Artma 2016

Artma, the biennial art auction event held in Denver to benefit research areas of childhood cancer was held again this year on February 20th. 
I've participated in every iteration since its inception, including this year, although just barely.  What with the upheaval of our move and the condensing of studio and home into a smaller home with ad hoc studio and storage space, I nearly didn't make the deadline.  In fact I actually missed the deadline, but the organizers still welcomed my last minute contribution. 

Flattened Buoy, Red 2012

The work I donated is a 2012 drawing done while on residency on Norton Island in Maine.  The pastel drawing is one of several I made inspired by the colorful buoys arrayed in the waters around the island and washed up on the shore.  Buoys were even re-purposed to mark the trails cutting through the woods of the island.  The drawings were kind of schematic dissections of the buoys; a not so strict rendering of them as if they had been flayed and flattened.

A group of buoy, and other, drawings in process on Norton Island in 2012.

Artma benefit art auction taking place Feb 8, in the Denver area

You may have thought, "Gee, 2014 is an even numbered year, and Artma must be just around the corner." If, indeed, you had that thought, then you were right on the money.  Artma, the biennial event and art auction to fund pediatric cancer research through the Morgan Adams Memorial Neuro-Oncology fund is happening on Saturday, February 8th, in Broomfield, CO. 

I'm very pleased to have contributed artwork for every Artma event since it's inception.  This year my contribution is a painting constituted of a grid of four smaller canvases.  This painting is part of the body of work that I've been creating as a response to my 2012 "residency" in Geneva, CH. 

If you're in the Denver area, I encourage you to visit the Artma site and find out more about the event and the artists participating.  Tickets are on sale now.

Trix of Memory, 2013, oil on canvas, 22"x28"

4x4x4 @ EDGE in Denver, CO.

The Immigration Game: Chutes, acrylic on canvas.

I currently four tiny paintings on view in the exhibit 4x4x4 at EDGE in Denver, CO.  

Four paintings measuring 4"x4".

Theses small paintings came about through email exchanges with Denver painter Jennifer Hope, who invited me to participate in the exhibit.  Our desire was to have both our contributions relate to one another, if not as a direct collaboration.  Jennifer was interested in tackling the subject of immigration reform 4" at a time.  I was game, and what followed was a back and forth that brought us to perceiving the subject as a game itself.  On all levels of the subject of immigration you have opposing forces at odds, with quite different objectives and strategies for attaining those objectives.  I was most engaged with imagining an objectification of the game on the ground; those physically maneuvering to gain entrance and stability here in this Candy Land and those working to prevent breaches in the border, and root out those interlopers who have gained purchase on the board.

The Immigration Game: Rolling Bones, acrylic on canvas, cotton sock.

We looked immediately to the notion of board games and the imagery therein and that moved our conversation forward.  I haven't seen Jennifer's final works, or the nature of our joint installation, but I'm anxious to see how it turned out.

The making of these works intersected with a moment of learning to read Ellsworth Kelly's Chatham Series of paintings that are currently on view at MoMA through September 8.  It's not a body of work that immediately speaks to me, so I spent some intention filled time working through my relationship with this work which in turn, influenced greatly the direction of these four tiny things.  Another process of initial intent and subsequent forays into fancy.   Almost by unconscious default, the result is a repeated expression of oppositional dualities. 

The Immigration Game: Ladders, acrylic on canvas.

The Immigration Game: For Us/Porous, acrylic on canvas.

4x4x4 is on view through July 14th.  There will be a second reception at EDGE on Friday, July 5 from 6-10pm.


The complete list of participating artists are:

Colby Brumit w/ Barbara Hale
Laura Phelps Rogers w/ Joe Short
Jessica Loving w/ Chris Campos
Rachael Amos w/ Sarah Clark
Faith Williams w/ Kevin Bell
Gayla Lemke w/ Marieke Bauer
Jennifer Hope w/ Chris Albert
Genevieve Yazzie w/ Susan Erikson
Dania Pettus w/ Sarah Doremus
Frederick Pichon w/ Madeleine Dodge
Michael McGrath
Dennis Stowell

Shallow Storage

from left to right: One White Duck, Betrayal, Estauns Interius, O' Fortuna.

