A Hearkening of Mythicals and Mysticals

 

A Hearkening of Mythicals and Mysticals

 

Divine Union, by Kimberly Blankenship

Devouring the Sun, by Crystal Robinson

Eclipse from the Other Side of the Moon, by Tom Delameter

Penumbra, by Tim Eakin

You're Only Made of Moonlight, by Bella Feliciano

Celestial Masquerade, by Carri Cleveland

Lacuna, by Alaska Thompson

By Tom Wachunas 

“The reappearance of the crescent moon after the new moon; the return of the Sun after a total eclipse, the rising of the Sun in the morning after its troublesome absence at night were noted by people around the world; these phenomena spoke to our ancestors of the possibility of surviving death. Up there in the skies was also a metaphor of immortality.”  - Carl Sagan

EXHIBIT: UMBRA – a collective perspective / at PATINA ARTS CENTRE, 324 Cleveland Avenue NW, Canton, Ohio / THROUGH APRIL 27, 2024 / Gallery Hours: Final viewing on Saturday April 27, 5pm – 9pm

Featured Artists include Kat Francis, Peyton Hopp, and David B. Martin, as well as work by Chris Cook, Erika Katherine, Sam Lilenfield, Zach Finn, Tom Delamater, Tim Eakin, Bella Feliciano, Maizy Jade, Rylee Lovelace, Melissa Goff, Dr. Demon, Carri Cleveland, Heidi Fawver, Monte Arreguin, Ben Sandy, Tessa LeBaron, Kimberly Blankenship, Justin Randall, Chrystal Robinson, Julianne Nipple, Alaska Thompson, Andy Tokarsky, Carri Cleveland, Kaley Weaver, Madi Miller

Umbra (noun) – 1 (a): a conical shadow excluding all light from a given source - specifically : the conical part of the shadow of a celestial body excluding all light from the primary source. (b): the central dark part of a sunspot.  / 2: a shaded area

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   Where did I leave off? My time and memory were temporarily…eclipsed… by events not of my making. Ahhh… yes, in my April 15 post here, about that other eclipse on April 8, with these closing thoughts: “…Art allows the events that befall us, whether common or rare, whether of our own making or not, to be ever-present, well beyond their time and place of origin.”

   Once again, art has been ‘allowing’ - this time at Patina Arts Centre. With sincere apologies for this literally last-minute commentary, the current show ends today, on Saturday, April 27.

   The total solar eclipse we witnessed on April 8 reminded me of how often I’ve embraced the megacosm as a grand, created allegory – the ultimate artwork - symbolizing an eternal theatre production, or a dance, unfolding across the stage of infinity. Think of our solar system as a small component of a cosmic dance/theatre troupe numbering countless performers. In this scenario, our earth and moon are in effect tiny dancers - a duet - constantly moving in and out of the spotlight we call our sun. But as April 8 so powerfully demonstrated, what a spectacular and mesmerizing pas de deux! Let me be so bold as to suggest that the playwright/choreographer of this celestial performance is a singularly supernatural being with limitless power.

   It's certainly not a new idea. Many ancient peoples theorized that the heavens were dwelling places of multiple spirits - deities and demons - and their offspring, the planets and stars, where the fates of us mere humans were written and carried out.

    This marvelous exhibit is a diverse, celebratory collection of illustrated insights, intuitions, and fantasies, all at once mythical and mystical.  Here the beatific and the beastly collide or coalesce, passing from light into darkness, or darkness to light. From the delightfully sparkling rhinestone rumination of Alaska Thompson’s Lacuna, to the electrifying fusion of laughter and tears in Carri Cleveland’s Celestial Masquerade; from the elegant balance and harmony of Kimberly Blankenship’s Divine Union, to the devilish strangeness of Bella Feliciano’s You’re only made of Moonlight; from the searing gaze of the turbulent sun flanked by icy blue Zodiac critters in Tim Eakins’ Penumbra, to the eerie gray quiet of Tom Delameter’s ghostly Eclipse from the Other Side of the Moon. And there are more, many more.

   The same Spirit who staged the aforementioned, most perfect mixed-media performance artwork ever conceived and unsurpassable in its sheer magnificence – namely The Universe – left a piece, a spark, of himself in every human being. In those we perceive as artists, we call that spark creativity, or inspiration. I sense that the exhibitors here weren’t just making art only about an outer space event so much as probing their own inner spaces. In the process, they effectively invited us viewers to do the same.