maytag Park for a hands-on experience of meeting artists, picnicking, swimming and watching comedians, magicians, balloon animal makers, etc. $1 and $2.
Des Moines Arts Festival, Gateway West, http://www.desmoinesartsfestival.org/ Free
June 26 - 27
A festival grand enough to inspire copycats, critics and loyalists, plus national rankings. We’re Number 5! And, yes, someone does actually rank art festivals, according to sales. The three day, free event brings 185 national artists of all media, and 24 emerging local artists, to the river banks of downtown Des Moines. Plus, there’s enough food and music to turn shopping into a mega-event and source of civic pride.
ArtFest Midwest, Varied Industries Building at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, http://www.artfestmidwest.com/ Free
June 27 - 28
Piggybacking on the big shoulders of DMAF, the eighth annual “Other Art Show,” boasts lots of demonstrations (glassblowing, pastel portraits, lampwork jewelry, pottery etc.) plus free parking and regional chauvinism. Over 210 artists will be showing, with approximately 40% from Iowa and 90% from the Midwest. The fest is now calling itself the “largest fine art show in Iowa.”
Art Stop
Sept. 10-11
The fourth annual shuttle bus tour of Central Iowa’s art galleries, studios and museums.
Galleries
Ongoing
Art Dive, 1417 Walnut St., http://www.artdive.com/
Des Moines alternative gallery plans alternative exhibitions. Be surprised.
2AU, 200 Fifth, West Des Moines
Beach boys of Ipanema and mermaids of Tahiti mix it up with Tanzanian gems this summer.
Des Moines Social Club, 1408 Locust, Ave. http://www.desmoinesocialclub.org/
Circus, wrestling, tai chi, akido, theater, belly dancing and other acts of sociability make the club’s Instinct Gallery the most alternative to alternative in town.
Finder's Creepers, 515 18th St. http://www.finderscreepers.com/
Alternative to alternative.
Kavanaugh Gallery
131 5th Street West Des Moines, 279-8682, http://www.kavanaughgallery.com/
Specializing in purchase estate collections, there’s no telling what you might find here.
Steven Vail Gallery, 500 E Locust St.
Focuses on late 19th century, and 20th century European and American art. Open by appointment only.
Susan Noland Studio Gallery, 902 42nd St.
The psychological properties of gems are front and center in this master goldsmith‘s repertoire.
Limited Engagements
Olson-Larsen Galleries, 203 Fifth, West Des Moines, http://www.olsonlarsen.com/
Through July 10
“Landscape Show”
New works by the gallery’s big picture stars Barbara Fedeler, John Preston, Dennis Dykema, Bill Barnes and Bobbie McKibbon *APT*
July 10 - September 4
“New Works”
New works by Ken Smith, Yuko Ishii and Mary Merkel-Hess
Moberg Art Gallery, 2921 Ingersoll Ave., http://www.moberggallery.com/
Through July 31
“Larassa Kabel"
Realist painter *APT*
“Small Works Exhibit” by various gallery artists
August 6 - Sept 18 (reception August 7)
“Richard Kelley”
New developments in housing, color and human obsessions from the unique world of Des Moines‘ master painter. *APT*
“Richard Kelley”
New developments in housing, color and human obsessions from the unique world of Des Moines‘ master painter. *APT*
Octagon Center for the Arts , 427 Douglas Avenue, Ames http://www.octagonarts.org/
June 3
ARTini Bash
Silent auction fundraiser with free martini bar and music by Soul Searchers.
Heritage Art Gallery, 111 Court Ave., http://www.heritagegallery.org/
ARTini Bash
Silent auction fundraiser with free martini bar and music by Soul Searchers.
Heritage Art Gallery, 111 Court Ave., http://www.heritagegallery.org/
Through June 2
“A World of Water, Wax and Wonder: The Art of Janet Heinicke”June 7 - July 20. Iowa Exhibited XXVThe annual exhibition of work by artists across the state, professional and amateur, juried by Jack Wilkes
“A World of Water, Wax and Wonder: The Art of Janet Heinicke”June 7 - July 20. Iowa Exhibited XXVThe annual exhibition of work by artists across the state, professional and amateur, juried by Jack Wilkes
August 8 - September 10“Robert Schulte and The Charitable Print Trust”A new venture by a team of DM Printmakers who unveil their plan and their recent work.
September 13 - October 23“Contemporary Fabrics: inspired by the art of quilting”
Local artists show innovative works in fabric and decoration. This show will be up for ARTSTOP
Local artists show innovative works in fabric and decoration. This show will be up for ARTSTOP
Museums
Des Moines Art Center, 4700 Grand Ave., http://www.desmoinesartcenter.org/
Through August 20
Summer classes. Day camps and family workshops. Call 271-0306.
