Digital Biennale at The Museum of Wild and Newfangled Art (mowna) Opening April 30, 2021

The Magic Hummingbird by Joseph Martin Waters

A new kind of art museum popped up online earlier this year, and its New York-based founders, cari ann shim sham* and Joey Zaza, say to expect no pop-up windows, data mining, advertising or any of the exploitative methods used by most free online platforms and websites. However, The Museum of Wild and Newfangled Art, with its bold yet whimsical name, is not free. It is a virtual, for-profit museum, conceived by artists for artists, featuring mostly new media and technologically-oriented art. Seventy percent of proceeds from ticket sales go to the artist, and 30 percent are used to maintain the museum up and running. 

What might be of immediate interest are the museum’s unique ethical stance and its upcoming Biennale show, intended to replace the Whitney Biennale, which has been postponed until 2022 due the the COVID-19 pandemic. “We have a unique, one-of-a-kind collection of curated art, all in one place, without ads or distractions, without cookie agreements or pop ups, without login requirements and data mining…we want our visitors to enjoy the art without manipulation,” says cari ann shim sham*, when asked about how the museum’s generous business model might compete with platforms that provide art content free-of-charge online.

Artists Speak asked cari ann shim sham* to go into detail as to why the founders of The Museum of Wild and Newfangled Art (mowna) think it's important for their museum to be ethical, what that means to them, and what is the relationship between technology and ethics to date. After citing the Center for Humane Technology as a pioneer in the fight for ethical technologies, she was quick to characterize GAFA as fundamentally unethical. 

Since mowna is a digital art museum, it also functions as a developer of new technological platforms for appreciating art, but it does so without exploiting artists or the viewing public. In order to highlight and support the role and freedom of the artist in the world, mowna pays artists a substantial commission and does not claim ownership over their copyright. The museum consults the artist in determining how his/her work is going to be displayed online, gives the artist the ability to remove an artwork from its archival collection or online store, and allows the artist’s work to be displayed elsewhere simultaneously. “We do not own the work, we simply store it,” says cari ann shim sham*. “We are pro-artist,” she says, emphasizing how a living wage for the artist is the goal. She thinks the Biennale might attract as many as one million viewers, which would translate to roughly $175,000 per participating artist, through ticket sales alone. While that’s an ambitious figure for a new arts organization, it is not inconceivable for a well-attended Biennale event. 

The mowna Biennale opens at the end of April and runs until September. It is intended to be a recurring event, to be held every two years, as the name suggests. This year’s show is curated by cari ann shim sham* and Joey Zaza and features 100 artists, including individuals, collectives, organizations and AI from 44 countries. It is viewable on any device that connects to the internet, and individual tickets are $18. While they are only valid for a 24-hour period, an interval modelled on traditional museum practice, a monthly membership costs $15 and provides around-the-clock access to the shows, collection and museum store, as well as special events, like meet the artists, curator talks, parties and mowna founder’s chats.

Black Man in America by Vance Brown and Justina Kamiel Gray

This year's Biennale features virtual reality artwork from Canada centering on the theme of the lockdown due to COVID-19, autobiographical visual and sound art meant to elicit the empathy of the viewer for the experience of a black Lebanese-Senegalese artist living in Ghana, a portrait series by Baltimore-based Zachary Z. Handler, who will photograph museum guests three time a week during May 2021, interactive virtual reality and video sculpture art from Brooklyn, a film about what it means to be a black man in America from New York City, a new media installation using soft robotics from Austria, comical gif art from Italy, and a series of experimental music videos from California, among others. For a list of some of the participating artists, see the press release here. Kicking off the Biennale on April 30 at 9 p.m. Eastern, mowna will host a special screening of the feature-length documentary The Faithful: The King, The Pope, The Princess, by Annie Berman, who will subsequently answer questions from the public. The screening will be followed by entrance into the virtual mowna party room, and an overview of the Biennale.   

As a reader, you may be skeptical of how the museum experience translates into a digital setting. I certainly am, but cari ann shim sham* assures us that it is an “intimate experience…there are no crowds in the way of the art or people taking selfies…the art is available 24/7, and you can spend as much time as you want with it.” And most importantly, it is a pandemic-free experience, or almost. Without the spread of COVID-19, this museum may in fact never have been created. So, artists, art lovers, tech geeks, students, teachers and people in search of something new from the comfort of your home, alone or in the company of friends and family, mowna invites you to explore the world of wild and newfangled art online.

Columbia Pike Artist Studios Open House and pARTy in Arlington, VA

On Saturday, Nov. 14 from 6-9 p.m. and on Sunday, Nov. 15 from 2-5 p.m., the Columbia Pike Artist Studios (CPAS) located at 932 S. Walter Reed Drive in Arlington, VA welcomes all to an open house event and party. Tour studios and meet artists working in a variety of media, including oils, pastels, acrylics, collage, encaustic, watercolor, printmaking, photography and sculpture.

Below is a sampling of the artwork on view and what some of the artists had to say about the role of art and CPAS in their lives.

Barbara Wolcott

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

I have been at CPAS for 22 years. I joined while finishing my junior year at the Corcoran School of Art and Design and was worried I would have to give them money that day (I had only $2.00 in my pocket ). After graduation, CPAS was where my "art community" lived. It encouraged and enabled me to dare move my process and learning further. Art can not just stay on one rung of a ladder.

2. How would you describe your work?

Movement is a major issue for me, and I am curious to observe the variety of shapes that are created by dance or work in humans and machines, how they produce their products. I am also interested in the shapes created as they produce. Gesture drawings of humans acting out their dramas of life. these initiate my paintings and are fun beginnings.

