All I Want for Christmas...

All I Want for Christmas…

    “…Just suppose that we identify (at least in his ‘natural’ aspect) the cosmic Christ of faith with the Omega Point of science: then everything in our outlook is clarified and broadened, and falls into harmony.” 

   - Pierre Teilhard De Chardin, from his essay, Suggestions for a New Theology,” 1945

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

    In offering for your viewing contemplation what I’ve come to call my “annual image,” I ask two questions. First, will you spend any serious time thinking about what the first syllable of the word ‘Christmas’ means to you? And second, what are you going to do about it? In answering the first question, it might be helpful to consider God’s own perspective as found in Colossians 1:15-17 :

   “…He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together…”

   Have a Blessed Christmas.

   T.W.

Thrilling Me Softly (and other eye tunes)

Thrilling Me Softly (and other eye tunes)

By Tom Wachunas

 

     “Interestingly enough, the sheer emptiness of the expansive gallery floor, combined with the generally neutral look and feel of the walls, conjures an eerie impression of an empty ballroom, awaiting the arrival of spectacularly attired guests. Ah well, maybe next year the dance will be more grand.”

    - from ARTWACH post on October 18, 2014

EXHIBIT: Stark County Artists Exhibition, at Massillon Museum, THROUGH JANUARY 10, 2016 / 121 Lincoln Way East, downtown Massillon  www.massillonmuseum.org

    Quoting myself above is simply a way to remind you of how miffed I was about the quality of last year’s annual Stark County Artists exhibit, not that it’s anything of great importance. Still, this year I’ve no axe to grind beyond my persistent concerns about the efficacy of “juried” exhibits and assigning gradated awards (Best in Show, Second Place, Third Place) along with a handful of Honorable Mentions, which one might call “also-rans.”

    In this postmodern era, there’s no universal standard by which to measure and declare an artwork’s indisputable excellence (much to the dismay, I’m sure, of some academic traditionalists). And regardless of a juror’s credentials, the process of determining relative levels of aesthetic quality is in the end a complex and mostly subjective one, fraught with subtle biases, including multiple definitions of art. The practice has become needlessly imperious and even a bit silly. Why can’t we simply have “jurors” as guest curators who choose the entrants to be exhibited and leave it at that? This is after all an art show, not a horse race. The designations of win-place-show certainly mean something unarguable in the sport of kings, but they have little if any truly meaningful function in the context of group art exhibitions.  

    Meanwhile, back at the track Massillon Museum, and to continue with the analogy of selected works with attendees at a ball, this year’s guests are elegantly dressed to thrill even if their aesthetic sensibilities are for the most part conservative and familiar. If artworks were songs - 63 of them here, by 42 artists -  most of them lie somewhere between easy listening and contemporary pop. That said, here are a few of the more appealing tunes that had me humming right along.  

    The sole printmaker in this year’s show is William Bogdan, and his haunting black-and-white woodcut, The Doe Lay Dead in a Field of Asters: No, is as stark as it is poetic. The large-scale verticality of the piece is compelling, giving it the resonance of a devotional icon. There’s something angelic about how the subtly toned and textured animal, with a cluster of floral shapes inscribed in its abdomen, seems to be ascending. Death begets life.

    Of the mixed media entries, In Her Shoes, by Clare Murray Adams, is especially fascinating. She’s particularly adept at distilling elements of ordinary domesticity into extraordinary moments of poetic materiality. There is an air of gentle mystique about this page from a dreamworld scrapbook – a tactile montage of childhood musings and memories.

    If there can be such a thing as Romantic Minimalism, photographer Seth Adam may have hit upon it with his crisp and bright image of a Pueblo structure in his Taos Shadows. While photographers don’t overtly “invent” a pictorial composition in the way a painter might, the most remarkable ones, such as Mr. Adam in this instance, know how to recognize and reveal a magical moment when they see one.

   Tina Meyers’ abstract acrylic painting, Living in the Trees, is a remarkably muscular composition, tight in structure and loose in gestural mark-making. The piece fuses figural with floral elements to create an enchanting biomorph.

    And there’s also plenty of enchantment in Brian Robinson’s Simple Waves. Robinson is a true master of the pastel medium. His stunning landscape is replete with feathery, silken textures; saturated, luminous colors; and sunlight rendered so lusciously you can almost feel the warmth on your face.

   Equally accomplished in the pastel medium (oil pastel, to be precise) is Diane Belfiglio, beautifully evident here in her glowing Fleeting Fall II. But her new sculpture, Repetitions II, is a surprising revelation. It’s a serious departure from the naturalistic realism she’s been so meticulously exploring – exhausting, really – for many years. The intriguing geometric abstraction of this free-standing work is on one level a nod to painter Piet Mondrian, but in airy 3D, with just a hint of Alexander Calder’s mobiles. Belfiglio is singing a new song these days, so to speak. Call it adventuresome alternative programming, and stay tuned for her future hits.