Summer classes. Day camps and family workshops. Call 271-0306.
June 11 – September 19, reception and preview party
June 10
“Iowa Artists 2010” APT
Fifteen artists this year range from performance diva Leslie Hall to realist oil pinter Larassa Kabel. Des Moines’ Dan Weiss, Nate Morton and Benjamin Gardner represent the metro.
June 10
“Iowa Artists 2010” APT
Fifteen artists this year range from performance diva Leslie Hall to realist oil pinter Larassa Kabel. Des Moines’ Dan Weiss, Nate Morton and Benjamin Gardner represent the metro.
June 11
“Leslie Hall’s School for the Precocious”
A diva tutorial for large sized appetites and ambitions.
“Leslie Hall’s School for the Precocious”
A diva tutorial for large sized appetites and ambitions.
June 17 & July 15
“Artist Gallery Talks” (6:30 p.m.)
June 18 - September 16
“Kill Them Before They Multiply”
Print artists from Picasso to Tara Donovan interpret multiplicity and excess.
“Artist Gallery Talks” (6:30 p.m.)
June 18 - September 16
“Kill Them Before They Multiply”
Print artists from Picasso to Tara Donovan interpret multiplicity and excess.
Through August 29
“The Bike Riders - Danny Lyon”
American photographer documents his years with the Chicago Outlaws biker club.
“The Bike Riders - Danny Lyon”
American photographer documents his years with the Chicago Outlaws biker club.
August 5
“The Wild One”
Brando‘s bad ass biker became a cult favorite.
“The Wild One”
Brando‘s bad ass biker became a cult favorite.
August 8
“Easy Rider”
Dennis Hopper’s anthem to the 1960’s open road.
“Easy Rider”
Dennis Hopper’s anthem to the 1960’s open road.
Ankeny Art Center,1520 SW Ordnance Rd. http://www.ankenyartcenter.com/
June “Mary Kline-Misol”
Iowa’s inimitable painter of wonderlands within and without.
Iowa’s inimitable painter of wonderlands within and without.
“Annick Ibsen ”
July
“Gary Tonhouse & Denny Peterson”
August
“Kyle Tyhe”
“Kyle Tyhe”
Brunnier Museum of Art, University Museums, 290 Scheman Bldg., Ames, http://www.museums.iastate.edu/
Through August 2010
“Exquisite Balance: Sculptures by Bill Barrett”
Sculptures recall fluid effortlessness of calligraphic strokes, and betray a positivism to which many viewers feel drawn.
“Exquisite Balance: Sculptures by Bill Barrett”
Sculptures recall fluid effortlessness of calligraphic strokes, and betray a positivism to which many viewers feel drawn.
Through August 6
“Polyphonic Abstraction: Paintings and Maquettes by Bill Barrett” in Morrill HallThis exhibition “juxtaposes his expressive canvases with his sculptural maquettes.”
“Polyphonic Abstraction: Paintings and Maquettes by Bill Barrett” in Morrill HallThis exhibition “juxtaposes his expressive canvases with his sculptural maquettes.”
The Vesterheim, 523 W. Water St., Decorah, http://www.vesterheim.org/
Through March 2011
“Pieces of Self: Identity and Norwegian-American Quilts”
The exhibition will highlight the ways Norwegian Americans have expressed gender, family, community, religious, and ethnic identities through quilt making.
July 17 - 24
“National Exhibition of Folk-Art in the Norwegian Tradition”Exhibition of knife making, rosemaling, weaving, and woodworking by the very best contemporary American artists working in the Norwegian tradition will be on view again next year during Nordic Fest, the last full weekend in July.
“National Exhibition of Folk-Art in the Norwegian Tradition”Exhibition of knife making, rosemaling, weaving, and woodworking by the very best contemporary American artists working in the Norwegian tradition will be on view again next year during Nordic Fest, the last full weekend in July.
June 18 - September 5
“Harry Shearer: The Silent Echo Chamber”
See President Barack Obama, Senator John McCain, cable news anchormen and other "talking heads" in the moments before they go "live" on television.
See President Barack Obama, Senator John McCain, cable news anchormen and other "talking heads" in the moments before they go "live" on television.
“Michael Van den Besselaar's Unconscious Optics”
Paintings, resembling 13 inch televisions freeze fleeting images once beamed into our collective consciousness of America.
Paintings, resembling 13 inch televisions freeze fleeting images once beamed into our collective consciousness of America.