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

I have really thought about this before. It just seemed necessary. I will answer by saying that life is so important, but words rarely express the necessary depth needed to describe the emotion a person is feeling. This makes art extremely important for reaching that depth of feeling, whether by visiting an art gallery or creating the art yourself (which is always challenging).

Maria Panas

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

I first sublet a studio at CPAS nine years ago and became a member and got my own studio one year later. It's been great. The encouragement, warmth and friendship I experience at CPAS is priceless.

2. How would you describe your work?

Observing all art gives an education and pleasure, but the works of the New York Abstract Expressionists put me on fire, so that is the genre I have developed. I also like the peacefulness and depth of Zen paintings and develop that feeling on paper and canvas in my quiet moments.

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

Being an artist has given me great pleasure. Painting offers a wealth of self-knowledge. It is a venue for self expression, a place of refuge, an escape when needed, and a chance for pure fun. 

Jay Young Gerard

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

I had to wait two years after moving to the Columbia Pike neighborhood before I could get off the waiting list and into a CPAS studio! It was worth the wait. I have been here for over two years now, and it is exactly what I hoped it would be. It is three blocks from my house! It has provided a collegial atmosphere among similarly-minded artists. It has given me not only dedicated space, but incentive: I think if my studio were more difficult to get to or unwelcoming when I got there, I would not feel as supported as I do here. It is a community and a refuge and an ongoing education.

2. How would you describe your work?

I have been a design professional for 40 years. In my professional life, I had to be able to justify every mark, color, word, decision to the client, and every single thing had to be perfect. There could be no errors in concept or execution. Painting for myself has proved to be a challenge: letting go of both concept and perfection is an ongoing goal. My ultimate goal was stated by Rothko: "The purpose of my painting is painting."

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

I can't sing! Less facetiously, it's what I've done my entire life, every day of my life, in one way or another. I also write. Between words and pictures, I am constantly expressing myself, my world view, my feelings, my memories. It is frustrating, thrilling, satisfying, ridiculous. Sometimes I stand back and look at my work and cannot remember how I did what I did, how I got there. It's eerie, and the biggest high ever. It's also extra wonderful when someone else values my work. That is the cherry on top of the hot fudge sundae I made after having churned the ice cream and melted the fudge and whipped the cream all by myself. It is the best stuff of life.

Sarah Bentley

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

I have been at CPAS for one year, exactly since last Nov. 1.  Having a community of supportive artists of all types has been invaluable, almost as invaluable as having a space dedicated just for working on art!

2. How would you describe your work?

My work has yet to settle into a theme.  I am a classical realist working with oils, exploring still lives and allegories, and coming back to portraits again and again.

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

Through making art, we are bringing something new into the world with every piece. It's a way to safely emote and decompress in a world where we are constantly aware of dangers around us, or a way of finding a small portion of peace in a chaotic life. Art is an expression and sharing of ideas in a visual language that surpasses a need for words.

Nan Morrison

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

I have been a CPAS member for six and a half years. Being a member of CPAS has enriched my artistic endeavors immeasurably. It is inspirational and educational to be in a community filled with diverse artists, multiple points of view, and various approaches to creativity. I have learned so much about technique, style, materials, resources and mediums from my fellow CPAS artists. It is great fun to compare notes with my friends at CPAS about composition, scale and framing regarding my paintings and how they evolve along the way to finality.

2. How would you describe your work?

First of all, I am a colorist. My paintings are very intuitive and expressions of how I feel in the moment. My abstract works reflect my interest in color, line, shape, texture, pattern and form.

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

Art is a huge and incredibly valuable part of my life. I love the individual nature and unique qualities of creativity. My paintings are a wonderful and important extension of who I am and how I feel. I am a docent at the National Gallery of Art and teach the art of the Renaissance for Georgetown University. The special thing about my own paintings is I can do whatever I want: my work reflects an important part of my overall well being. Art is great therapy!

Anne Hancock

1. How long have you been involved with with CPAS and how has it helped you in your artistic endeavors?

As one of the three founders of CPAS, I have been at the studio from the beginning, through the process of incorporating, leasing, fundraising and renovating.

2. How would you describe your work?

My work is largely personal and reflects my interactions with and memories of places, family and friends.

3. Why is art and art-making meaningful to you?

Creating art is my way of expressing my thoughts and reactions to the world where I live and the people with whom I interact. It is a way of capturing and paying tribute to those small, everyday activities that collectively define who I am.

Faculty and Resident Artist Exhibit at the Arts Barn

The following artists, educators and artists-in-residence, are showing their work at the Arts Barn in Gaithersburg from now until January 25, 2015. Their media range from acrylic, watercolor and oil paint to sculpture, glass work and photography. They were asked to discuss their work in terms of what they learned while producing it, and to address their students in their response, since most of them are art teachers at the Arts Barn and elsewhere in Montgomery County, Maryland.

Vian Borchert's artwork

Vian Borchert
I have two artworks in the faculty show, an acrylic painting titled "John Lennon: Love Triumphs" and another drawing in colored pencils titled “Maleficent.”

John Lennon has been my muse for many years, not only because he is a great musician and song writer, but also because of his beliefs of spreading love and peace - great ideologies any person can live by. When I look at this artwork, the first thing that comes to mind are the Beatles' song lyrics "All you need is love, love is all you need," which is true to the utmost. These words and Beatles and Lennon love songs don't only have a good ring to them, but they also carry a wonderful message as well. It is only through love that societies overcome problems and thrive and become better communities. The love that I am referring to is the love that has to start from within, love that starts from the heart and spreads within, allowing that person to bring it outward to the world. So, through a vision of love, just like John Lennon had, hope and positivity can spread.