One of my tasks while in Denver recently was to contend with my storage space, which I intended to cut in half.  What is in storage is mostly artworks, my own and that of others that I have acquired, and some books and personal miscellany.
The new smaller storage space did not allow space enough for several larger works.  My solution to this was to take several of these works to my buddy Cole's place.  Cole has an abundance of wall space and a desire to act as ward for these things.
Reflecting on things that we keep and the cost associated with keeping them leads to many questioning of value.  It's an act of luxury to ponder the fate of acquired objects.  But as an artist - one who makes things, it's a constant point of consideration.

Estuans Interius & O' Fortuna, 1997

The works taken over to Cole's place largely date from 1997-1999 and many of them painted after I returned to Denver from living in Miami Beach and Cole and I were roommates.  The prospect of bringing these works into the sunlight for a period of time got me thinking of the possibility of reexamining the paintings to determine whether they're worth paying to store or not.

This opened the door to the idea of a self instigated residency in which I would return to Denver next year, set myself up at Cole's place and rework/work over those pieces that I deem lacking - and make them worth paying to store.

Betrayal, 1997

One White Duck, 1997

Looking at some of these works out in the open again, I find most of them are of their moment and may not warrant a do over.  There are a couple of large works that are still in storage that will come out and will definitely go back under the knife.

Vantage: Longview, 1998

For a period when we were living together, Cole and I hosted a stretch of Saturday "salons".  a group of friends came over every week and we'd record improve jam sessions, play surreal poetry games and create collaborative visual works.  These sessions were immensely fun, creatively provocative and spawned some meaningful artworks for me.
My memory is that for a while these get togethers were fairly sustained.  There's a bit of a utopian veil that that guazes over my view on that period.  It was an expression of pure, fun creative interaction, unburdened by expectations of outcome  (although, knowing my mind as I do, I must have projected some outcome expectations of our activities at the time).

A group of watercolors from 1999-2000 on the left and on the right, an arrangement of Genesis paintings from 2007. 

Three of these works are watercolors from 1999-2000, the lower left work is by another artist.

In a moment of personal awareness, hanging the Genesis paintings near the small watercolors that were already there, I saw a relationship, compositionally and chromatically between these two bodies of work which I had never considered.

Trapt, 1997on the left and on the right, a tagteam collagoration with Yackel, 1998ish,

I'm expecting this residency, lasting 2 to 3 weeks, to happen sometime next year, will be a slight revisitation of that moment.  Interacting with Cole and other collaborators, open endedly producing sound and visuals.  I expect also that the thrust of my activity during this period will be framed with the intention of contending with storage (and the objects within) in a different, studio based way.
I'm thinking of pulling out the artworks of others that have unfortunately been packed away since moving to NY and live with them again, reflect on them, respond to them.  I also plan on placing the items I have in storage into service in the making of new work....allowing them to earn there keep, as it were, beyond dusty mementos.

These Plastic Shoes Carry The Scars From My Life With Pa, 1997

These Plastic Shoes is one of the works directly inspired by these Saturday get togethers.  Inspired, really by a particularly brilliant line of incidental poetry.  It's a multi-part painting, measuring something like 50"x60", the parts of which have been slowly been distributed among folks who have been important to me in my life.  Below are two of the constituent parts.  The remaining parts are sitting in a box in the storage space and they will certainly make their way out during this residency.

The March of Nature

Untitled, 2003, wood, paint, glass....living vines and dead antlers

This sculpture from 2003 has been hanging on the wall behind Phyllis Lerud's garage in Denver since I finished it.  I was glad, on this recent trip, to spy it in this condition of nature overcoming it, and augmented by a small rack of antlers pinned between the work and the wall.