“Mark Wagner: Art/Appreciation”
Wagner collapses all pretense between art and money, archly appraising the status and intersection of both without devaluing either.
Wagner collapses all pretense between art and money, archly appraising the status and intersection of both without devaluing either.
“Bryan Drury - The Feast” APT
Artist’s solo show focuses on a single painting, The Feast.
Artist’s solo show focuses on a single painting, The Feast.
Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, 410 Third Avenue SE, Cedar Rapids, http://www.crma.org/
Through September 19
“From Monet to Picasso ”
Significant but little-known works by Monet, Renoir, Degas, Pissaro, Chagall, Cassatt, Dufy, Matisse, Léger, Mondrian, Miró, Dali, Braque, and Picasso - the Riley Collection has become one of the most significant private collections in the state of Iowa.
“From Monet to Picasso ”
Significant but little-known works by Monet, Renoir, Degas, Pissaro, Chagall, Cassatt, Dufy, Matisse, Léger, Mondrian, Miró, Dali, Braque, and Picasso - the Riley Collection has become one of the most significant private collections in the state of Iowa.
June 19 - November 14
“Grant Wood Windows”
Wood‘s drawings for his stained glass windows displayed for the first time.
“Grant Wood Windows”
Wood‘s drawings for his stained glass windows displayed for the first time.
MacNider Art Museum, 303 Second Street SE, Mason City,
http://www.macniderart.org/
http://www.macniderart.org/
Through July 24
Martin Weinstein’s “The Teresa Paintings”
Works focus on the artist’s wife, in the landscape of the shared family home on the Hudson River.
Martin Weinstein’s “The Teresa Paintings”
Works focus on the artist’s wife, in the landscape of the shared family home on the Hudson River.
University of Iowa Museum of Art, 1375 Highway One West, Iowa City, http://uima.uiowa.edu/
Through June 22
“Two Turntables and a Microphone:Hip-Hop Contexts” at the Memorial Union
Features Harry Allen's "Part of the Permanent Record: Photos from the Previous Century"
Through June 22
“Two Turntables and a Microphone:Hip-Hop Contexts” at the Memorial Union
Features Harry Allen's "Part of the Permanent Record: Photos from the Previous Century"
Figge Art Museum, 225 West Second St., Davenport, http://www.art-dma.org/
Through August 15
“10 Years: The Brand Boeshaar Scholarship Program”
Highlights the successes of several scholarship recipients who are fulfilling their career dreams of working in art-related fields.
“10 Years: The Brand Boeshaar Scholarship Program”
Highlights the successes of several scholarship recipients who are fulfilling their career dreams of working in art-related fields.
June 6 - August 29
“Scale: Ceramic Forms and Photographic Landscapes”
Gerry Eskin’s primary interest remains ceramics but he returns here to an early interest, photography.
“Scale: Ceramic Forms and Photographic Landscapes”
Gerry Eskin’s primary interest remains ceramics but he returns here to an early interest, photography.
Des Moines’ Avant Garde: Rising from the Dead
The avant garde ain’t what it used to be. Appropriated from the military after the Napoleonic Wars, the term has been deployed ever since by marginalized artists, writers, composers and intellectuals who oppose mainstream values. That got tricky after the Industrial Revolution when new technologies began shortening the gap between culture’s margins and mainstream. The Surrealists were self proclaimed revolutionaries in the 1920’s but by the next decade surrealism was part of the commercial establishment in advertising and mass produced art. In the Information Age, the gap’s virtually non existent - social media bypasses the old arbiters of cultural validation. If your You Tube video gets ten million hits in the right demographic group, the opinions of producers, editors, publishers, critics, museum directors, grant committees, and gallery or club owners don’t much matter.
Now days counter cultures stream through young blood more hopefully than ever. In fact, today’s avant garde is seizing ground that is counter to counter culture, yet alone to mainstream culture. “Hi-Fructose” art magazine subtitles itself “under the counter culture.” When it began five years ago, its stated intention was to represent the culture “beyond the comfort zone of the ‘alternative’ norm to deliver a diverse cross section of the most influential, genre bending and defining subversive art of our time.” Yet “Hi-Fructose” celebrated its fifth anniversary with an exhibition at a prestigious Los Angeles gallery.