 Lessons learned while creating the work: This piece is actually one of the few pieces where I have the portrait smiling. It really wasn't my intention to have a happy, smiling Lennon. Yet, it somehow came out that way. Maybe the spirit of John was trying to tell me something through the creation of this piece - that is why I titled it "John Lennon: Love Triumphs."

You have to be open to possibilities in art. I went into the process of creation wanting to paint a serious John Lennon painting, and ended up with a happy Lennon. So, be open to the idea that subject matters can change while creating a work of art. The point is to be open minded in your approach to the creative process.

Regarding “Maleficent,” which is a drawing done in colored pencils, I actually liked the character in the movie “Maleficent” played by Angelina Jolie. This drawing started off as somewhat of a sketch because I was approaching the drawing like children playing with Legos, figuring out what can be built from the Lego blocks in front of them. While I was working on this piece, I realized that Jolie, especially in this role, is very interesting to draw with her striking features.

What I learned from creating this piece, which deals with women's issues, is that a person can appear dark and wicked from the outside, yet, underneath that appearance can be a kind person with a loving heart. 

Students should try drawing subject matters that are not typical. This involves thinking outside of the box. So, rather than drawing the classical still life with fruits, pots and pans, make your artwork more interesting by choosing subject matters that are unusual. I find that students do better in drawing unusual subject matters, such as a child's toy rather than an apple, since they have to challenge themselves to look carefully at the unique still life. So, allow yourself to be brave in your approach to art and its creation to discover the creativity within you.

Jack Donnelly with his "Caldermobiles"

Jack Donnelly

The work in this show has been an enormous learning experience for me.

 I have been a metalsmith for many years now, but I recently discovered two things:

First, I had the opportunity to work with the amazing metal called aluminum for the very first time. Each and every single metal has its own unique properties, Alluminum (Al) is light-weight and very malleable, but it cannot be soldered or easily welded. This limitation got me exploring cold fusion methods like using aluminum pop rivets as connections. Rivets are an old-school method that I had largely not used since my 8th grade metalshop class. I love their solid industrial aesthetic.

Second, I was so fortunate as to experiment with 3D kinetic sculpture for the first time ever. I am in complete awe of the inventive work of Alexander (Sandy) Calder (1898-1976). His intuitive concoctions have taught me a new way of looking at the world. Found objects from all walks of life can inspire, if not become an actual component of the artistic creation, and the sculpture itself evolves past the static form to an ever-changing, perpetual motion machine, responding to the breezes, vibrations, and motions of life. I am thrilled to be working both of these aspects into many new projects in the New Year!

Photograph by Jaree Donnelly

Jaree Donnelly

The lesson when shooting moving water is photographing at the right time of day (early or late), getting the shutter speed just right, and using a tripod with a trigger release. By slowing it down, shooting in lower light, and using a tools to prevent the camera from shaking, you can get that beautiful, silky look!

Hung bowl by Tony Glander

Tony Glander 
I started “hanging” bowls a few years back. I was offered part of a gallery show, except there was no flat space for bowls. The solution to hang them gave them much more dimension. I just found a new hanging device that allows the bowl or plate to be taken off the wall and used.  

Watercolor by Sue Kay

 Sue Kay
While watercolors have been my medium of choice for some time now, I find I am often driven to seek new subject matter that challenges my hand and eye. This painting is the second one I have done to try and show the texture and movement of water. I have come to love the different patterns in the water, from the rushing currents with their bold lines and broad strokes to the swirling bubbles and the deeper, more quiet patterns of still water.

Painting the objects that get swept along in the current offers up even more challenges of color and texture, and helps to describe the water in its own way. The teacher in me likes to be constantly exploring and challenging my own skills in the same way I enjoy teaching and challenging my students.

Natalya B. Parris with her artwork (left) and holiday ornaments designed by her (right)

Natalya B. Parris
I have two paintings currently on display at the “Arts Barn Faculty Exhibit” (November 26, 2014 - January 25, 2015 in the Arts Barn Invitational Gallery): “Lotus" (acrylic on canvas, 12" x 12") and "From Me to You" (acrylic on canvas, 8"x10”). These paintings show that I wanted to capture movement ... like a light breeze ruffling the flowers. To create this effect, I strategically did not draw the flowers in the center of the canvas and avoided symmetry when I drew the petals and leaves. The challenge with “Lotus" was to decide where to paint the dots, where to double and triple them, and what section of the painting should have only one layer of dots or no dots at all in order to enhance the uniqueness of the flower. The other thing that both paintings have in common is that they represent “over-sized” flowers that are very colorful. Painting so many multicolored dots was challenging and fun at the same time.

Oil by Yolanda Prinsloo

Yolanda Prinsloo 
I chose to exhibit this still life painting because of the holiday season. The subject matter is sentimental, antique silver ladles and humorous porcelain creamers, objects given to me as gifts a long time ago. The painting is realistically rendered in oil on gold leaf. I enjoyed the simplicity of the work and what I experienced while working on it: a slowing down my often fast tempo, and taking time to enjoy the play of light and shadow on the objects as I took in their shapes and form.

Natalya B. Parris: 'Portrait in Lace'

Alexandra by Natalya B. Parris

There are several shows coming up this month and this winter for painter Natalya Parris. Known for her "dots" technique, which overlays dots of different sizes within a composition to form a familiar and sometimes abstract image, Parris will be showing work at four venues in the coming months: Blackrock Center for the Arts in Germantown in the annual Art League of Germantown winter show; the Maryland Federation of Art Circle Gallery in Annapolis in its National Juried Small Works Exhibition; the Foundry Gallery in Washington, D.C. as part of the "Come In from the Cold" exhibit; and the Strathmore Mansion in North Bethesda as part of the 81st Annual International Exhibition of Fine Art in Miniature show.