    PHOTOS (from top): The Doe Lay Dead in a Field of Asters: No, woodcut by William Bogdan; Living in the Trees, acrylic, by Tina Meyers; In Her Shoes, mixed media, by Clare Murray Adams; Repetitions II (foreground, on white pedestal), pinewood and chains, by Diane Belfiglio           

Owning Scrooge

Owning Scrooge

By Tom Wachunas

    “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach.”  - Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol (1843)

    The last time I saw the Players Guild production of A Christmas Carol was in 2011. The ensuing years have not dulled this lustrous theatrical gem. In fact, director and choreographer Michael Lawrence Akers seems to have sweated the small stuff so that some facets of this year’s offering have acquired a sparkling new radiance.

    Joshua Erichsen’s scenic design includes meticulously sculpted 19^th century architectural facades that swivel to reveal period interiors. When paired with thrilling fly effects, the entire set takes on a dramatic dimensionality, further animated by the authentic period costumes by George McCarty II, based on original designs by Susie Smith and Patricia Hemphill. Then there’s the wowing light and sound design by Scott Sutton, including very effective reverb effects along with tight spotlighting that makes individual characters seem to magically glow when they sing. A particularly spectacular and startling effect is the projection of Jacob Marley’s ghostly face on to the door-knocker of Scrooge’s house. The vivacious 11-piece orchestra, led by composer and keyboardist Steve Parsons, provides a scintillating atmosphere for John Popa’s clever and often compelling lyrics. And finally, the astonishingly talented 35-member cast rounds out this list of ingredients which add up to nothing less than a benevolent conspiracy to enthrall.

    The big ensemble choral numbers are impressively stirring with their sonorous harmonies. And when not front–and-center, the ensemble members are nonetheless adept at portraying authentic townsfolk sincerely engaged with each other through gestures, shared glances, and animated dialogue.

    Matthew Horning brings real warmth and earnestness to his role of Bob Cratchit. His singing of “A Child Alone,” along with the equally earnest Adam Petrosino as Tiny Tim, is one of the evening’s most tender passages. Amanda Medley plays Belle, Scrooge’s erstwhile love. When she senses her hold on Scrooge slipping away, the heart-piercing sweetness of her voice, tinged with palpable hurt, is riveting as she sings “I Have To Know.”

   In her airborne rendering of The Ghost of Christmas Past, Sarah Marie Young is mesmerizing as she sings “Walk With Me” to an incredulous-looking Scrooge in tow. There’s a soothing resonance to her soprano tonality that imbues her character with childlike innocence, subtly tempered with gentle wisdom and even a bit of irony.

    The tonal muscularity in Bart Herman’s voice is well-suited to his roles of Mr. Fezziwig, Scrooge’s former boss, and the Ghost of Christmas Present. As Fezziwig, he’s the picture of magnanimous joviality. As the Ghost, he’s alternately ebullient and authoritative in a cautionary sort of way.

    Other strong performances include Matthew Heppe in his dual role of Fred, Scrooge’s affable nephew, and Scrooge as a young workaholic, especially engaging when he sings “Ten Minutes More.” The evening is peppered with memorably funny scenes such as the jaunty “Mister Scrooge.” The song features The Collecting Men - a trio of charity solicitors played by Tyler Ferrebee, Doug Lisak, and Greg Rininger (who also turns in a chilling portrait of Jacob Marley’s ghost) - who cavort and cajole with quasi-vaudevillian glee, their harmonies reminiscent of old-timey radio jingles.

   This performance marks the sixth appearance of Don Jones in the role of Ebenezer Scrooge. A seasoned veteran of the stage, it’s clear that he’s never stopped fine-tuning the nuances of his character to become more emotionally expansive. Here, he’s wholly in the moment(s) as he progressively sheds a convincingly irascible, selfish persona and steps into compassionate living. When he’s cruel, we shudder at his vitriol; when remorseful, he breaks our hearts; when redeemed, we’re giddy with elation right alongside. I think it fair to say that Jones (and for that matter the entire cast and production staff) owns Scrooge in the same way one would possess and care for a precious family heirloom.

   Precious indeed, this production. The Players Guild’s continuing commitment to this iconic story is a necessary and brave tradition of holding up a much-needed light and generous measure of grace in an ever-darkening world. It’s surely an artful epiphany that blesses us, every one.  