Can you un-know this man?

Nancy Switzer, "Can Wall v.6 Violet Fusion",  oil on canvas, 60"x60" ©2009 Nancy Switzer

My reading yesterday, in Lewis Hyde's Trickster Makes This World, both served as a continuation from the previous post and reminding me of an experience of seeing a work that informs the same topic .  While in Denver, I saw a painting by Nancy Switzer that embodies the the best balance between the recognizable and the un- mentioned on the previous post.  I couldn't find an image of the painting online, so I grabbed another from the artist's website which points to this balance, one of her "can wall" works.  For me, the works of her Can Walls are the most compelling because they ride the line of that duality, although in this case, it's to a lesser degree than the painting I'm remembering.   Switzer's work focuses on sundries from the pantry; tin cans, cutlery, fish laid out on a surface.  Her paint application  is thick and generally contours around the forms of she depicts. 
I don't know the name of the painting I saw in that residence outside of Denver, but, like the work seen above, it is large and square.   The square is a nearly all over painting of predominantly grey tone, except for a band of black, perhaps 8" talk along the top of the work.  The division between this blackish band and the rest of the body is a little uneven, making for a slightly irregular - and high - horizon line.  The first analogy that comes to mind is to that of a late grey Rothko, but the field of grey is actually a melange of colors, applied thickly - almost to the degree of a Freud, except less brutally applied.  The overall grey effect is also not alien to Freud's palette, there are dustings of pure hues,  but The swells of paint are applied more conscientiously, flowingly.  Thatched is a word to describe the body of this field, not unlike a Kiefer landscape.  I know it's gauche to describe any work through the similarities it to the works of others...but such are the difficulties of conveying a vivid description.
It's a profound work.  Heavy.  The painting is as arresting as a Rothko is.  It's more captivating and assured in its subtle presence than any other recently produced painting I can remember encountering. 

Unfamiliar with Switzers' subject matter when I first noticed the painting, I was surprised to learn that the work is a representation of a large array of silver utensils on a surface.  Similar in nature to the painting below, the work I'm describing renders the subject far more ambigously.

Nancy Switzer, Long Silver Scatter, oil on canvas. via claggettrey.com

The great effect of this work is that once one knows the subject, one can read (roughly, but satisfyingly) what's being represented, but this layer of recognition doesn't detract at all from the process of knowing this piece.  So often the learning what a piece is "about" (or what it "is") affects negatively that process of knowing a work for oneself.  Essentially, never being to unknow what you've learned in order to get back to that primary moment of introduction to a work.  Unlike most work, this work doesn't close that door on your experience.  It has the unique quality of allowing one to pass through that threshold  - in both directions.  It's a shame I can't show you.

In Trickster Makes This World, Hyde happened to offer up a few a passage on the very nature of recognition.  In describing Andre Serrano's Piss Christ, he writes:

Serrano seemed to me to be playing with the old problem of recognition.  How do we see what's really in front of us?  The swineherd meets Odysseus on the beach, but does not know him.  Why can't he see what's there?  How does the mind recognize the real meaning of what the senses offer up?  Conjoining an abstracted Christ and the human body, specifically the body we deny and turn away from, the blood and excreta from which we normally avert the eye, Serrano's image seemed to me to ask what the Roman soldiers asked Peter: "Do you know this man?

It's a real tortoise/hare race between our senses and our mind.  That the two are in competition - or I might say that it's the mind, full of all it's embedded agendas, which is in competition, the senses simply are - makes understandable the misinterpretations and inabilities to see what's in front of us.

In following some rabbit holes in writing this post, I came across this post on the Peripheral Visions blog which mentions the Lawrence Weschler book Everything That Rises: A Book on Convergences, a work I hadn't heard of, but will check out.  Convergence is much of what it's all about.