For the latter, she created her first miniature painting "Portrait in Lace," a 4x4 inch black and white piece incorporating her dots technique on a much smaller canvas. (She usually works at four to five times this size.)

Portrait in Lace by Natalya B. Parris

"In “traditional miniatures” not only the size of the artworks is small, but the image is also very small; and that is where the biggest challenge was. I do images in my art 'bigger than life,'" she stated in describing how she had to condense all of her thoughts and emotions into this one miniature.

"One canvas just could not hold all of my feelings and ideas," she added, attributing her tendency to work at a relatively large scale to her Russian roots and what she terms "love without measure."

Nonetheless, participation in this show is encouraging her to produce more miniatures and develop this line of work, "I am thrilled that my first miniature artwork was juried into the prestigious International Exhibition of Fine Art in Miniature."

A Portrait of Labor: Art and Politics Meet at VisArts

UPDATE: Following litigation after their removal from the Maine Department of Labor building, Judy Taylor's mural panels on Maine's labor history now reside in the Maine State Museum in Augusta on a three-year renewable loan from the Department of Labor.

Article originally appeared in The Gaithersburg Patch on 9/10/11.

Judy Taylor says her art became political when politicians got involved.

Taylor created a mural for the Maine Department of Labor that became the subject of controversy in March when Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R) ordered its removal.

"When a political figure or a political organization use the art, it becomes political," Taylor said in an interview during the opening reception of a show of her work at VisArts in Rockville on Thursday. "In a broader sense, it could be used as a messaging tool by anybody."

VisArts will host a talk by Taylor at 3 p.m. today.

The artist said that her talk will demonstrate that the mural is about Maine labor history. In researching historical material for the mural, she engaged the advice of preeminent Maine labor historian Charles A. Scontras, who also sat on the original commissioning committee.

"If you want to know Maine labor history, you have to talk to Charlie," Taylor said. "If anybody wants to learn about the panels, come to the artist talk." Taylor's panels depict Maine labor history, as well as national figures and events from the labor movement including: apprenticeship; child labor; women textile workers; the secret ballot for joining the union; the first Labor Day; wood workers; the 1937 Shoe Strike; Frances Perkins—the first U.S. Secretary of Labor and the first woman to hold a cabinet position; Rosie the Riveter; the Jay Strike and the Rev. Jesse James; and the future of Maine labor.

Click here to read Taylor's statement on the removal of the mural in The New York Times. The mural's story also has been covered in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Huffington Post and the The Wall Street Journal. When The Gazette previewed the VisArt exhibit late last month the story was picked up by Politico.

Taylor's talk will provide insight into her working process and her personal interest in labor history. She said she painted "Rumford Paper Mill on the Androscoggin" after reading Richard Russo's "Empire Falls."

Taylor is an artist based in Maine. She lives and works on Mount Desert Island and much of her work portrays daily life on the island. The Maine labor mural was her first public commission, and since then she has completed five paintings for Mesa State College in Colorado under the state's Percent for Art program. She studied art at the New York Academy of Art, the National Academy of Design and at the Art Students League in France. She has taught painting and drawing at the Austin Museum of Fine Arts and at Saint Andrews High School in Austin. Currently she teaches out of her studio on Mount Desert Island and gives workshops internationally.

VisArts will also host a panel discussion on the removal of the murals at 7 p.m. on Thursday, September 15. The panel includes Georgetown University Prof. Joe McCartin; former Treasurer of the League of Women Voters Penny Harris; Union of Maine Artists President Rob Shetterly; Susie Leong, public art director at the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County; and Don Tuski, Maine College of Art president.

The show closes Sept. 20. All events are free and open to the public.

"Celebrate Labor: Where Art and Politics Meet," an exhibition of work by Tayor and by Michael Spafford, is the brainchild of VisArts curator Nancy Nesvet. Nesvet first learned about the removal of the publicly-commissioned mural from the Maine Department of Labor anteroom through an email sent to Maine College of Art alumni by Don Tuski, the president of the college, which is Nesvet's alma mater.

Nesvet saw an opportunity and answered a call to action:

"I believed, as an artist, that the public had paid for this mural, and it was commissioned by the Maine Arts Commission specifically for the Department of Labor, and specifically to depict the history of labor in Maine, and since it met all the qualifications, should not have been removed because the new governor objected," she said.

Nesvet told VisArts Executive Director Alice Nappy about the removal of the piece, which had been commissioned using $60,000 in state and federal funds. Nappy "thought it would be a great idea" to bring the multi-paneled mural—and Taylor—to the Washington metropolitan area, "where they would get national attention," Nesvet said.

"Of course, the murals were not available because they were hidden in a warehouse in Maine by order of the governor," Nesvet said.

With Nappy's support secured, Nesvet used her connections in Maine to bring the controversy to the national capital area for further discussion. She approached Andy Graham at Portland Color, a photographic reproduction shop in Maine, and asked him to lend his expertise in reproducing Taylor's 11 mural panels.

Next she contacted Don Berry, president of the Maine AFL-CIO, who enlisted the help of the International Teamsters Local 340 to ship them to VisArts. The national AFL-CIO, based in Washington, D.C., also contributed generously to the show.

(AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka was slated to attend the show's opening but was unable to due to President Obama's jobs stimulus speech to Congress.)

The multifaceted effort resulted in an exhibit featuring nine original labor-themed paintings, three preliminary paintings and four preliminary drawings for the mural, as well as all 11 labor mural panels reproduced at 6 by 3 feet each by Taylor.