    A Christmas Carol, The New Musical, with music by Steve Parsons, book and Lyrics by John Popa (originated in 1997), at Players Guild Theatre, 1001 Market Avenue N, Canton, Ohio, THROUGH DECEMBER 20, 2015 / Shows on Friday at 8:00 p.m., Saturday at 2:00 and 8:00 p.m., Sunday at 2:00 p.m. / Single tickets:$26/ 17 and younger: $19/ Seniors: $23 / Box Office 330.453.7617 / www.playersguildtheatre.com

   PHOTOS, from top, courtesy Players Guild Theatre: Don Jones as Ebenezer Scrooge / Sarah Marie Young as Ghost of Christmas Past / (left) Bart Herman, Ghost of Christmas Present; Don Jones as Scrooge      

Embracing Terpsichore with the Canton Symphony Orchestra

Embracing Terpsichore with the Canton Symphony Orchestra

By Tom Wachunas

 

    In Classical mythology, Terpsichore, the daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne, is the Muse of Dance. On November 21, she was present at Umstattdt Performing Arts Hall, in all her poetic vivacity, for a magnificent performance by the Canton Symphony Orchestra (CSO).

    Commemorating the 25^th Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the CSO partnered with Dancing Wheels Company & School for two of the works on the program. Dancing Wheels was founded in 1980 by Mary Verdi-Fletcher, the first professional wheelchair dancer in the U.S. Her company integrates the talents of dancers with and without disabilities, and is considered one of the premier arts and disabilities organizations in the U.S. today.

   In his opening remarks about the program, Maestro Gerhardt Zimmermann explained that the theme of the evening, “Walls of Glass,” was a metaphor for the societal obstacles and prejudices faced by the physically disabled. He assured us that we were “…in for a very emotional ride.”

    Indeed, beginning with the Adagietto movement for harp and strings, from Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, the orchestra was wholly gripping – as it was throughout the entire program - in its emotive power. Strings seemed to weave a velveteen tapestry threaded through with brilliant shimmering from the harp. This most beautiful of wordless love songs is replete with heartrending crescendos and suspended moments of both joyous and bittersweet sighing. It was an altogether arresting backdrop for the dancers as they moved about the stage in front of the orchestra.

    The dance was choreographed by Bobby Wesner, co-founder and artistic director of Neos Dance Theatre. His movement design combines balletic grace and formality with a distinctly modern sensuality. The upright dancers - in duet, trio, or quartet configurations – were mesmerizing as they executed breathtaking lifts and sinewy leaps. Meanwhile, the dancers in wheelchairs seemed to simultaneously float on air and glide magically along the stage with their stand-up partners. They were a poignant reminder that dance is as much a matter of moving the human spirit as it is one of unfettered feet. And like the harp in the music score, they were an impassioned embodiment of wistful yearnings and warm embraces.

    Wesner’s choreography for the thrilling second work on the program exuded the same sense of fervent connectivity between wheelchair and stand-up dancers, though with even more emotional impact. This was the world premiere of Symphony llll, Lightfall, by American composer Stephen Melillo. Scored for full orchestra, the work is in three movements and was commissioned by Gerhardt Zimmermann for this occasion.

    The thematic scope of Lightfall is well-captured in Melillo’s words, “In Dedication to: Those who forever choose to look up and embrace the wonder-filled Universe and the Joy of Life.” It is a marvelous object lesson in blending Romantic classicism with contemporary, even cinematic sensibilities. From the brassy chaos and thunder of the first movement, the haunting lyricism of the second, and through to the triumphal optimism of the finale, there is a kinship in Melillo’s writing to Mahler’s penchant for fusing the sublime with the banal, the ethereal with the mundane.

    Additionally, Melillo’s robust invocation of victory over adversity was an especially appropriate fit with the themes of cathartic love and apotheosis so powerfully articulated in the evening’s final selection, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. Here was the CSO at its electrifying best.

    Interestingly though, for all of the compelling aural artistry provided by the orchestra during this most riveting offering in recent memory, what lingers is the image of the dancers at the end of Lightfall. As they stood at the foot of the stage, they mimed running their hands across a vast pane of glass, feeling their way, as it were, toward an opening. They found it - a window on the fiery, indefatigable soul of Terpsichore.

Insiteful Collaborations

Insiteful Collaborations

By Tom Wachunas

 

 EXHIBIT: TRANSLATIONS presents PAPER, ROCK, SCISSORS: The Art of War,  Cyrus Custom Framing, 2645 Cleveland Ave. NW, THROUGH NOVEMBER 28    330.452.9787   www.cyruscustom.com 

    Of all the ideas for a group show offered by Translations curator Craig Joseph across the past several years, this one, called “Paper, Rock, Scissors: The Art of War,” is in his words, “…one of our wildest concepts yet.” I couldn’t agree more, and I would add that it’s one of the most enchanting, too, in the grandest sense of the word. So to continue, I’ll first give you Craig Joseph’s initial media release (the exhibit has been up since October’s First Friday):

   “We got together with five of our favorite artists - painters Steve Ehret and Kat Francis, and sculptors Gail Trunick, Kelly Rae, and Breanna Boulton. Together we brainstormed fifteen different environments - for example an abandoned carnival, a trailer park, a meadow, a train yard, etc. Together Steve and Kat have painted fifteen large and gorgeous landscape paintings - 2'x 4' and 3' x 5'. Then, our sculptor ladies were handed the task of building people or creatures or beings that would inhabit these environments. The catch? One of them would build and incorporate paper, one would build and incorporate natural materials, and one would build and incorporate metal. And the final result is fifteen scenes of sorts, with the creatures doing battle on little shelves with the landscape paintings as backdrops. You, the audience, will get to decide who wins: paper, rock, or scissors.”