For today’s graphic artists, that magazine represents the aspirations of the new avant garde better than any mainstream publication. In Des Moines, Instinct Gallery began its second year of monthly exhibitions that have consistently made that point. Their latest show, “Flies in the Land of Milk and Honey” features artists from all over North America, including Jaqueline Roate and Michelle Holly from Des Moines and Chris Bent from Toronto. Like “Hi-Fructose,” they’re more apt to take style tips from surrealism, anime, comic books and science fiction than from mainstream art history. They may not be “subversive” or “genre-bending” but they are arresting to the eye and a lot of fun. Some of these artists use “virtual Easter eggs,” an avant garde term invented by Diego Rivera, Alfred Hitchcock and “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” but trademarked and owned now by Atari. Virtual Easter eggs are hidden personal signatures (actual Easter eggs in “Rocky Horror“) in an artist’s work.
Dancing and strutting in custom made, high performance, pink spandex jump suits that could raise Elvis from his grave, Leslie Hall has staked the most commanding position of any member of the Iowa avant garde. While others crowd under the counter culture, Hall attacks the “high end of hip hop,” plus multimedia art, gay wedding culture, and tight stretch pants style. Hall’s diva shows have been selling out in the avant garde capitals of America from Cambridge to Seattle where an “homage to her diva-ness” has been proclaimed. The Des Moines Art Center will host her “School for the Precocious” on June 11, as part of their annual Iowa Artists Exhibition. It’s limited to 16 students over age 21.
It will sell out faster than a poorly designed jump suit makes “proud lady stuff jiggle.”
In the old spirit of avant gardism, EVAC’s May Day (April 30) exhibition at Northland Studios focuses on symbolism from both Bolshevism and Mother Nature:
“To increase awareness of the connection between nature and humans. If we continue to misuse our natural resources and employees for greed, all of us are doomed,” explained EVAC artist Deborah Vanko. She will exhibit along with Janet Marie Safris, Chris Peterson, Brad Ball (whose work would fit well in “Hi-Fructose“), Bethany Springer, E.J. Wickes and new EVAC member John Sayles, a reborn former Establishment artist whose poster art could convince the proletariat that Lenin is rising from his tomb.
Now days counter cultures stream through young blood more hopefully than ever. In fact, today’s avant garde is seizing ground that is counter to counter culture, yet alone to mainstream culture. “Hi-Fructose” art magazine subtitles itself “under the counter culture.” When it began five years ago, its stated intention was to represent the culture “beyond the comfort zone of the ‘alternative’ norm to deliver a diverse cross section of the most influential, genre bending and defining subversive art of our time.” Yet “Hi-Fructose” celebrated its fifth anniversary with an exhibition at a prestigious Los Angeles gallery.
For today’s graphic artists, that magazine represents the aspirations of the new avant garde better than any mainstream publication. In Des Moines, Instinct Gallery began its second year of monthly exhibitions that have consistently made that point. Their latest show, “Flies in the Land of Milk and Honey” features artists from all over North America, including Jaqueline Roate and Michelle Holly from Des Moines and Chris Bent from Toronto. Like “Hi-Fructose,” they’re more apt to take style tips from surrealism, anime, comic books and science fiction than from mainstream art history. They may not be “subversive” or “genre-bending” but they are arresting to the eye and a lot of fun. Some of these artists use “virtual Easter eggs,” an avant garde term invented by Diego Rivera, Alfred Hitchcock and “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” but trademarked and owned now by Atari. Virtual Easter eggs are hidden personal signatures (actual Easter eggs in “Rocky Horror“) in an artist’s work.
Dancing and strutting in custom made, high performance, pink spandex jump suits that could raise Elvis from his grave, Leslie Hall has staked the most commanding position of any member of the Iowa avant garde. While others crowd under the counter culture, Hall attacks the “high end of hip hop,” plus multimedia art, gay wedding culture, and tight stretch pants style. Hall’s diva shows have been selling out in the avant garde capitals of America from Cambridge to Seattle where an “homage to her diva-ness” has been proclaimed. The Des Moines Art Center will host her “School for the Precocious” on June 11, as part of their annual Iowa Artists Exhibition. It’s limited to 16 students over age 21.
It will sell out faster than a poorly designed jump suit makes “proud lady stuff jiggle.”