The exhibit also features large-scale reproductions of both of the "Twelve Labors of Hercules" mural panels by Michael Spafford. Spafford's mural was removed from the House of Representatives chamber in Washington state nearly 30 years ago and has found a new home at Centralia (Wash.) College. Taylor's mural is being housed in an undisclosed government storehouse in Augusta, Maine until legal action determines its fate.

Berry, of the Maine AFL-CIO, attended the show's opening at VisArts. He challenged LePage's claim that the mural alienates the business community. "I went through the Department of Labor lobby a lot," Berry said. "I learned to enjoy the mural and did a lot of thinking about its meaning. It's not anti-business as the governor says. There is a history lesson in each one of its panels."

Berry wants the panels returned to the lobby because they were designed for that location, he said.

"I've never seen a businessman in that lobby anyways," he added.

"We don't know what will happen next to the murals," Nesvet said. "They are still hidden from the public at a Maine commerce department government warehouse in Augusta."

A court case will be decided by the end of the month, she said.

"As for the copies, I have insisted from the beginning that I or VisArts does not own them," Nesvet said. "They belong to the people of Maine."

They will be displayed at a convention of the Maine AFL-CIO in Augusta later in September, she said. "And then their fate will be decided."

"I am hoping that the result of this show is to open a discussion of how we treat public art in this nation, from commissioning to funding to displaying."

Terry Leonino and Greg Artzner of Magpie, a folk band from upstate New York, once based in Washington, D.C., performed a labor-themed concert at the opening reception. Their collaboration grew out of the Civil Rights movement, and they have recorded nearly 20 albums together, including several tributes to Pete Seeger.

Artist Interview: Glen Kessler

Glen Kessler's new series of paintings "Command-Shift-3," on view at the Yellow Barn Studio and Gallery March 24-25, 2012, takes a close look at technology and how it shapes the way we see, look and feel.
(This interview has been edited from its original version.)

1. How would you characterize your work from 2005 - 2010?

I graduated with my MFA from The New York Academy of Art in 2005.  The curriculum at 'The Academy' was rigorous, both technically and conceptually.  For my thesis, I conceived of a painting that explored a surprising interaction I had with my wife (then girlfriend).  We were watching a news report on the Iraq War.  Later, we discussed it only to find that we had completely different takes on it.  I knew that it was our opposing political views that caused the schism and was intrigued by how much personal biases and preconceived expectations can shape our understanding of facts.  Being a painter, I found a visual equivalent of this distortion: 

Conceptually speaking, I took a topic like politics, beauty, oddity, combat and mined art history for an image that represented that topic.  I replaced the head of the lead figure in the found image with that of an analagous contemporary figure. I distorted the hybrid image through anamorphic distortion, which distorts an image from all possible perspectives other than one specific oblique angle.  Finally, I rendered the painting in a style that combined old world painting (glazing) and modern painting (thick impastos).  The resulting image was rife with dichotomies for the viewer to explore.  See the images here: http://www.glenkessler.com/Site/2005-2010.html.

2. You are showing recent works (completed in the past year) on March 24-25 at the Yellow Barn Art Gallery in Glen Echo, MD. Does this work represent a shift from your previous paintings or is there also a continuity that it encapsulates?

My newest body of work, 'COMMAND-SHIFT-3,' completed from 2011-2012, represents a shift from the previous series because I am concerned with different issues today than I was from 2005-2010. 

These new paintings focus on the unflinching march of technology into our daily lives.  I marvel at how quickly things are changing, as the internet, GPS, and miniaturization allows computers to creep in.  I use a lot of technology in my personal life and career.  As a painter, I try to maximize the potential of technology to make my work more effective.

Also, as a teacher, I interact with hundreds of people each week. Today’s high school students do not know a world without e-mail, phones with cameras and the immediacy of social media and information at their fingertips. Their world is a one of answers, information, accessibility, ease. 

As a culture we can ask how we, our children, and our children's children will be hardwired as a result of this new way of interacting? Are we aware yet of how this new technology-driven paradigm will continue to shape our minds, our beliefs, our philosophies and psychologies?  This is what my recent work explores. 

Observing how different generations perceive technology, I feel a bit like a cultural anthropologist.  If I were a writer or a researcher, I might publish my findings in words, but as a painter I convey my observations through paint. 

I believe these new paintings have much to offer the patient viewer.  They are layered, offering a depth of meaning. 

I operate with intellectual certainty, but also with a healthy dose of instinct. Both are essential for art-making.  If the work becomes too cerebral, all the mystery and all the empathy is lost.  If it gets too instinctive, the artist loses his way.

Overall, my work remains very personal to me and focuses on my observations of the world around me.  When I began painting in the mid- 90's, I was trained as a perceptual painter.  Initially, that meant painting literally what I saw in front of me, but as time went on, I became bored with the lack of conceptual depth in that mode of working.  Philip Guston captures my thoughts when talking about his studio practice in the face of world events:

"What kind of man am I, sitting at home, reading magazines, going into a frustrated fury about everything - and then going into my studio to adjust a red to a blue." 

I sought to use my skills as a painter to convey a world beyond just the visual.  I wanted to give tangible form to my inner thoughts, with all the richness and depth of which painting is capable. 

I see my transition as a very logical progression. It would be odd to make the same work year after year as the world around me changes, and I change as a result. 

See my recent work here: http://www.glenkessler.com/Site/Recent_Work.html.

3. How does technology inform your paintings?

Technology is the backbone of the concepts in my paintings but also plays a major role in the making of the work.  A few years ago, I transitioned from printed photographs as my primary source to the computer screen.  I love the way the glowing pixels capture a luminosity closer to real life than the ink printed on paper.  I can also zoom in effortlessly and even use programs to tinker with the image in a seamless process of 'sketching.'  In my studio, I have a large monitor that I sync up to my smaller laptop screen.  This allows me to really observe details.  It is a great setup that I am sure more and more artists will employ.