    Remember? Paper wraps rock, rock breaks scissors, scissors cut paper. Here then, an old children’s game has morphed into 15 ambitious tableaux. Each work includes a trio of cleverly constructed resident characters. I say “characters” only because these works have a particularly theatrical sensibility, as if they could be set designs for an elaborate stage production featuring some sort of confrontation or aggression among the denizens of a given environment.

    Those environments are represented through exquisitely executed oil-on-panel paintings. More fascinating is the fact that while these luscious backdrops are collaborative configurations, they’re visually seamless. This is to say that in any given painting there’s no ostensible break in style or technique across the picture plane. Which artist contributed what aspects? That would be my direct question to the painters, Steve Ehret and Kat Francis, when I see them at the artists talkback scheduled for Monday, Nov. 16 at 7:00 p.m. in the gallery. I include here a link to the public invitation: 

https://www.facebook.com/events/1516004268712710/    

    In each of these scenarios, the “battle” on the shelf placed just below the painting isn’t necessarily a graphic illustration of a conflict in progress, though sometimes that much is implied. The iconography tends instead to be somewhat elliptical in that regard, and seems to symbolize confrontations that could be in the past, present, or yet to come.

    Four of the five artists here are women, including the three sculptors: Gail Trunick, Kelly Rae, and Breanna Boulton. Their manipulations of diverse substances are remarkably inventive. The elemental physicality of their pieces reminds me that efficacious representations of war, whether metaphorical or literal, are not the strict purview of men alone. While there are some objects we might regard as relatively whimsical or delicate in their conveyance of a “feminine” perspective, in most of the pieces, it is an aggressive and powerfully poetic spirit that abides in their earthen materiality.    

    Conceptually, the integration of the women’s sculptures with the painted backdrops is often an intriguing exercise in what one could call aesthetic alchemy. The juxtaposition of 3D and 2D iconography can transform the immediately apparent content of the 2D backdrops into alternative realities. For example, viewed by itself, the painting for Factory is a convincing depiction of modern industrial architecture. But the accompanying sculptures are eerie evocations of Dark Age weaponry or torture devices, imbuing the painting with the suggestion of a medieval fortress. Similarly, while the painting in Forest is sublimely expressive of sylvan fecundity, the sculptures provide a nearly mythological dimension that re-contextualizes the forest into a wholly numinous, magical place.      

    To continue the analogy to stage production, while the artists have engineered the sites wherein various actions can occur, as well as the cast of players to carry them out, YOU, the viewer, are ultimately the playwright. In that capacity, you get to construct the narrative. It’s a subtle take on interactive art. Not simply a passive observer, you’re a collaborator in completing the meaning of the work.

    But in determining the victor in any specific battle, beware. In this context, paper may well survive an attack by scissors, rock might be too fragile to crush scissors, and scissors rendered impotent against paper. Art wars can be unpredictable that way.

    PHOTOS, from top: Forest; Arctic Circle; Tribal Village; Factory; Abandoned Amusement Park (detail)

Macabre Magnificence from the Canton Symphony Orchestra

Macabre Magnificence from the Canton Symphony Orchestra

By Tom Wachunas

 

     Conjuring the spirit of Halloween for just one more night, the November 1 program by the Canton Symphony Orchestra (CSO), under the enchanted baton (or magic wand?) of Maestro Gerhardt Zimmermann, was frightfully delicious. Not that I favor socializing in the netherworld, but from beginning to end, the evening was a magnificent dance with the devil.

    And what better way to set the tone for these noir proceedings than Modest Mussorgsky’s sprawling Night On Bald Mountain? In what the composer had once called a “wicked prank” in 1867, the brass and percussion evoked the forces of thunder and lightning as the strings recalled frenzied, biting winds swirling around a haunted mountaintop. The orchestra delivered the music with such a sense of raw, strident urgency that this terribly familiar work (included in Disney’s 1940 animated classic, Fantasia) sounded startlingly new.

    If night terrors can be said to have a humorous face, Malcom Arnold’s rarely performed Tam O’Shanter amply fit the bill. The music was drawn from Scottish poet Robert Burns’ epic story of a hapless but jolly drunkard, Tam from the town of Shanter, riding home atop his trusty mare, Meg, on a stormy night after drinking at the pub. When he stops to peek inside an abandoned church, he beholds a ghastly orgy of witches and demons dancing to Scottish jigs and reels. Eyeing a young witch clad only in a revealing undergarment called a “cutty-sark,” he lets out a loud and lascivious cry of delight that prompts the hellish celebrants to give furious chase.