In the old spirit of avant gardism, EVAC’s May Day (April 30) exhibition at Northland Studios focuses on symbolism from both Bolshevism and Mother Nature:
“To increase awareness of the connection between nature and humans. If we continue to misuse our natural resources and employees for greed, all of us are doomed,” explained EVAC artist Deborah Vanko. She will exhibit along with Janet Marie Safris, Chris Peterson, Brad Ball (whose work would fit well in “Hi-Fructose“), Bethany Springer, E.J. Wickes and new EVAC member John Sayles, a reborn former Establishment artist whose poster art could convince the proletariat that Lenin is rising from his tomb.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Making a Scene
Des Moines “Paintpushers” Defy the OddsDes Moines‘ art scene just completed a very good decade. Sticks, a professional artistic design company, expanded in the city, creating scores of jobs for artists. The nine member rock band Slipknot maintained residences in Des Moines even after winning a Grammy and hitting the top of the Billboard charts. Public art featured prominently in new developments like Davis-Brown Tower, Mercy Wellness Center and Ponderosa Village. Record setting attendance at Des Moines Art Center continued show after show and that museum produced critically acclaimed traveling exhibitions when many museums had given that up. Hollywood film makers frequented the city. Pappajohn Sculpture Garden, one of the nation’s grandest sculpture parks, opened between downtown’s two busiest streets.
In the shadow of those ballyhooed events, Des Moines’ creative culture received perhaps its biggest boost when a group of painters gave the lie to a time honored negative cliché - that a young artist had to choose between living off his art and living in Iowa. While the World War II and Baby Boomer generations produced original artists here, their art hardly ever provided a full time profession. Richard Kelley pushed a broom at the Des Moines Register. Mary Kline Misol taught at North High School, Karl Mattern at Drake. Cornelis Ruhtenberg and Jules Kirschenbaum were rising art stars in New York but when they moved to Des Moines they taught too. Others left town. Larry Zox and Richard Bauer moved to New York City, Doug Shelton and Ellen Waggoner to the Southwest. Bill Luchsinger and Karen Strohbeen made their living solely from their art here but they were rare exceptions to the ruling cliché.
That changed last decade and the emergence of the city’s new artist community can be traced to March of 2002 when a dozen young painters, many Sticks employees, produced a trunk show that has become a local legend. Determined that Des Moines painters needed other painters for collaboration, critique and support, Chris Vance started a group that Frank Hansen named Paintpushers.
John Phillip Davis joined a year later. Paintpushers met monthly to discuss one another’s art, rented space for an annual exhibition and sold their art wherever they could - street fests, trunk shows, consignment galleries. Almost simultaneously, the destinies of those three painters were being forged by a young sculptor who felt that his art was stuck in the rut of his own success.“For seven years I had worked back to back to back on commissions, mostly out-of-state. Each one took six months to a year. But I was recreating the visions of my clients and I was tired of it. I hoped that owning a gallery was a means to more artistic independence,” TJ Moberg explained why he decided to open Moberg Gallery in 2003 with his wife Jackie Moberg.Thanks to mutual support, all four artists realized their dreams of making it in Des Moines before they turned 40. What’s more, after signing exclusive contracts with the Mobergs, the three painters did it with non commercial, personal styles that Central Iowans now recognize as brands. Bigger markets opened too. Moberg Gallery added an annex in Beverley Hills, California and the internet has given their artists a wider audience.
“People in Chicago and Los Angeles look at the Moberg website and are totally impressed at the all the good art and inevitably disbelieving that the gallery is in Iowa,” said Vance.
All four artists still collaborate, each contributing something different. The others credit Davis for teaching them to take more pride in their production values.
“I remember the first time I looked at the sides and the back of one of John’s paintings. They were more professionally produced than the canvasses of many other artists. I was so impressed by that attention to detail that I started upgrading my materials and taking care with little things,” Hansen explained.
Vance is the nurturer, the only one of this group who still goes to every Paintpushers meeting, “Just in case I can help someone younger.” When he bought another artist’s work at a Des Moines Social Club exhibition last year, the word spread so quickly that within an hour, people were coming in and asking, “Which one did Chris Vance buy?”
Hansen motivates the others with context and enthusiasm.
“When we started Paintpushers, we were all novices. Frank brought so much energy to the group that I felt I had finally met someone with real passion for their painting. Frank told stories about his work, little personal histories behind each painting that brought out that passion,” Vance said.
TJ is considered the voice of reason. He says that Vance and Hansen are more receptive to his advice than Davis.
“I tell John that a painting is perfect and a week later I will go back to his studio and see that he has painted it over completely,” he said, soliciting a response from Davis.
“If someone likes one of my paintings too much then it becomes theirs, not mine. I don’t have anything in my studio that I think is underdone,” he explained.
All four agree that their common denominator is an Iowa work ethic. Each artist said that they were familiar with 100 hour work weeks. “It’s a cliché but as different as we all are, we have it in common. We are all work horses,” said Vance.
“And as soon as I got to know them, I knew that I wanted to be part of this gallery. TJ and Jackie work harder than any gallery owners I’ve met anywhere. And TJ really has a different way of looking at art - mostly because he‘s an artist himself,” Davis explained.
