Real Time dances with the Concrete River at Alfons Gallery

If you're following my work I expect you know that I and my collaborator Melanie Ariens have a major exhibit currently on display at the Alfons Gallery, called "Concrete River: Memorial and Promise on the Kinnickinnic." (If you missed my earlier description of it, click here.)

I am excited to announce that Daniel and Andrea Burkholder are planning to perform a dance that they've created especially for the installation. The performance is on July 1 at 7 PM.

Alfons Gallery is located at 1501 S. Layton Blvd.

"Real Time" is a regular feature held on the first Friday of each month.

This is how they describe the program:
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July’s Real Time performance will draw inspiration from Eddee Daniel’s photography exhibit, Concrete River: Memorial and Promise on the Kinnickinnic, installed at Alfons Gallery, by exploring the inherent tension within the exhibit’s photographs of “urban wilderness.” Real Time will engage these photographs and gallery installation through their subject matter, the beauty of form found in them, as well as the absurdity.

As a 30-minute performance which will repeat, non-stop, three times, the audience is invited to enter and exit the event at their pleasure or whim.

Integrated throughout the performance will be opportunities for the audience to discuss with the performers, Andrea and Daniel Burkholder, as well as photographer Eddee Daniel and environmental artist Melanie Ariens about the art work, the performance, and ecological issues.

Wine and seltzer water will be available, without charge, as part of the discussion with the artists. 

The performance series is completely funded by its open-priced ticket structure. The cash-only tickets go on sale beginning at 6:45pm and are available pay-what-you-will, where the audience puts it’s own value on the live art it comes to see. While NOT a donation format- everyone must pay- the payment is meant to reflect what each individual can afford.

Real Time is curated by Andrea Chastant Burkholder and Daniel Burkholder. It has featured aerial dance from Andrea Chastant Burkholder, improvisational dance from Daniel Burkholder, duets from the two of them, as well as solos and collaborative work with guest artists from Milwaukee and elsewhere in the United States. All shows in the series offer a new insight into the performance form of dance and what it can encompass. With each show lasting one hour or under, there is always time for drinks and conversation at the end of the night.

“We are working to meet our community where it’s at as far as seeing the arts, and from there, we hope to develop together as performers, audience, and as a larger community.” says Andrea Chastant Burkholder one of the creators of Real Time.

Full disclosure: This is not my first collaboration with the Burkholders. In April Andrea invited me to collaborate on her program, Bayou's State, at Danceworks. And in May I was an enchanted witness to their tribute to nature in the open-air and traveling performance of Scenic Route MKE. It has been a great pleasure to be a part of their creative endeavors.

Nothing Kills A River Like Concrete: Exhibit invitation

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Concrete River: 

Memorial and Promise on the Kinnickinnic River

Photography by Eddee Daniel

Collaborative shrine and installation with Melanie Ariens

Alfons Gallery

1501 S. Layton Blvd., Milwaukee, WI

Opening reception: May 22, 1 - 3 pm. 

Artist's remarks: 2 pm.

I hope you'll join me and Melanie for this event. This will not be an ordinary photo exhibit. We plan an installation that will make the gallery feel like the concrete channel.

Exhibit runs through July 31

Gallery hours:

Wed, Thu, Fri, Sun 12 - 3 pm

and by appointment.

For more information: Alfons Gallery website.

Artist's Statement:

Nothing kills a river like concrete. How we treat rivers is suggestive of how we relate to the natural world in general.

Historically, rivers have been central to the growth of human civilization. This was as true at the founding of Milwaukee as it was in the Fertile Crescent between the Tigris and Euphrates. Somehow, though, in the late twentieth century, our modern society lost sight of this vital truth. Milwaukee’s three rivers suffered many abuses, including habitat loss, pollution and dams.

But there’s nothing like pouring concrete into it, essentially transforming it into a drainage ditch, to signal the destruction of a river. Sections of other rivers and creeks in the Milwaukee River watershed were subject to this debasement, but the Kinnickinnic River suffered the most.

In the 1960s the KK, as it is still affectionately known, was straightened and lined with concrete in order to mitigate flooding problems in the surrounding neighborhood. Although at the time this dramatic action did provide some relief from the risk of flooding, it also compromised the river in significant ways. The concrete channel destroyed aquatic and riparian habitats, degraded water quality, and increased the risk of drowning during high water flows. Ironically, today even the original intent of the channelization has become outdated and ineffective for flood control.