August in Denver

At the Denver Art Museum: The Big Sweep by Coos van Bruggen and Claus Oldenberg, Lawrence Weiner's 

"As To Be in Plain Sight" across the street and you can just make out the Red Grooms "Shoot Out" to the right, on the roof.

I didn't get around to see much art on my short trip back to Denver in August.

This exhibition is headlining at the Denver Art Museum through Jan 9, 2011.  

I decided to pass.

Locking Piece.

I made a point of checking out the installation of Henry Moore sculptures at the Denver Botanic Gardens.  The nine month long exhibit places 20 of the artist's sizable works throughout the grounds. 
Visiting the Botanic gardens is one of the most urbane experiences Denver has to offer and the presence of these works just piles on that effect.
There are very few vistas in the gardens that belie urban surroundings beyond the perimeter of foliage.  The pervasively visible border between the natural and the constructed enhances the experience of the sculptures - from my view.  In most cases the sculptures, arrayed within the sweep of flora were seen in relation with some other architectural or man made detail within the field of view.  In the few instances, such as in the image directly below, where a work rests in isolation amidst a believably natural setting, the effect feels forced and contrived.  It's a great exhibit made even better by the ability to experience through the procession of seasons.

Large Totem Head

Large Reclining Figure

Reclining Figure: Arch Leg

Knife Edge Two Piece

Hill Arches

Goslar Warrior

Above and below: opposing views of Oval with Points

Three Piece Reclining Figure: Draped

And then:

At the time, I puzzled over what this was trying to say - or why it needed to be said. 

Now I just don't know why it's on a bumper sticker.

Works On Paper Sale in Denver - August 7, 2010 12-5pm

 

On Saturday August 7- in Denver-, I'll be holding a sale of works on paper - a Trunk Sale of works on paper.  I'll be including drawings, paintings, collages, prints and anything else I can dig up from the past 15 years or so.  For this sales extravaganza, I'll be returning to my old 'hood in Denver's Golden Triangle.  Michele Mosko has generously offered the use of her gallery Michele Mosko Fine Art at 136 W 12th Ave for the day.

If you or someone you love is in Denver and in need for a little bit of artwork to get you through the rest of the Summer, then this is the event for you.   Feel free pass this along. 

I'll be posting updates here on the blog and on my website at www.christopheralbert.com/events

Meet yer Maykr: Lauri Lynnxe Murphy

Lauri Lynnxe Murphy has been a staple in the Denver art scene for some twenty years.  She's had her finger as a member/and or founder of a number of artist initiate groups and venues throughout the city.  Lauri is preparing for a change as she is shipping of to Ohio later in the year to embark on the MFA adventure.  In preparation for this pending event, LLM is holding an all out clearing sale this weekend in the wonder emporium she calls a studio.While in Denver last November, I stopped into the Curtis Park garage to pick up her kork advent contribution (Dec 3.) (Previously, in July of last year, LLM cultivated a heretofore unknown life form on the board of
Below are images from my brief studio visit:

 The space is pretty enormous, and although it has been shared among (three people, I think) there's no doubt that LLM's projects take up the bulk of the space.  The density of materiel and the breadth of projects made this joint feel particularly homey for me.

I likes me that herringbone pattern - in whatever form it takes.

I think this is when, overwhelmed, I started getting dizzy.

Several days prior to my studio visit,  LLM had an opening at Plastic Chapel which I was able to take in, accompanied, by chance, by fellow Beacon (and kork) artist, Elia Gurna.  The exhibit consisted of a menage of wall mounted roccoco wormlike tubers that had a very rococco quality.

On Colfax, a walking version of an LLM work in the micro blizzard that greeted us on leaving the show.

Lauri is currently organizing and curating the exhibit Objectophilia which is opening on June 30, 2010 and is part of the Biennial of the Americas being held in Denver during the month of July.

Here's a link to all of the Meet yer Maykr studio visits over at maykr.com