Vance, Hansen and TJ say that Davis has a genius for conceptual discipline that they lack.
“John knows exactly what he’s going to do two years in advance. I am working year by year,” Vance said.
“And I am minute to minute,” said Hansen with the others nodding.
Davis thinks each artist has a distinctive brand now but that they will always feed off each other.
“Chris is the one who’s seen as a local icon. People identify his work with the city. He’s the name artist. TJ is the gallery owner and the public artist. I’m the enigma and Frank is the crazy artist. We’re packaged quite differently but we are all afflicted with the same fetish - to make that which we love making and to figure a way to live off our labor,” he explained.
John Phillip Davis, 41, paints very large, heavily layered abstractions dealing with conflict and tension - “Push and pull, chaos with a design,” in his words. The most philosophical of the group, he consciously paints to provoke ambiguous responses, both visceral and subliminal. Subjects can veer toward the holy and the demonic. Lately, Davis has been working in tactile, three dimensional paintings and sculptures. He shows biennially at Moberg Gallery.
Chris Vance, 33, is the best known and most collected artist in Des Moines. A hundred paintings often sell at his annual exhibitions at Moberg. He paints on all kinds of media in both narrative and abstract styles. Often his paintings are meant to be re-arranged as segments of an ephemeral anthology. Known for bright attractive colors, he calls his subjects a “diary of small things,” like the tribulations of raising children and pets. Vance has won “best in show,” or “best in class” at every major festival he’s entered. He had his first museum show last year at the South Dakota Art Museum. 
Frank Hansen, 40, calls his art “Emotionalism” and combines words and subjects in ironic narratives and autobiographical reflections. He deals with modern Midwestern themes, like the transformation from rural to urban life. He paints with all kinds of media, from branding irons on Buffalo hides to canvasses moved by steering wheels. His work is collected by television stars and has appeared in Slipknot videos. Hansen was the subject of Mark Kneeskern’s 2009 documentary “Thank God I Sucked at Sports.” He designs ski ware for Neve and now has a line of T shirts with Smash of Des Moines.
TJ Moberg, 34, is best known for large, realistic sculptures such as horses racing out of a wall at Prairie Meadows Racetrack & Casino and a “Race Car” at the Iowa Speedway. He says he will never do anything like them again. His later sculptures are multi faceted abstractions with identifiable themes. They include a symbolic landscape installation at Mercy Wellness Center in Clive and “The Homework Machine,” a walk-through sculpture for the Marshalltown Library. Thursday, April 15, 2010
March 2010
Robyn O’Neil: Origins of the Universe
Wunderkind artist Robyn O’Neil (at the Des Moines Art Center through May 23) stalks both high and low culture for stimulation.
“I read the classics. Except for Cormac McCarthy, that’s about all I read. Walt Whitman, Nabokov, I just finished the complete Proust thing,” she said, before admitting a rather different influence.
“I love bad TV. I have it on all the time while I work,” she revealed, adding that her alter ego is a character from “Roseanne.”
“Darlene Connor is my hero. We’re virtually the same age, grew up together,” O’Neil explained.
The Texan resembles Roseanne‘s younger daughter in many ways. Both grew up in “average Middle American households” and were usually the smartest person in whatever room they occupied. Both depended upon dark humor to muddle through their teenage years with “jerk” boy friends, and both went off to art school in Chicago only to discover they missed their fathers terribly.
"Most people see me and assume the artist is late. They can’t believe these expressions come out of this demeanor. I work at it. I am product of polite Midwestern moral responsibility that demands one be cheerful amongst others. It‘s a good thing I spend most of my time alone, other than with my dog. I couldn’t handle a real social life with a job. I break down and cry when I am alone, for reasons I couldn’t explain to others.
"I need that. I have to pace. When this opening is over, I will not explore Des Moines, I will shut myself in my hotel room and read. That’s how I do it. Patrica Highsmith wrote that imagination functions better when you don’t have to speak to people. I believe that," she said.
Had she been real, Darlene Connor might have created the darkly humorous universe that O’Neil etched
“obsessively” over seven years with the nothing more than the smallest lead pencil and the largest commercial paper. That universe is populated by funny little men in track suits and sneakers, modeled after the death shrouds of the Heaven’s Gate suicide cult. Her men behave badly and not so badly, balancing acts of cruelty and brotherhood.
"These are my melancholy worlds, I don’t use models, it’s all my imagination. I admire the Italian Renaissance painters sense of perspective, how buildings have an unnatural awkward relationship to landscapes. My men float awkwardly like that. Unlike trees, I don’t really let them fit in, they float on the landscape, sometimes without even casting a shadow," she explained.