Fortunately, for the river and for the community, attitudes have once again shifted. Caring for and revitalizing rivers has captured the public imagination. On the KK the current solution is a project to remove the concrete channel and restore the river to a more natural condition. When I was invited by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District to document the project area I jumped at the opportunity. It’s exactly the kind of subject to which I am drawn.

 

The KK River Project, officially known as the Kinnickinnic River Corridor Neighborhood Plan, is a joint endeavor by the MMSD and the Sixteenth Street Community Health Center. The project area is located between 6^th Street and 27^th Street. (An earlier phase of the project, completed in 2012, removed the concrete channel downstream from 6^th St.) The 50-ft. wide concrete channel is to be removed and a 200 ft.-wide rock-lined river channel created. This has necessitated the acquisition and deconstruction of 83 homes in order to accommodate the wider river. Although most of those houses had already been removed, I witnessed and documented the deconstruction of several of the few remaining.

Because the project is in its early phases, most of the images in this exhibit depict the river’s current state as a concrete channel. Furthermore, the installation itself is intended to reinforce the claustrophobic and treacherous conditions that exist. In order to represent the more hopeful future of the KK, I have invited environmental artist Melanie Ariens to collaborate with me on a water shrine to signify the restored vitality that is envisioned in the KK River Project.

See more of my KK River photos in my Flickr album. 

The split personality of the NGV

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

From "Enclave," by Richard Mosse

The NGV, as it is commonly known, has a split personality and is literally divided into two campuses.

The Ian Potter Center: NGV Australia specializes in art of Australian origins, both indigenous and not, from colonial to contemporary. It is a major responsibility for a continent-sized country.

But then again, the NGV International, like so many “encyclopedic” museums in other cities around the globe, attempts to represent the entire rest of the world.

I spent more time in the Ian Potter Center but I managed to catch a few things at the International as well.

Here is a very small selection of things that caught my eye.

Ian Potter Center: NGV Australia

In this multi-media installation by Adam Goodrum, the immaterial aspects—cast light and shadows on the walls—seemed more substantial than the sculptural bit made of polymer resin at its center.

I very much enjoyed the indigenous works on display, some of which were historical and some contemporary.

This detail from a painted Eucalyptus pole was made in 2003 by Gawirrin Gumana of the Guyamirrilil people of the Northern Territory.

I especially enjoyed seeing traditional works displayed in proximity to more modern and non-indigenous works of art.

Having recently experienced Australian wildlife for the first time ever, I was drawn to indigenous representations such as this kangaroo by Robin Nganjmirra of the Northern Territory.

I’d seen kangaroos several times in the wild by this point in my trip. This one, however, was in a wildlife park, which enabled me to get close up and personal. In fact, they eat out of your hand like goats in a petting zoo.

However, I learned the hard way not to let the emus eat from my hand. Fierce creatures; they definitely bore a familial resemblance to velociraptors.

This sculpted representation was made from actual emu feathers and other fibres by Treahna Hamm of Wodonga, Victoria.

This modern piece was made circa 1962 by Godfrey Miller and titled Trees in Quarry. Like many Australians, Miller was educated in Europe before moving back to Sydney and an art career.

My favorite works in the Ian Potter Center were a roomful of altered photographs by Tony Garifalakis. This set of three demonstrates the tone, technique and style of the rest. Collectively called Bloodlines, The suite of 12 portraits of royal families have been ruthlessly defaced with black enamel paint.

I also liked the architecture of the building, which clearly eschews the straight and plumb of traditional structural forms. The exterior of the building, which I neglected to photograph (mentally kicking myself), looked like a child’s play structure that had been knocked down and rebuilt several times before the child went on to other things. The aerial shot (above) I borrowed from a website called Culture Victoria.

This is a shot of the interior showing a little of the complexity of the spatial relationships and off-kilter lines of the architecture.

Outside, there were several very intriguing, if hard to decipher, relief sculptures set into the very irregular paving bricks of the huge plaza.

NGV International

I can’t do this museum justice. I blitzed past most of the collection in order to see contemporary work on the top floor. Just three examples:

This sculptural mural made of painted wire by Mira Gojak is entitled “Unending herd of blue.” The artist intended it to represent the progression of Western art from the earliest cave paintings through Renaissance development of perspective and chiaroscuro to Modern art’s concern for the picture plane. Not to mention the tension between the drawing-like linearity and three-dimensional space. (Then again, maybe it wasn’t the artist who had all those grandiose intentions, but the curator who wrote up the wall label.) Sarcasm and hyperbole aside, I enjoyed its scale and playfulness.

This painting, slashed as you see it, is by an “American” named Titus Kaphar. When visiting a foreign museum, even the U.S. artists represented are unfamiliar ones. The work is entitled “Stripes.”

