Insides Out

Insides Out

"Listening to the Rain" by Corbett Lee Teter

"Red Colonial" by Diane Pribojan

"No Us #14" by Mark Keffer

"Nightly Commute" by Emily Schmidt

"The Art of Aging" by Charles Felzen Johnson MD

"Sunset Gathering" by Tina Meyers

"Street Fair" by Tina Grondin

By Tom Wachunas

“The title, “A View from Within”, suggests not only a personal viewpoint but also a perceptual or conceptual framework for seeing. This point of view, or attitude, incorporates how an artist establishes relationships between elements. Ideas and processes converge in order to communicate something vital, essential, or provocative in an artful manner…”

 - from the exhibition juror statement by Christopher Hoot, art and design teacher at the Myers School of Art at The University of Akron and  Coordinator of Foundations 2D Design and B.A. Studio Program.

   EXHIBIT: A VIEW FROM WITHIN / juried group show at Summit Art Space / 140 East Market St., Akron, Ohio /  THROUGH JULY 6, 2019 / Gallery hours are Thursdays and Fridays, 12 – 7 pm / Saturdays 12 – 5 pm.

   NOTE: The artists and exhibition juror Christopher Hoot will discuss the exhibit and art at a panel discussion on THURSDAY June 20, 7 p.m. Interested persons are invited to see the exhibit before the panel. Reserve your seat here: 

 https://bit.ly/2Jwa8P

https://www.summitartspace.org/

   As a total viewing experience, while impressed by the  eclectic range of media and stylistic content, I found this show of 42 works by 38 local artists to be curiously underwhelming. I’ve already reported to you the inclusion of my own work in the show (see my post from May 29 at

  http://artwach.blogspot.com/2019/05/deus-ex-machina-part-2.html  .

 Ultimately only you, the viewer, can decide how whelmed you may or may not be by it or for that matter any of the other works chosen for exhibition here.  Personal subjectivity will usually get the upper hand in making such determinations.  The initial Summit Artspace call for entries to this particular show invited a wide-open spectrum of iconographic interpretation:  “All individuals bring their own perspective to what they see and how they interpret it.  The artists’ view reflects their view of the world around them. Artists can isolate the view or expand the view, direct our vision or simply allow us to set our own boundaries…”

   So imagine for a moment that the exhibit is a gathering of essays and poems titled, say, “Responses to Being Alive.”  It’s an uneven collection. Some of the authors are indeed provocative wordsmiths and thinkers while others are less than compelling.

   Of the former, here are a few I thought especially engaging.

   “Listening to the Rain” might seem like an unlikely title for the oil painting by Corbett Lee Teter. The imagery suggests an aerial view of forested or rocky terrain, or perhaps an urban coastline seen from outer space. There’s something hypnotic if not relentless about all that thick paint that saturates the surface in repetitive cross-hatched patterns. Like the percussive drone of drenching raindrops?

   The arresting perspective in Diane Probojan’s acrylic painting, “Red Colonial,” effectively captures the sensation of looking up at a house while standing in the shadow of a nearby overhang. It’s an exquisitely simple composition, bathed in a gentle light that brings to mind the haunting quiet of an Edward Hopper painting.

   At first blush, the very strange “No Us #14” by Mark Keffer (First Place award) looks like a slick, printed poster. But it’s a meticulously executed acrylic painting on paper. Here’s a dazzling precision of pure enigma, the eerie poetry of constructed ambiguity.

   The partially painted cotton weaving by Emily Schmidt, “Nightly Commute” (Honorable Mention) is a mesmerizing moment. Amorphous glows of warm light are seemingly refracted through patches of darkness.

   What comes to mind when looking at “The Art of Aging” (Third Place award), a vertical assemblage by Charles Felzen Johnson MD? An upended pinball machine, perhaps. Life as an arcade game? There’s infancy at the top, signified by a dangling pacifier. Follow the zigzag line from youth – a circuit board securely wired into vibrantly colored panels; through middle age and the advent of medication (white pill bottles) to alleviate damage from the now disconnected circuit board; and finally down to the bottom - muted colors of encroaching demise, with three black pill bottles like ominous sentinels keeping watch in the left corner. But all is not lost yet. Maybe you could recapture happier days with a dose of the medicine from those bottles in the opposite corner – an energizing snack of candy and Cheerios.

   At which point you might consider visiting the raucous celebration suggested in the mixed media collage by Tina Meyers called “Sunset Gathering” (Second Place award). It’s a delightfully frantic but festive work. And the oil painting by Tina Grondin, “Street Fair,” is invested with a similar spirit of crackling jocularity. Both works are episodes of joy made tactile.