Lately, I have been exploring how technology can improve my studio practice.  I 'sketch' and take notes on my laptop and iPhone.  I have not had a paper sketchbook in years. Utilizing all the tools at our disposal is where art is headed.

You might look at my work and say I am a traditional painter, but I love the way modern technology can assist in the artistic process. I am certain that if Velazquez or Picasso were alive today they would use the computer, smartphone and internet in their work.

4. What view of technology do your paintings express?

 When people hear about my work, they might assume I am cynical of the changes technology is ushering in. Not true.  However, I am also not simply advocating for those changes either. 

I have always thought of the artist as an eye - like Philip Guston's great cycloptic figure, a massive eye on an otherwise featureless head.

The eye's job is to observe the world around it and offer intelligent, well-crafted visual essays on what it finds.  I do not like art that hits you over the head with the artist's opinions.  It is small, and a waste of the great gifts of the history of painting. 

I am old enough to remember a time before cell phones, the Internet, VCRs, even remote controls.  I grew up as these technologies came into common use. I am also young enough to make use of them with facility and joy.  However, the incredible speed at which they make their way into every facet of our lives, makes me wonder how people adapt to think, act and believe in new ways. 

Today's high school students accept that information should be immediately accessible, that friends are always within reach, that one should never get lost and that every minute is an opportunity to accomplish some task.  I teach a lot of high school students at The Yellow Barn Studio and Gallery, and I can tell you that they have different expectations now than they did even just five years ago. 

An astonishing number show traits of ADHD. Is this biological, or are we hardwiring children to jump from task to task like apps on a phone?  Many students excel in technical exercises but have difficulty exploring concepts in greater depth.  Is this just youth, or are they being trained to expect answers quickly, without deeper investigation? These fascinating changes appear to be the initial indications of a societal shift.  The past generation tends to observe differences, even to label and treat those differences.  Ultimately, the next generation will shape our culture in its image. 

My work takes note of these seeds of change and communicates them through a beautiful and layered visual language.  I leave it to the viewer to evaluate the impact of these changes. 

My book, "COMMAND-SHIFT-3, New Paintings by Glen Kessler," which includes personal essays on art and technology, will be available for sale at my show on March 24-25.

For more information visit www.GlenKessler.com.

Artist Interview with Clement Valla

"Mechanical Turk is also twisted," said Clement Valla, who uses the interface to engage people creatively. He has written a software program that enables Mechanical Turk workers to create collaborative paintings made of up 1600 discreet one-square-inch pieces. He titles these works Seed Drawings because they emanate from a single tile that multiplies iteratively. Users are asked to copy the tile that is next to their own assigned blank tile, but because each new copy is essentially made by hand or an inexact process, each newly-filled tile ends up looking slightly different than the previous one. Sometimes a user decides not to follow the instructions, and whole new patterns evolve in the paintings.

Mechanical Turk is an Amazon.com platform for employing human users to perform tasks that a computer is unable to carry out. In an interview with Artists Speak, Valla explained the origin of the name. An 18th century contraption, the Mechanical Turk was a chess-playing automaton that appeared to be a robot. A reputed chess-champion, capable of beating most human opponents, the Mechanical Turk was actually a human disguised as a robot. Behind every automaton lies a human hand.

Before developing the software that would spawn his Seed Drawings, Valla elicited the help of distant human artists for his Master's thesis at the Rhode Island School of Design, where he studies and teaches in the Digital + Media MFA program. Encouraged to work in an unfamiliar medium for an assignment in a theory class, Valla took on the challenge by ordering custom paintings from Chinese artist villages. What started out as an experiment would transform into an entire body of work for his thesis.

Fully embracing the digital paradigm of instruction-based art, Valla asked the Chinese painters, who all had Western names, to paint the view outside their window. Unlike most of the orders they received from other clients who asked for copies of famous Western paintings, like Monets and Van Goghs, Clement's instructions sought to humanize the process of ordering copies from a production studio accustomed to mass customization in an outsourcing economy. For the 2009 Wassaic Project arts festival, Clement ordered an oil painting that combined three different contexts and eras from the Wushipu Chinese Painting Village in Xiamen, China. Set against a background sky of a painting by the Hudson School painter Frederick Church and a Google Earth relief of Wassaic, NY is a building in Xiamen. The building just happens to evoke the stature of the Wassaic Mill, which is where the arts festival is held each year.

Drawing from the minimalism of Sol LeWitt and Mel Bochner, Clement Valla explores the structural potentials of form-making. His work examines repetition in a digital medium within the confines of a pre-existing system. When ordering paintings online from China, in order to communicate with artists, Valla subjected each image that was produced to a digital critique. He would send instructions to his overseas workshop by email, and with each exchange, a copy of a copy would insert itself into the internet-based feedback loop and ultimately make its way into the final object. The difference between the Wushipu paintings and the Seed drawings is that the former participate in an additive process where each new layer masks what was there before, whereas the latter record and divulge each additive transformation in horizontal and radial format. Nonetheless, for his thesis show, Valla had ordered copies of copies of copies of copies of paintings from artists working in China, and structurally, his commissioned, instruction-based collection looked a lot like the more abstracted and minimal Seed drawings that were to follow.

Digital production and hand-made craft combine nicely in Clement Valla's work, whether he is crowdsourcing the production of his Seed drawings or outsourcing his MFA thesis. The results are beautiful and document a modern-day palimpsest of working class creative output through a critical-productive framework.