   The thoroughly Scottish-flavored score is a pastiche of often comical aural devices. The orchestra seemed to be possessed by a delightfully naughty spirit as it immersed us in evocative textures, at times in convincing imitations of a bagpipe chorus. Amid stormy bursts from brass and percussion, bassoons lumbered along like the inebriated Tam, and solo trombone hilariously voiced his drunken salutation, “Weel done, cutty-sark!” Well done indeed.

    Concluding the evening’s first half was Totentanz (Dance of Death), a symphonic poem for piano and orchestra by Franz Liszt. The work is a masterpiece of virtuosic keyboard writing, built around a thematic core of variations on Dies Irae (Day of Wrath), the Gregorian plainchant associated with the Mass for the Dead. Guest pianist Spencer Meyer was something of a force of nature here, passionately articulating the relentless percussive thrust of the music. Imagine the orchestra as a darkly colored canvas stretched taut. As it depicted the dancing of ghosts and the haunted clattering of dry bones, it held its own quite well against Meyers’ pounding glissandos and breathtaking arpeggios, all executed with the fiery panache of a painter wielding a broad brush of enchanted colors.

    A relatively more lyrical, though equally diabolical character was threaded through the following selection, Camille Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre. Here, the composer cast solo violin as the fiddle-playing devil. The harmonic dissonance in the violin music is the result of intentionally tuning down the top string a half step to enhance its ominous presence. In this role, CSO Acting Concertmaster, Hanna Landrum, adopted an oddly quiet energy. Yet, ironically enough, it was the palpable gentleness of her touch that made the devil’s tune all the more eerie.

    During the evening’s final work, Liszt’s Mephistopheles, the third movement of A Faust Symphony, the music twists and writhes in a grotesque revelation of the devil’s relentlessly taunting nature. But with the entry of a male choir in the “Chorus Mysticus,” an ethereal light seems to cut through the darkness. The Canton Symphony Men’s Chorus, under the direction of Dr. Britt Cooper, rendered this drama of apotheosis with wondrous sonority. And the crystalline voice of tenor Timothy Culver soared in a powerful embodiment of majestic and mystical solemnity.    

   As if to add an exclamation point to an already electrifying encounter, Maestro Zimmermann surprised us all by leading the ensemble in a rousing encore - Charles Gounod’s Funeral March of a Marionette. Alfred Hitchcock would have surely approved.

 PHOTOS: (top) Pianist Spencer Meyer; (bottom) Tenor Timothy Culver

   www.cantonsymphony.org

Wizards of Odd

Wizards of Odd

By Tom Wachunas 

    In any art, you don't know in advance what you want to say - it's revealed to you as you say it. That's the difference between art and illustration.  - Aaron Siskind

EXHIBIT: IKON IMAGES – The Illustration Gallery, 221 5^th Street NW, downtown Canton, 330.904.1377, www.ikonimagesgallery.com

Hours: Wed. – Sat. 12p.m. to 6p.m.

   With Canton’s newest art venue, Ikon Images (which opened in August), owner Rhonda Seaman has provided the Arts District’s most quintessential example of form following function when it comes to art galleries. It’s a remarkably handsome chamber – bright and large (65’ x 15’), with lots of unobstructed wall space and architectural elegance, right down (or up) to its vintage tin tile ceiling. So call me a traditionalist, but this is, as a purely physical environment for exhibiting art, everything a gallery should be.

   Ikon Images is devoted to showing the paintings, drawings, prints and sculptures of internationally accomplished artists in the realm of fantasy illustration. As a formal designation, Fantasy Illustration has come to denote a very specific yet eclectic iconography, embracing everything from fairy tales and ancient mythologies to sci-fi epics and horror stories. Call it the celebration and commodification of the odd and eerie. So it seems only appropriate that I’ve been writing my comments on Halloween night.

    For starters, I highly recommend clicking on Ikon’s web link posted above to get an introduction to the gallery’s featured artists, though certainly not as a satisfying substitute for visiting the gallery in person. To do so is to encounter a magical collection of works that are wholly captivating if for no other reason than their exquisite precision of execution. Additionally, you can click on the “The World of Illustration” tab at the top of Ikon’s web page for a useful overview of the term and its historic applications. 

    Thanks in large part to mind-bending developments in digital animation technology over the past few decades, the Fantasy genre has substantially advanced to become a major entertainment component of our consumerist culture. What was once a relatively specialized niche of artistic practice has morphed into an elaborately appointed castle, so to speak.

    That said, permit me to wax confessional. I admit to a complicated if not polemical appreciation of the genre, particularly as it is practiced in the art of painting. My ambivalence is grounded in my sense that contemporary 2D illustration has become something of an impotent subset of true fine art painting. Some may find that distinction to be an elitist one. So be it.