The real reason I went to the NGV International was to see “Enclave,” the video installation by Richard Mosse, which I saw listed in the promotional brochure at the Ian Potter Center. I’d heard of Mosse and seen stills of his powerful infrared images, taken in war-ravaged Democratic Republic of the Congo. But stills cannot convey the power of the video. Even a single video screen online cannot really represent the power of the installation, which employs at least 6 enormous video monitors at various angles throughout a large, darkened gallery. The monitors cannot all be taken in at once and if you move around to see them all it is as if you are amongst the people in the videos themselves. Very immersive and the more moving for it.

To see an interview with Richard Mosse and get a sense of the content of the video, go to Vimeo.

“Enclave” was my favorite work of art of all that I saw in Australia--and I saw a lot of great work! Click here to read my review of the Adelaide Gallery of Art.

Richard Mosse image credits: Louisiana Museum of Modern Art website.

Tarnanthi: Art in Adelaide, Australia

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Tarnanthi is an aboriginal word from the Kaurna people of South Australia. It means to come forth or appear – like the sunrise, or a seed sprouting. For many cultures, first light represents a new beginning. I was fortunate, not only because I was able to travel to Australia and visit the Art Gallery of South Australia but also because this exhibit called Tarnanthi had just been unveiled. Billed by the museum as the “most ambitious exhibition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art in its 134 year history,” Tarnanthi was more ambitious even than that. It really is a series of 21 distinct exhibitions and those exhibitions were just part of a citywide festival of indigenous arts. 

Here is but a very small sample of what I saw at the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Traditional indigenous paintings on eucalyptus bark by various indigenous people.

Detail of “Dead man” from the Gunbalanya people of western Arnhem Land in Australia’s Northern Territory.

This is a detail of just one of several rooms devoted to the weavings of contemporary indigenous artist Yvonne Koolmatrie, of the Ngarrindjeri nation. The weavings reference traditional eel, fish and animal traps, along with scoops, baskets and other utilitarian woven objects. Koolmatrie, whose art practice was inspired by her experiences as a seasonal worker and a “lifelong relationship with the river,” became a “pivotal figure” in contemporary aboriginal art. She represented Australia in the 1997 Venice Biennale.

One of the things I liked best about the installation of the permanent galleries in the museum was the placement of contemporary works amongst traditional ones. The piece in the center of this gallery features the headless, skinned bodies of two horses. Called “We are all flesh,” by Belgian artist Berlinde De Bruyckere, it has been one of the more controversial ones, according to the museum staff person I spoke with.

This series of portraits was created between 1944 and 1947 by Australian artist Sidney Nolan.

One of the things I did not care for was a penchant for hanging paintings and framed works on paper on mirrored walls positioned in the middle of galleries. I found it distracting to see the reflections of other works of art on opposing walls, not to mention people moving through the gallery. Here is one of Hokusai’s famous woodcut prints of “Fuji in Fair Weather.”

An untitled photograph by a contemporary Swiss artist named Claudio Moser seems to float in the doorway between two galleries.

  

This is the second of a series of stories about art experiences during my recent foray to Australia and New Zealand. To read the first, click on Toi o Tāmaki.

To read stories from my excursion to the Antipodes, go to Urban Wilderness. To see a series of photos from Australia and New Zealand, go to my flickr album.

Toi o Tāmaki: Auckland Art Gallery

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image courtesy eventfinda

The Maori words Toi o Tāmaki are a literal translation of the English: Auckland Art Gallery. In backlit steel they run together across the polished stone exterior of the museum. I love that the two languages are given equal footing. From the permanent signage affixed to the building, to museum publications, website and even to the T-shirts worn by gallery staff, the institution is consistently identified in both languages.

As striking as that is to someone like me who is visiting New Zealand from the U.S. for the first time, it is hardly the most distinctive thing about the museum. The main entrance is a soaring atrium space with tall timber columns that flare outwards overhead like the canopy of the forested park into which the building is nestled. I found it exceptionally beautiful when I was there but I’ve since learned that it’s also internationally renowned.

The World Architecture Festival (“the world’s largest architectural event,” according to its website) named the Auckland Art Gallery as the Building of the Year for 2013. If I hadn’t had the good fortune to visit New Zealand I would never have known.

The collection was as interesting as the architecture and includes what seemed to me a healthy mix of Maori and European-oriented artists. I’ve always enjoyed visiting places like this where you get to see outstanding work that falls outside the canons of Western art historical convention. I didn’t take any photos inside the galleries but I enjoyed seeing the site-specific work of New Zealand artist John Ward Knox that was installed around the outside of the building.