O’Neil gives cynical titles to her works:
“Everything that stands will be at odds with its neighbor and everything that falls will perish without grace.”
“As Ye the sinister creep and feign, those once held become those now slain.”
“As darkness falls on this heartless land, my brother holds tight my feeble hand.”
“As my heart quiets and my body dies, take me gently through your troubled sky.”
“Oh how the heartless haunt us all”
Such titles were grave enough that Artforum magazine attributed them to the “Book of Revelations.”
“That was flattering. Someone thought something I wrote sounded Biblical,” she said, before revealing that Goya’s “Disasters of War” were an inspiration for her vision.
“Who doesn’t love that?” she asked.
In O’Neil’s drawings, men are always secondary to Mother Nature. Trees, owls, bison, dogs and horses cast shadows in some works in which her soulless men do not. The latter indeed die without grace, while her trees perish in magnificent splendor and her talon-bearing oceans and skies reveal superhuman countenances.
"I am a severe weather watcher, I am obsessed with that too. I mean I am one of those geeky people who calls in weather news to the TV station. It comes from growing up in Omaha and North Texas."
Her series concludes dramatically with the end of mankind.
“That was my intention from the beginning. That’s why I never drew a woman, to remove their hope of procreation,” she explained.
Her final survivor is last seen desperately clinging to a tightrope above a sea of wrath. O’Neil thought his fate was obvious.
"I always knew I would kill all the men off. I just didn’t know when till it was time. I could have ridden off into the sunset with the men too. Could have made a nice living continuing to draw them, that’s what people want. People love these goofy guys but I could care less. They’re too goofy for me now.
"I don’t see the world that way anymore. I have a little more respect from human life now. I see the world in quieter tones, more somber and less anxious than before. I have grown more comfortable with melancholy," she explained.
The more confortable O'Neill takes others unexpected. For all practical purposes, this writer found her to be a rather cheerful young lady. She laughed when I told her that.
“People have trouble with how devastating my work is. One sweet old lady in Dallas told me that she believed he was going to climb right on up to Heaven. I guess I got what I deserved, but hat’s not how I see it,” she said.
She's not so comfortable that she wants her photo taken. After I snapped her she asked that I never publish it anywhere. Preferring to deal with the cheerful persona, I promised.
Two drawings in the Art Center show portend O’Neil’s future. One is a take on Caspar David Friedrich’s depiction of a poem by Goethe, the super ego of Romanticism and the original reconciler of high and low cultures.
"Even a purely romantic scene like that, I was drawn to the idea of a black & white rainbow - not exactly hopeful. I can’t help imposing a down note even in romance. Bird of prey die mating in free fall. That’s romantic, " she confessed.
The other places her doomed tribe within the medieval legend of Magonia - a mysterious place beyond the clouds that has inspired true believers inpredetermination, utopia, and UFO sightings. O’Neil says she’s putting her pencil down to work on an opera about that footnote to France’s Dark Ages. She brought her composer to Des Moines - Chicago singer-songwriter Daniel Knox who shares style with Tom Waits, a view point with Randy Newman and a first name with Darlene Connor’s dad. O’Neil said she’d never even listened to an opera until she was urged to write one about Magonia, by Werner Herzog. But, that’s another story in Robyn O’Neil’s brilliant career.
Touts
From Our Hands won the Niche Award for the nation’s best retail art stores… Chris Vance’s new exhibition opened at Moberg Gallery after the artist’s smash debut in Denver, where 22 of his paintings sold on the opening weekend at 44T Art Space…
Wunderkind artist Robyn O’Neil (at the Des Moines Art Center through May 23) stalks both high and low culture for stimulation.“I read the classics. Except for Cormac McCarthy, that’s about all I read. Walt Whitman, Nabokov, I just finished the complete Proust thing,” she said, before admitting a rather different influence.
“I love bad TV. I have it on all the time while I work,” she revealed, adding that her alter ego is a character from “Roseanne.”
“Darlene Connor is my hero. We’re virtually the same age, grew up together,” O’Neil explained.
The Texan resembles Roseanne‘s younger daughter in many ways. Both grew up in “average Middle American households” and were usually the smartest person in whatever room they occupied. Both depended upon dark humor to muddle through their teenage years with “jerk” boy friends, and both went off to art school in Chicago only to discover they missed their fathers terribly.
"Most people see me and assume the artist is late. They can’t believe these expressions come out of this demeanor. I work at it. I am product of polite Midwestern moral responsibility that demands one be cheerful amongst others. It‘s a good thing I spend most of my time alone, other than with my dog. I couldn’t handle a real social life with a job. I break down and cry when I am alone, for reasons I couldn’t explain to others.