   Within this bazaar of the bizarre there is a curious pastiche of historic painting influences. It’s as if the ghosts of Gothic drama, Baroque theatricality, Rococo whimsicality, and Neoclassical heroism have been processed, distilled and otherwise compressed into pristine pictorial episodes of a hyper-realistic nature. As I mentioned above, it’s true that in terms of mechanical technique, there is much to praise. All of the artists demonstrate, to varying degrees, astonishing drafting skills and design sensibilities. But their precious exactitude of rendering gives their surfaces the detached, photographic look of animated film stills. After a while, this formulaic sameness tends to sap their power as discrete painted objects, and undermine their potential for making any truly remarkable intellectual or emotional impact.

    In this context, I miss the ghosts of Goya and Delacroix.

    PHOTOS, from top: We Are Lost, by Raoul Vitale; Bone Image, by Travis Lewis; An Offering, by Ania Mohrbacher; Descent of the Centaur, by Soutchay Soungpradith; Lubber, the Pine Sprite Elder, by Kevin Buntin       

Enchanted Transitions

Enchanted Transitions

By Tom Wachunas

 

    “Now I really feel the landscape, I can be bold and include every tone of blue and pink: it's enchanting, it's delicious."  -Claude Monet

   “Painting from nature is not copying the object, it is realizing one’s sensations.”  -Paul Cezanne

    EXHIBIT: LIGHT – new works by Heather Bullach, at the Little Art Gallery, located in the North Canton Public Library, 185 North Main Street, North Canton, on view through November 15, 2015 / 330.499.4712

www.heatherbullach.com

    Here’s an excerpt from a review I posted back on February 11, 2014, about Heather Bullach’s portrait paintings: “…And to her method she brings a necessarily keen, sensitive eye for nuances of light, color and perspective, along with a remarkably adroit physical touch that gives a silken presence to her surfaces.”

   That assessment remains largely apropos to Heather Bullach’s current body of work, but it also merits appending some other observations. Whereas her earlier surfaces effectively honed the “silken presence” of her paint handling, giving her images a tidy realism, her new works represent a transition toward purer painting, which is to say letting the paint be paint. In so doing, they announce an invigorated and considerably less timid presence of the artist’s brush. While this sort of manual expressivity is subtly evident in a few of Bullach’s recent portraits, it’s decidedly more apparent in her newfound embrace of the landscape genre.

    Her intimately-scaled oil paintings are seductive hybrids of the literal (representational) and the essential (abstract). Throughout most of the compositions, colors and shapes are treated as harmoniously balanced planes, rendered with a quietly gestural energy (as opposed to weighty impasto). Sometimes the softly blended brushstrokes appear a bit formulaic or precious in the regularity of their application, such as in the gold and brown fields depicted in September. But generally, they suggest actual textures while not belaboring meticulous illusionism. Bullach is beginning to use the materiality of paint not toward a strictly mimetic end so much as a sensational one in the true sense of the word.

    Certainly the most striking presence here is the ephemeral yet tangible character of light itself. Reflected light, as in the jewel-like shimmering of Indian Summer. Refracted and dispersed light, as in the eerily serene Fog. Or the spectacular potency of dramatic light, as in Charelston Steeple.

    Of course, it’s via the transformations of color that we best apprehend light in its most palpable manifestations. The subtle dynamics of variable color intensity and saturation work remarkably well together in Bullach’s landscapes, imbuing them with - to borrow another reference from my 2014 review - not just credible likenesses, but enchanted lifenesses.

   And if colors can be said to impart real tastes, Bullach’s are indeed delicious. Monet would approve.

    PHOTOS, from top, courtesy Heather Bullach: September; Indian Summer; Fog; Charleston Steeple; Sunlit

Reading Light

Reading Light

By Tom Wachunas

 

    "If you can't do it in black and white, all the color in the world is not going to help." - Robert Malone, Southern Illinois U., Edwardsville

    “Sane judgment abhors nothing so much as a picture perpetrated with no technical knowledge, although with plenty of care and diligence.”  - Albrecht Dürer

    EXHIBIT: Black & White Linocuts: Printmaking Works by Dennis Revitzky, THROUGH OCTOBER 25, 2015, at the Canton Museum of Art, 1001 Market Avenue N., Canton, OH  www.cantonart.org  330.453.7666

    I remember well an episode from the fifth grade when I first encountered a picture of Albrecht Dürer’s woodcut print (c. 1497-8), Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, in an encyclopedia. The crisp precision and abundance of detailed linearities, and the dramatic capturing of light – all in black and white - were completely mesmerizing. I want to learn to draw just like that, I thought to myself. Subsequent learning about the demanding process of  producing such an image, called “relief” printmaking, made Dürer’s artistry all the more amazing to me.

