FRESH Narratives
By Tom Wachunas
“…In my juror’s statement from last year’s
FRESH, I spoke about the presence of our nation’s political and social crisis
that I saw in the works submitted. We are reeling in shock; now we begin to
join together to heal, stand for the causes we hold true, and find ways to move
ahead as one. FRESH 2017 explores new definitions of space and this new place
that we must all learn to navigate and inhabit together.… If FRESH 2017 was a
reeling in the face of a shocking new narrative, FRESH 2018 is about artists
constructing a better narrative.” - Artist
Charles Beneke, Juror for FRESH 2018
EXHIBIT: 14th annual FRESH, through March 31 / Summit ArtSpace, 140 E. Market St.,
Akron / Hours: Noon to 7 p.m. Thursdays-Fridays, noon to 5 p.m. Saturdays /
Information: 330-376-8480/ www.summitartspace.org
ARTIST PANEL DISCUSSION Thursday, March 22,
7 pm / Free and open to the public / Reserve your seat at http://bit.ly/2BBUzlq
I’m very pleased to
report that my mixed-media relief painting, “After the Sermon,” was selected to
be in this exhibit, and grateful to be in the company of so many truly engaging
works from 34 artists, chosen from 150 submissions. I wrote here about my piece back
in October, 2017, so if you missed that post and you’re interested, here’s a
link:
A particularly
‘fresh’ aspect of this exhibit is the adjudication procedure. Artist Charles
Beneke was the sole juror for last year’s FRESH exhibit, and he was asked to
return this year in the same capacity. In his juror’s statement (excerpted
above), Beneke explains, “The organizers were curious to see how time and
cultural movement in this volatile era could have affected the artists of our
region and how any potential changes may have become manifest in the artworks
they produced and chose to submit as evidence of who they are one year later.” I highly recommend reading his full
statement, so once again, here’s a link:
I didn’t see FRESH
2017, but evidently there were threaded through it manifestations of the
sociopolitical Sturm und Drang of our
time – our “volatile era.” If I’m
reading Beneke’s assessment of the current show correctly, this year’s
installment is distinguished by a comparatively different kind of probity, a
lens-shifting of sorts.
Eminently
noticeable in this exhibit is its pervasive inwardness - a palpable arc of
personal introspection, discovery, and yes, mystery. The pieces I find most
compelling aren’t only visually beguiling but also conceptually and
psychologically insistent. Some of them keep singing in my memory like a song I
can’t stop humming even if I’ve forgotten the words.
A substantial portion of the paint in Catherine
Spencer’s abstract oil on gessoed woodboard, Separation Anxiety, looks like it was applied with a putty knife, erasing
some shapes and color passages while simultaneously creating others. And then
there’s that odd vertical divide right down the middle. It’s a stream of
self-conscious mark-making that maybe
wants to harmonize with its surrounds, yet ultimately disrupts the
composition’s equilibrium. Purposeful, or accidental? Anxiety indeed.
Robert Carpenter’s
fascinating three-sided Sketch is a sculptural work made from wood,
plaster, gauze, and paint. It’s an unusual spatial configuration that hangs
perpendicular to the wall and has the look of an improvisation with scrappy
found materials. The formal complexity of
this 3D drawing conjures a wrecked building being salvaged and re-assembled, a
ravaged space being repaired.
Holy
Games is a sprawling abstract work on paper by Jack St. John. His layered
strata of acrylic, ink, pastel, and spray paint make for an active surface,
seething with idiosyncratic scribbles, frenetic splotches, and broad scrapes.
The whitish cruciform emerging from the middle of the picture plane (or is it
being engulfed?) is vaguely suggestive of a figure, arms outstretched and
dripping pink, as if attempting to embrace and unify all the volatile energy
surrounding it.
On a more charming
note, there’s the shimmering Random Star
Variations by Roger Benedetti. These brightly colored, very shiny (some
painted with nail polish) whittled sticks pop off the wall and seem to dance
with their own shadows. I wanted to see a much wider expanse of them, to be
more fully mesmerized by this cosmetic cosmos. As it is, the piece is
nonetheless a titillating evocation of childlike wonder.
Amidst all of the
remarkably diverse iconographic and material content clamoring for attention in
this exhibit, it could be easy to miss the foam, paper, and metal piece by
Carol Klingel, parts of me I know nothing
about. From a distance you might think it’s an electrical wall fixture. Plug
into it anyway. This close encounter of the tiny kind (approx. 5” x 3”)
resonates in a large way, if only in its uncompromisingly enigmatic nature.
There’s something almost primordial about the
image of what might be smoke plumes, or a vaporous sky, set at the bottom of a
molded foam box, itself looking like packing material. What originally filled
those negative spaces? In solidarity
with the artist, there are parts here we know nothing about. At once inviting
and elusive, it’s that proverbial song in the head again.
The words are gone,
but the tune won’t let go. Art can be like that.
PHOTOS, from top: 1. Separation
Anxiety, by Catherine Spencer / 2. Sketch, by Robert Carpenter / 3. Holy
Games, by Jack St. John / 4. Random Star Variations, by Roger
Benedetti / 5. parts of me I know nothing about, by Carol Klingel
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