"I need that. I have to pace. When this opening is over, I will not explore Des Moines, I will shut myself in my hotel room and read. That’s how I do it. Patrica Highsmith wrote that imagination functions better when you don’t have to speak to people. I believe that," she said.
Had she been real, Darlene Connor might have created the darkly humorous universe that O’Neil etched
“obsessively” over seven years with the nothing more than the smallest lead pencil and the largest commercial paper. That universe is populated by funny little men in track suits and sneakers, modeled after the death shrouds of the Heaven’s Gate suicide cult. Her men behave badly and not so badly, balancing acts of cruelty and brotherhood."These are my melancholy worlds, I don’t use models, it’s all my imagination. I admire the Italian Renaissance painters sense of perspective, how buildings have an unnatural awkward relationship to landscapes. My men float awkwardly like that. Unlike trees, I don’t really let them fit in, they float on the landscape, sometimes without even casting a shadow," she explained.
O’Neil gives cynical titles to her works:
“Everything that stands will be at odds with its neighbor and everything that falls will perish without grace.”
“As Ye the sinister creep and feign, those once held become those now slain.”
“As darkness falls on this heartless land, my brother holds tight my feeble hand.”
“As my heart quiets and my body dies, take me gently through your troubled sky.”
“Oh how the heartless haunt us all”
Such titles were grave enough that Artforum magazine attributed them to the “Book of Revelations.”
“That was flattering. Someone thought something I wrote sounded Biblical,” she said, before revealing that Goya’s “Disasters of War” were an inspiration for her vision.
“Who doesn’t love that?” she asked.
In O’Neil’s drawings, men are always secondary to Mother Nature. Trees, owls, bison, dogs and horses cast shadows in some works in which her soulless men do not. The latter indeed die without grace, while her trees perish in magnificent splendor and her talon-bearing oceans and skies reveal superhuman countenances."I am a severe weather watcher, I am obsessed with that too. I mean I am one of those geeky people who calls in weather news to the TV station. It comes from growing up in Omaha and North Texas."
Her series concludes dramatically with the end of mankind.
“That was my intention from the beginning. That’s why I never drew a woman, to remove their hope of procreation,” she explained.
Her final survivor is last seen desperately clinging to a tightrope above a sea of wrath. O’Neil thought his fate was obvious.
"I always knew I would kill all the men off. I just didn’t know when till it was time. I could have ridden off into the sunset with the men too. Could have made a nice living continuing to draw them, that’s what people want. People love these goofy guys but I could care less. They’re too goofy for me now.
"I don’t see the world that way anymore. I have a little more respect from human life now. I see the world in quieter tones, more somber and less anxious than before. I have grown more comfortable with melancholy," she explained.
The more confortable O'Neill takes others unexpected. For all practical purposes, this writer found her to be a rather cheerful young lady. She laughed when I told her that.
“People have trouble with how devastating my work is. One sweet old lady in Dallas told me that she believed he was going to climb right on up to Heaven. I guess I got what I deserved, but hat’s not how I see it,” she said.
She's not so comfortable that she wants her photo taken. After I snapped her she asked that I never publish it anywhere. Preferring to deal with the cheerful persona, I promised.
Two drawings in the Art Center show portend O’Neil’s future. One is a take on Caspar David Friedrich’s depiction of a poem by Goethe, the super ego of Romanticism and the original reconciler of high and low cultures.
"Even a purely romantic scene like that, I was drawn to the idea of a black & white rainbow - not exactly hopeful. I can’t help imposing a down note even in romance. Bird of prey die mating in free fall. That’s romantic, " she confessed.
The other places her doomed tribe within the medieval legend of Magonia - a mysterious place beyond the clouds that has inspired true believers inpredetermination, utopia, and UFO sightings. O’Neil says she’s putting her pencil down to work on an opera about that footnote to France’s Dark Ages. She brought her composer to Des Moines - Chicago singer-songwriter Daniel Knox who shares style with Tom Waits, a view point with Randy Newman and a first name with Darlene Connor’s dad. O’Neil said she’d never even listened to an opera until she was urged to write one about Magonia, by Werner Herzog. But, that’s another story in Robyn O’Neil’s brilliant career.
Touts
From Our Hands won the Niche Award for the nation’s best retail art stores… Chris Vance’s new exhibition opened at Moberg Gallery after the artist’s smash debut in Denver, where 22 of his paintings sold on the opening weekend at 44T Art Space…
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