   A brief primer is in order. The relief method of printmaking requires cutting or carving into a block of suitable material such as wood (“woodcuts”) or linoleum (“linocuts”) so as to produce a raised image (hence, an image “in relief”) to which the artist applies ink and transfers it to paper via pressure from rubbing by hand or rolling it through a mechanical press.

   While skilled drawing in the traditional sense produces instantaneous results by directly applying a drawing implement to paper, much of my fascination with relief printmaking lies in appreciating its meticulous procedure of sculpting the matrix, i.e., the surface of the block, to recapitulate the artist’s original drawing. Additionally, relief prints are not “right-reading” duplications of the original drawing, but rather mirror images. The artist must necessarily think in reverse, as it were.    

    Though the images in this remarkably arresting collection of black and white linocuts by Dennis Revitzky aren’t as densely packed with tight clusters of individual lines as, say, the Dürer masterwork mentioned above, they are no less enthralling in their diverse pictorial textures. Their very high contrasts of light and dark values cause them to practically pop off the wall with a sculptural boldness (even when viewed from a substantial distance) while simultaneously drawing us to the finer points of their interiors. Reading them abstractly, the whites function not as static backgrounds or inactive negative spaces, but as integral units of illumination in an organic whole – white light as a discrete, positive form sublimely balanced with heavy blacks and “grey areas” of delineated patterns.

   Mr. Revitzky is multi-lingual, in a manner of speaking. His particular brand of naturalism (sometimes imbued with surrealist sensibilities) allows him to be equally eloquent in landscape, still-life and figural genres. And playful, as evidenced by his witty appropriation of significant works from art history. With pieces such as Art History in the Great West and The Collection, for example, try making a game of identifying borrowings from ancient Greece, Michelangelo, Van Gogh, Picasso, Magritte, or Dali, among others.

    Revitzky’s fluid drawing/cutting style has all the confidence and elegance of finely-wrought calligraphy. From that perspective alone, you might consider the experience of looking at his prints a delightful exercise in write-reading.

    PHOTOS, from top: The Collection; Winter Night; Art History In The Great West; Oriental Still-Life

Peculiar Heroics from the Canton Symphony Orchestra

Peculiar Heroics from the Canton Symphony

By Tom Wachunas

 

     The theme of the Canton Symphony Orchestra’s season-opening concert on October 3 at Umstattd Hall was “Heroes Among Us.” It is an ambitious theme, to be sure, and one that understandably sets up an expectation of hearing truly iconic music exemplifying lofty ideals such as bravery, courage, or sacrifice. And yet I felt half the program content on this occasion to be somewhat underwhelming in that regard, if not downright peculiar.

    The evening’s first selection was Joan Tower’s Fanfare For The Uncommon Woman #1(1986).  The piece uses the same instrumentation as Aaron Copland’s unforgettable Fanfare for the Common Man, and even begins with essentially the same solemn, measured strokes from the percussion. But after that, Tower’s scoring for the brass instruments is considerably more busy and textured than the majestic or “heroic” simplicity of the Copland work. It’s probably best to think of Tower’s piece not so much as a cheeky or feminist retort to Copland (as some have considered it in the past), but rather as a respectful and warm embrace of women across history who, in Tower’s words, “…take risks and are adventurous.”

    Further pursuing the notion of adventure as it relates to women - though this time of a fantastical sort - the second work on the program was the stormy Ride of the Valkyries, from Wagner’s opera, Die Walküre. In Norse mythology, the Valkyries were valiant warrior maidens on horseback, given the power to determine a battle’s outcome and reward fallen heroes by delivering them to Valhalla to reside with the gods. Not surprisingly, the orchestra, like the Valkyries themselves, boldly soared to the occasion, effectively conjuring all the music’s haunting imagery of ominous battle cries echoing through windswept cliffs.

    Continuing with Wagner’s ‘Ring Cycle’ as source material, the proceedings took a decidedly quirky and abstract turn with Christopher Rouse’s Der Gerettete Alberich (roughly translated as “Alberich Saved”), composed in 1997. The work is a concerto-like fantasy for solo percussionist and orchestra that very loosely explores Wagner’s melodic themes connected to the character of the maleficent dwarf, Alberich.

    “As Alberich’s whereabouts are unknown at the end of the Ring,” Rouse tells us in his program notes, “it occurred to me that it might be engaging to return him to the stage, so to speak, so that he might wreak further havoc…” And that’s precisely what guest artist/percussionist Colin Curie accomplished with his dizzying array of instruments, including a variety of drums, wood blocks, and marimba.