Read Clement Valla's Master's thesis Original Copies:
http://www.lulu.com/items/volume_65/7166000/7166262/2/print/thesis.pdf

Edvard Munch at the National Gallery of Art

Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art

In an intimate setting at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, 59 of Edvard Munch's prints are displayed from now until October 31, 2010. Sometimes referred to as a Synthetist, a Symbolist, sometimes more broadly as a Post-Impressionist, and most often as a progenitor of Expressionism, the Norwegian artist is often identified through the expression of intense human emotion in his work. The Master Prints exhibition reveals a methodical streak in Munch's thematic unity of expression and does not overwhelm with the inclusion of his entire ouvre. Instead, it focuses on five discreet themes that the curators, Andrew Robinson and Elizabeth Prelinger have identified in the grouping they have assembled from three separate collections - the National Gallery's own collection of Munch prints, the Epstein family's collection, and the Blitz/Woodard collection in New York.

The intimacy that the small rooms, painted a deep navy blue, afford in the East Wing of the National Gallery is unprecedented. A close up view of the profile portrayal of his sister Sophie in The Sick Child shows the softness of linework that Munch achieves through lithography. With four renditions of the same image side by side, the power of repetition evinces a delicate regard for the subject, which Munch renders in cherry, red and yellow tones. The image appears scribbled with crayons, as if a small child had made it, but the boldness of composition is that of a seasoned artist.

It is impossible to make it through the exhibit without noticing compositional similarities in Munch's work. He centers the subject on the plate, the woodblock, or the stone - depending on the printmaking technique he is using - and prints a usually flattened composition that emphasizes color and bold strokes over depth. One of his last works, Kiss in the Field of 1943, is composed very similarly to Toward the Forest of 1897 with the figures set as outlines against an atmospheric background. Two Women on the Shore of 1898 also depicts two central figures, but in this case, the background is fragmented around the central subject, and Munch experiments with various intensities of color and texture to evoke the lone silhouettes of a young woman on the shore with death at her side.

The exhibit focuses on his technique and the variations Munch explores, rather than the biographical details that might have influenced his work. Two sets of dates accompany each print noting the creation of the printing matrix against the actual printing date, which usually came much later. Textual explanations throughout the exhibit refer to Munch's use of intaglio, woodblock or lithographic process, his habit of breaking a woodblock into pieces and then adjoining them to make a print, which in one instance of Two Women on the Shore, embosses the paper and defines disparate zones of color and depth that almost detach themselves from a compositional unity.

One of the first prints in the exhibit, a lithograph of Evening on Karl Johan Street of 1895, depicts a flattened street view with several ghoulish figures staring out of the composition and creates an instantaneous visual connection to Munch's Anxiety series, on which his most famous work, The Scream, is based. Themes that reappear in Munch's work include the tension between piety and sexuality, the myth of the fall, love, death and loneliness. A curious paradox that persists in Munch's work and that of the Expressionists is that the urgency of depicting an inner world through expressive linework and color participates in a self-conscious and self-questioning cultural context, which constructed itself as a measured reaction to the scientism of the Impressionists.

Industrial Cathedral of Arts: The Wassaic Project

Climb up the narrow stairwell at Maxon Mills in Wassaic, NY and peek into the dark openings overlooking a seven-story shaft that murmurs and hums with a deep, damp hollowness and the sound of various recordings by Leah Rico at each landing. The space is sublime. So is the artwork that sits within its cathedral-like exterior.

Artists from all over the United States exhibited their work at the Wassaic Project on August 13-15, enliving the small hamlet, which is part of the town of Amenia about two hours north of New York City along the Harlem Line of the Metro-North commuter rail train. Visitors poured in from all directions and populated a designated camp ground with their tents and then rushed toward the Maxon Mill, once used as a grain elevator, to see the art and enjoy the live music on the front porch of the hotel that adjoins the seven-story industrial structure. The hotel is also no longer a hotel. Small rooms with slanted floors and half-height walls that allow natural light into the spaces through heavy-timber columns and beams housed a photography exhibit consisting of medium-size pigment and inkjet prints. It would have been a squeeze to have more than two people in each room perusing the exhibit. On a chiaro-scuro mezannine, a lone piano basked in the sunlight streaming through the windows, its keys rising and falling and clicking. No sound was produced. It was an exercise in silence and automation. Back on the main level of the hotel a tilted wooden model of a city block with photos pasted to the rooftops invited visitors to look through a magnifying monocular, which deciphered the contents of the photographs, otherwise too small for the naked eye to see. The piece referenced an ongoing participatory public/private urban spaces activity accessible by emailing the artist, Jo. Q. Nelson.

By no means was this the end of it. The exhibit wound up another section of the building with jubilant momentum. But safety first. As a volunteer at the festival, my job was to monitor the number of visitors climbing up the narrow fire stairs so that they did not exceed allowable capacity. I also had to make sure that nothing caught fire. Also acting as gatekeeper to the exhibits accessible through the back staircase, Gwen Charles's Safety Project provided orange life vests to visitors who wanted to wear them free of charge. "If you are not wearing a life jacket, it's not going to save your life," was written on the booth showcasing the vests. On departure, visitors could opt to buy these psychological failsafes for $45. Many who were wearing them commented on how comfortable and safe they actually felt with some degree of due irony.

