and it keeps on giving!
http://untitledartshow.com/?p=2188
Check out the Katie Caron and Martha Russo interview on The Untitled Art Show.
Today’s Feature Artist
- Karin Davis, between what i see and what i know, 6′x3.5′x2′
an excerpt from http://www.rmcad.edu/gallery-exhibitions/rude-gallery/karin-davis-2011-07-08-2011-08-05
“In her often delicate, formal sculptures, Karin Davis engages with tangible materials as a way to connect with and know the world. Her approach to art is rooted in the experience of sensory pleasure and delight; both in the process of making and the nature of the finished work. Her pieces frequently exist in the realm of the humble and awkward, teetering between form and formlessness, made and unmade. While embodying the touch of the artist’s hand, they also present the possibility of having made themselves.”
Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Davis received her BFA from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She currently works toward her MFA at the University of Colorado-Boulder.
Today’s Feature Artist
Pattie Lee Becker. What I Thought Was Once Mine is Now Ours.
An excerpt from the artist’s website: http://www.pattieleebecker.com/
Pattie Lee Becker’s work resides in the complex space that connects humans with their physical and psychological landscape. Personal stories are transformed into imaginative invention. Color and pattern narrate; images conjure both the familiar and the fantastic.
Raised in the great Midwest, Pattie Lee spent her childhood surrounded by prairie and open sky. After graduating from Rhode Island School of Design, she moved her studio to Brooklyn, NY, where she spent a decade developing her work before relocating to the Rocky Mountains. Pattie Lee holds an MFA from Columbia University’s School of the Arts and has been awarded numerous residencies and fellowships.
Check out the image of her piece in the gallery in Michael Paglia’s review here at this link:
http://www.westword.com/2012-02-23/culture/ice-cube-gallery-icebreaker-show/
Icebreaker 3 presents a mix of little-known and established artists
This year’s juried annual at Ice Cube Gallery, Icebreaker3, includes works selected by Denver Art Museum curator Gwen Chanzit, who also designed the installation. Though Chanzit took an inclusive approach, she laid out the show coherently by grouping together works with stylistic affinities.
Owing, no doubt, to Chanzit’s position, a number of established artists who might not have been expected to enter a juried show entered this one — artists such as Joellyn Duesberry, Peter Illig, Irene Delka McCray, Susan Goldstein and Annalee Schorr. Most of the show, however, is populated with works by little-known artists, which is what makes it so interesting.
You can’t miss the tornado funnel cloud of foam rubber and other materials by Pattie Lee Becker (pictured) that twists from floor to ceiling. Another example of a sculpture made from soft materials is the fuzzy stile by Karin Davis. A very different sensibility informs the anything-but-soft abstract sculpture constructed from pre-painted found metal by Maureen Hearty. And Wendy Franzen‘s piece is very nice, as are the split wood and aluminum panels by Mai Wyn Schantz. Among the abstract paintings are strong entries by Lydia Riegle and Adam Holloway.
In the relatively short span of three years, Ice Cube Gallery has rapidly risen to the top ranks of Denver’s exhibition scene. The co-op’s members do a lot of things right, and they have an impressive facility. But there is one thing that I think is wrong: Ice Cube members are allowed to enter the Icebreaker shows. This virtually unheard-of practice inevitably gives the appearance of favoritism, an impression only encouraged by the many members who wound up getting into the show. Even if the jurying was fairly done — which I’m absolutely sure it was, given Chanzit’s character — it looks suspicious. When I was juror the first year, I made this complaint in person. Now I’m making it in print: The Ice Cubers need to recuse themselves next time.
Icebreakers3 at Ice Cube (3320 Walnut Street, 303-292-1822, www.icecubegallery.com) closes February 25.
A review of Icebreaker3 by Christopher Fox
From Christopher Fox an artist who shows regularly at Abend Gallery, a review of the work posted on his website http://www.denverdart.com/ http://www.denverdart.com/tag/christopher-fox/.
Icebreaker3: Review
Raise your glass to Ice Cube Gallery on 33rd & Walnut, because Icebreaker3, on display through February 25th, deserves a toast. With over 500 submitted works to choose from, juror Gwen Chanzit (curator of modern and contemporary collections at the Denver Art Museum) certainly could have taken any perspective she wanted. But it’s clear that she worked closely with Ice Cube and wisely chose artistic vision as the thread that ties each artist to the next on display, and the mix works.
Adam Milner’s offering, “Letters to people that should never read them,” is hilarious and engaging. It’s two rows of five letters, all addressing scorned affection, but executed in a way that explores censorship, anonymity and the sometimes painful process of human interaction with great results. You’re left wanting to know more: who were they and what happened? Did she really call him that? It’s raw and engaging, without being lewd or overtly hateful.
Lydia Riegle’s piece “Audacity” is beautiful. The staccatos and adagios of her brushwork are exquisite. The color palette is restive, grounded with rich ochre yellows, dove greys and deep umbers to keep the piece substantial and dignified.
We’re still processing Mai Wyn Schnatz’s “Splitting wood: Walnut,” and “Splitting wood: Pine,” but we know we love them. She floats a painted film of chopped firewood on brushed aluminum panels, and as a collection of graphic images they pack a lot of personality–not an easy task when your subject is firewood. But she pulls it off, and the panels stake a claim for their space in a worthy way.
We were also glad to see that Gwen Chanzit juried in “Diane Arbus photographing the Doppelganger twins,” by Sally Stockhold. Stockhold’s “Myselfportraits” series, with new works in the series displayed almost annually at Spark Gallery since 2006, is in our humble opinion one of the most significant bodies of work in the genre of photographic self-portraits a living Denver artist has produced. That’s primarily because the scope of her project has been an immensely time-consuming affair, but also because she’s fabulously talented when it comes to self-analysis. The amount of energy and time she puts into each scenario is admirable, and they always reveal different aspects of her personality in a slightly humorous, self-mocking way—she’s always engaged and actively analyzing, but it never feels tortured or burdensome.
Bonnie Ferril-Roman’s handmade paper and wire installation, “Continuum/Interrupted Conversations,” is an absolute jaw-dropper. The central figure of the grouping, or continuum, is an illuminated handmade paper sculpture of what we believe is the artist’s rendering of her own body while pregnant. It is stunning. She’s surrounded this form with tightly coiled handwritten notes (interrupted conversations) held within floating spheres, and punctuated this hovering and magical universe with spiraled trails. The overall effect is dazzling at minimum, and Ferril-Roman turns an otherwise unfortunate placement in the show into a vortex of self-revelation, life-giving intimacy and dialogue. You are seeing the work of an artist who has clearly made the passage not only into motherhood, but into a new phase of conceptual maturity and mastery of her medium.
Other works that caught our eye were Sharon Bond Brown’s “Family Portrait,” Carol Browning’s “Simple Truth,” and Tyler Vorhees’s “The Lector.” All three are wonderful efforts that deserve a second look.
The show’s great. Go, already.