    Also in the array were two guiros – hollow gourds or wooden cylinders with notches cut into the sides to produce a raspy noise when rubbed with a stick. In this context, that sound was a particularly appropriate irritant, representing Alberich’s mischievous, taunting nature. Curie’s manual dexterity, tempo management and rhythm sensibilities were marvelous to behold as he produced an astonishing range of tonalities harmoniously balanced with the orchestra. At times the music erupted into very loud, wildly textured cacophonies of rhythms exchanged with the orchestra, with one passage suggesting that Alberich had become a 1970s rock-and-roll drummer. So yes, the music was cleverly structured and loaded with aural witticisms, yet ironically light in poetic or emotional thrust.

    This was not so much the case with the final work of the evening, Prokofiev’s powerful Symphony No. 5. For all of its rhythmic complexities, tempo changes and occasional dissonances that tend to interrupt its more inspired and emotive passages, it is nonetheless a compelling enough homage to fortitude and joyous valor in times of war.  

    In the end, the program seemed to dangle a question: where do our most meaningful ideas of heroes reside? In the fables of fictional gods, or in the inspiring accomplishments of real humans? Thematic shortcomings notwithstanding, one other expectation of the evening was certainly well met, and that would be the breathtaking sonority of the Canton Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Gerhardt Zimmermann. This remarkable ensemble’s consummate artistry is itself…heroic.         

Ascending to the Depths

Ascending to the Depths

By Tom Wachunas

 

    “If the doors of perception were cleansed, every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.”

― William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

    EXHIBIT: “The Tree of Life” – Mixed media assemblages and watercolors by Scott Bryant, at the Little Art Gallery, located in the North Canton Public Library, 185 North Main Street, North Canton / one week remaining – on view THROUGH OCTOBER 4 / 330.499.4712

   My desire to post a more timely commentary on this exhibit has been thwarted both by a daunting teaching schedule and the complexity of my interpretation of Scott Bryant’s work. The latter reason is quite ironic because in many ways I consider him something of a kindred spirit, both on the superficial plane of his sculptural working materials (combinations of found objects, paint-stiffened fabric, and various other common substances)  and for the spiritual thrust of the subject matter.  

    After initially viewing his pieces at the September 3 reception (which include ten mixed media sculptures, each with an accompanying watercolor painting numbered in the image with Roman numerals I through X), I was unusually eager to write about them, only to experience an unsettling and protracted realization that I couldn’t easily distinguish between forest and trees, as it were. Part of my dilemma was rooted in the sheer diversity of esoteric imagery that Bryant presents.

    He tells us in his statement that “…this collection was nurtured through years of personal and spiritual seeking and study.” A pilgrim’s quest, then? In that sense, aren’t all artists - and for that matter, all serious viewers of art – pilgrims of a kind? More specifically, Bryant references “The Tree of Life” and its ten spheres, or animating energies, as “the timeless blueprint explaining the construction of the universe.” What he doesn’t specify in so many words is his embrace of The Kabbalah, an ancient body of teachings originating in Judaic mysticism that addresses, among other things, the nature of the cosmos. That said, some viewers might infer as much via the Hebrew script that Bryant incorporates in his watercolors.

    In any case, The Kabbalah articulates the Tree of Life as a sort of “map” of creation and an embodiment of ten Divinely-revealed principles for life. Additionally, there are syncretic adaptations of Kabbalah teachings to be found in the writings of some Christian mystics as well as Greco-Roman philosophies/religions. So it’s no surprise that beyond the Judaic iconography in Bryant’s work, we also encounter Christian and mythological references.

    Bryant’s assemblages – at once biomorphic and architectonic - are placed atop open-volume pedestals made from what appear to be recycled wooden crates or warehouse pallets. It’s an austere and airy look, yet complementary to the visceral physicality of the assemblages on top. These are 3D meditations, like so many impromptu shrines, or altars erected along the way to a holy destination.

    Some of the figural elements blended into the assemblages are rendered with remarkable finesse, as in the eerie, purple shrouded figure in Transformation (#9). But for pure fluidity of form and lyrical impact, none is more elegant than the free-standing sandstone sculpture (wonderfully polished to suggest wood), The Flame. While it is actually not part of the ten-work “Tree of Life” sequence, the spiraling, abstracted figures locked in a kiss are nonetheless a thematically relevant and compelling symbol of unified materiality and spirit.      

    After an extended second viewing of the exhibit, and beyond any strictly formal or conceptual analyses, it occurred to me that Bryant’s work resonates enough outside the confines of its physical properties or specificity of historical sources. I’m reminded of art’s potential to transcend even an artist’s most nobly-stated intentions, and of art’s capacity to lead us on unexpected ascents to other fruitful places. Such as the mind of God, for example.

   One could well ask, “What’s Bryant’s work really about?” Based on his statement alone, from his perspective as I understand it, the short answer is… everything. Hoping not to sound too flippant or obtuse, I’ve grown increasingly comfortable with the long answer: everything else.

    PHOTOS, from top: The Flame; Transformation - #9; Severity (Gevurah)-#5; Passion Burns - #5; Beauty (Tiferet)- #6