With over one hundred artists showing their work, the festival could have easily become a maelstrom, but the narrow stairs controlled the flow of people very efficiently through the vertical stacks of the industrial space. When I took a break from my volunteer job, I had a chance to glance through the 2nd and 3rd floor exhibits. I stumbled upon a dark room with a wall-width projection of names. Stephen Eakin's In Memory Of, a compilation of names of deceased individuals allowed visitors to enter the name of someone they wanted to commemorate through a user-friendly, touch-based interface. Dim lighting gave the space the somberness of a mausoleum and the visitors the privacy of remembrance. I entered my grandfather's name in the dense pattern of names and returned to my post at the base of the stairs where I had an excellent view of Brinton Jaecks's Unconscious Collective - a vortex of carved wooden beds attached to the ceiling and to each other with smoothly carved wooden chains and spanning across most of the ground floor. The piece references institutions and has a musical quality expressed through compositional tension and axial rotations of the individual beds. It is also a fine work of carpentry.

The festival accomodated both digitally produced work and manual processes. Clement Valla engaged 1600 individuals in the creation of two composite paintings on mylar through online software. Mary Lydecker created imaginary cities with traditional collage techniques, but the intersections were so seamless that the places became believable in their own right. She combined imagery from Stockholm and Hong Kong or Cocoa Beach and Stockholm, establishing a picturesque ambiguity about the sense of place. Her collages bridge geographic distances yet seem perfectly familiar at first glance because the patterns of development over the last century have produced odd stylistic and scalar juxtapositions.

Although there were other noteworthy pieces participating in innovative and polemical trends in the arts at Wassaic, for the sake of brevity, the remainder of the article focuses on the work of four artists who made a particular effort to engage their audience.

Jesse Kauppila
Printmaker Jesse Kauppila performed live demonstrations of his Bitmap Machine project for his audience. Collaborating with a mathematician, Jesse is generating combinations of "bitmap" prints, which will function as 2D, scannable barcodes. At the festival, he could be found shaking a box he had constructed to print the custom barcodes and explaining the process outloud. A ball-bearing grid underlay a metal, pixellated grid. Each time he shook the box, the ball bearings would land into random quadrants of their underlying grid and push up on the individual pixels of the grid above them. Jesse would then ink the end result and print the bitmap impression on Japanese rice paper. He was able to carry out this process without a press because the box he had built for himself performed all of the functions of a printing press. His individual prints became part of a larger twine-stretched grid, which he used to hang his pieces and keep track of the random combinations generated by the way the ball-bearings fell into place. His project aims to marry traditional print-making techniques with digital barcode technology. Throughout the duration of the exhibit, Jesse never tired of elucidating his process and answering questions.
He is based in San Francisco, where he practices printmaking and seeks collaborations with other artists.

Ben Cuevas
Installation artist and avid knitter, Ben Cuevas is inspired by British artist Damien Hirst and French social thinker Michel Foucault. When his frind taught him how to knit, Ben focused on how surgical the process seemed. His knitted hearts, skeletons, colons and scrotums among others, appear soft and plush and evoke the sense of comfort that any knitted apparel might. Structurally they are familiar because they are based on medical illustrations rather than photographic images of human anatomy. It is difficult to remember that they represent a disembodied grotesque. However, Ben insists that his work is not about representation. The installation piece he chose to showcase at Wassaic Project features a knitted skeleton seated atop a pyramid of Borden's condensed milk cans and a cloud of screen prints on Plexi glass suspended above it. The prints are of disembodied anatomical parts photographed in high resolution with diagrammatic illustrative overlays. Ben conceives of the piece as a reference to material culture and Wassaic's local history (The Borden Company had a condensed milk factory in Wassaic.) and a meditation on transcendence. The knitted skeleton is seated in the lotus position. His piece, like many of the other installation pieces in the exhibit drew the attention of the improvisational dance troupe comprised of dancers Charmaine Warren and Ashe Turner and musician John Ellis. Ben is based in Los Angeles and attended Hampshire College in Mass.

 
Josh Atlas
Josh Atlas wants to make you laugh. His doughnut-covered disco ball, frosting-laden beach gear and picture frames jammed in buckets with foam cushioning evoke Wayne Thiebaud's pastry paintings. Josh's work is 3D, however. It responds to lighting conditions, and both kids and adults love it. In order to prepare the doughnuts for his disco ball, Josh had to coopt another artist's studio and set up a drying abacus. To preserve the piece, he coated all his doughnuts in urethane and the frosting in epoxy. In order to provide a stable substructure for his disco ball of doughnuts, Josh used a beach ball as the core. His meticulous and finely-crafted drawings demonstrate the care and effort that went into creating his wondrous glazed amalgamations. Their precarious balance is due to a finely-tuned process.

A visit to Josh's studio affords a glance at a large photoprint of Josh submerged in a bath of doughnuts. He invites all to take a dip or watch him bask in the pleasure. One question we can all ask ourselves is whether such quantities of doughnuts express a love of them or an uncomfortable overabundance. Josh says he is just obsessed, and that this is an object-oriented turn in his work. He is also based in Los Angeles.

James Weingrod
The cosmos in a petridish comes to mind when James Weingrod starts painting with his custom-created water-soluble pigments and resins. He uses a clay-surfaced wooden base and films the process. A drop of silver fizzles and bleeds outward melting into the black, phalo blue and veridian green sea that Weingrod calls the universe. He invites participants to create the universe with him and explains doppler effects and supernovas as he reconstitutes the painting laying flat. It took him three years to master his materials and learn to control and predict their behavior. Weingrod's materials come from a small independent store called Guerra in New York City. Although he does not claim to be a chemist, Weingrod mixes all of his own paints. Dressed in a Tyvek suit and a Fedora hat, he has a knack for his participatory act and is not shy about engaging an audience and opening up his simple yet mesmerizing and infinitely engrossing process to all willing participants.

The Wassaic Project is an annual event, and it is organized by artists for artists. All the co-directors - Eve Biddle, Bowie Zunino, Elan Bogarin and Jeff Barnett-Winsby - had pieces in the exhibit and spent all year planning the well-attended, three-day event.