Hardly Held Lightly, John Ward Knox

Clearly referencing natural, delicate and ephemeral spider webs, these not only are enormous and made of industrial-strength steel chain link. They also, literally as well as metaphorically, connect the architectural structure with the surrounding trees, thus reinforcing the architect’s vision of the gallery as a haven within the protective environment of the forest.

To see a slide show of the award-winning gallery, click here. 

To see a series of photos from Australia and New Zealand, go to my flickr album.

 

A Sense of Place at Wisconsin Lutheran College

Eddee Daniel

I am honored to be included in an exhibit at Wisconsin Lutheran College entitled "A Sense of Place." The other artists in the show are Leon Travanti, James Smessaert and Elizabeth Carr Whitmore.

The opening reception is Friday, Feb 27 from 6 - 8 pm.

Kristin Gjerdset, who heads the college's Art Department, was the curator. Here is her statement describing the show:

Wisconsin artists present their perspective on place, whether a geographical location or in the mind. Travanti’s paintings reflect his travels to Asia, inspired by “the rhythms, patterns and colors of exotically decorated people, animals and architecture.” Smessaert’s wood constructions connect with early recollections of tree and forest and “the free play of childhood that still lives within him.” Whitmore’s series of “felted wool landscapes detail her exploration through unfamiliar landscapes of Eastern Europe and South America.” Daniel’s photographs “explore the intersection of nature and humanity.”  Together the artists are represented in various art collections locally, nationally and internationally, and have years of experience in exhibitions and artist residencies.

Wisconsin Lutheran College's Schlueter Art Gallery is located at 8815 W. Wisconsin Avenue in Wauwatosa. The gallery is free and open to the public. Hours: Mon-Sat 9-9, Sun 1-9.

If you've never been to this gallery, it is beautiful and is inside the dramatic Center for Arts & Performance. I hope you'll join me for the opening.

Here are samples of each of the artists' work. Except for my own, these are details of larger works and, in my opinion, don't do them justice. When I delivered my work today I saw the others' pieces for the first time. It's a great show! I'm glad to be part of it.

Leon Travanti

James Smessaert

Elizabeth Carr Whitmore

Eddee Daniel

Sneak preview: Distressed Structures – The Weathering of Ecology opens Friday at Jazz Gallery

The Riverwest Artists Association presents an exhibit called Distressed Structures - The Weathering of Ecology at its Jazz Gallery with an opening on Friday, January 23.

This group exhibit has been curated by C. Matthew Luther, MIAD instructor and newly appointed president of the Riverwest Artists Association. I have the honor of being among the five featured artists. My work includes this portrait of Milwaukee Riverkeeper, Cheryl Nenn, who will also be giving a presentation at the gallery (see below).

Here is his description of the show:

Distressed Structures is a transient glimpse at Milwaukee artists who use ecology as a literal or conceptual theme in their work. Artists around the world produce art that questions our consumer culture and ideas of the landscape. This exhibition takes a look at local artists that use nature as a form of dialogue about the human relationship to the physical, temporal, and ephemeral affects of ecology.
            On the one hand, there is certainly no shortage of picturesque landscape paintings and photographs to adorn the walls of country homes. On the other hand,  there is a continual evolution in our understanding of how we view the landscape through the lens of art and what pictures mean. We need to examine the history of nature and the history of the painted, photographed, and sculpted landscape, along with current ecological theory as one continuum. The two have become intertwined. The pictorial landscape must now position itself within not only the history of art and painting, but history itself, land use, the rise of environmentalism, sustainability, and the social value of nature.

Featured artists: Melanie Ariens, Eddee Daniel, Matthew Lee, Nathaniel Stern, Corbett Toomsen. Scroll down to see samples of each artist's work.

The exhibit runs January 23rd to Febrary 15th.

Opening Reception January 23rd, 6-9 pm.

Three community programs will be presented in conjunction with the exhibit:
Milwaukee Riverkeeper, Cheryl Nenn, Presentation Thursday January 29th at 6:30pm
Artist Panel Thursday February 5th at 6:30pm
Milwaukee Water Commons Presentation Thursday February 12th at 6:30pm

All are free and open to the public.

Untitled, Melanie Ariens

Diligent Truth, Matthew Warren Lee

Syncopated, Nathaniel Stern

Yosemite, Corbett Toomsen

Jazz Gallery is at 926 East Center Street in Milwaukee.
Gallery hours: Tue. 6 - 9 and Sat. 12 - 5.
More info at RAA.

Ofrendas: Art and offering

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We all die. I was reminded of that in church today. As undeniable as that truism is, it isn’t a popular message in our culture in or out of a religious setting. Other cultures don’t have the same aversion to death, however. We are reminded of this each autumn around this time when the over-commercialized holiday of Halloween is accompanied, as it increasingly is, by the Day of the Dead.

Alverno College Ofrenda, detail (UCC)

The traditional Mexican observance of Día de los Muertos was a family affair held in the home or at a cemetery where ancestors were buried. Altars called Ofrendas ("offerings" in Spanish) often were lovingly created to honor the dead. Over the years this reverential folk tradition has been expanded and Ofrendas have become more diverse. Today in Milwaukee you can find contemporary versions of Ofrendas in several local art galleries. Many of them hew closely to the time-honored conventions that feature skull motifs, skeletal figures, flower arrangements and foodstuffs, along with photographs and other images of the deceased.

Others take the themes of the occasion as a point of departure to make artistic, societal and even political statements. Over the past week I visited three galleries that have chosen to recognize the Day of the Dead by inviting artists and others to create Ofrendas on site in their spaces. I’ve taken some photographs (which should be no surprise.) In most cases I didn’t capture the whole Ofrenda, choosing instead to focus in on a detail that caught my attention.

My hope is to encourage you to visit these places and spend some time with the Ofrendas in their intended context. Their meanings cannot be taken in at a glance in any case and they deserve to be experienced in the reverential spirit with which they were created.

Thoughtful descriptions or artists’ statements accompany many of the Ofrendas. I have included excerpts from some of them.

Alfons Gallery

The Alfons Gallery is a bit off the beaten track, located on the second floor of the imposing main building of the School Sisters of St. Francis campus on South 27^th St. The gallery invited artists, interns, staff, and volunteers at Redline Milwaukee to collaborate in a single large altar. I particularly enjoyed seeing this Ofrenda within its religious context, among the permanent collection of sacred artworks.

Walker’s Point Center for the Arts

Leann Wooten: “It was very healing for me to work on this piece with my father in mind. I felt a spiritual connection to him on this artistic journey….” 

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Sue Vliet: “Beautiful, laughing brown eyes, my paternal grandmother had kind eyes, always full of mirth and mischief. My memories of her are clear and happy…. She allowed me to eat cake for breakfast, kept an can of ‘spray’ whipped cream in her refrigerator for special snacks, took walks with me, listened to my stories, and laughed at my jokes.”

Gary Niebuhr: “I am not comfortable…thinking about my own mortality. I would rather think about someone else’s mortality…. I never practiced the witchcraft of art until after the passing of my father. I often wonder if his death was a freeing experience or if it is the shadow of guilt that follows me. “

Sally Kuzma: “This ofrenda is in memory of my mother Ellie….  The word for bellybutton—a tangible connection to our mothers—hangs in the air, contributed by friends, colleagues, and students of mine who have ties to dozens of different languages.”

Latino Arts Gallery

United Community Center

“Remembrance Altar” (detail) by the UCC’s art therapist and selected clients in honor the memories of loved ones who have passed away.

Jeanette Arellano: “This altar is dedicated to our loved ones who have lived with mental illness…. I wanted to make this piece interactive because all of us have at some point in our lives lived with a mental illness or know someone who has, however we keep it hidden as though it doesn’t exist, which is something I can personally attest to.” [Visitors are invited to inflate balloons in remembrance of loved ones with mental illnesses and to think about moments they share with them.]

Ximena Soza: “Nidos Vacíos is dedicated to the sons and daughters that have been lost to violence. Whether it is in Palestine, Ferguson, Milwaukee, or Mapuche land in Chile, the loss of sons or daughters speaks the same language of pain…. My ofrenda is a piece of fabric with a dress and a nest in the center representing the grieving process of mothers and families, the emptiness of death lives in those who are alive.”

Clay relief sculptures with acrylic paint by second grade students at Bruce-Guadalupe Elementary School based on discussions about community wishes.

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What do George Washington and Vince Lombardi have in common? How are these and other well known historical and pop cultural figures related to deceased parents, grandparents, and family pets? They are all well represented in the wall-sized, multidisciplinary and collaborative ofrenda created by fifth graders at University School of Milwaukee.

detail

This was a lovely experience, clearly a crowd favorite at the opening reception Friday evening. I witnessed many people carefully viewing each of what seemed like hundreds of tiny individual memorials that make up this ofrenda. 

detail

detail

On Saturday, November 1 there was a Día de los Muertos parade in Milwaukee. If you missed my earlier post and photo essay about that, click here to see it.