Two shows

I wanted to highlight two shows that are in the Fondren area right now.  They have been up for the month of April and will be coming down soon.  Currently at the Cedars, which is a community center and part time gallery run by the Fondren Renaissance Foundation, is an exhibition that I am part of.  Exhibiting with me are two long time friends David West, and Ky Johnston.  David teaches drawing at Belhaven University, and Ky teaches pottery at Delta State University.  Also in the show is the collaborative glass work of Elizabeth Robinson and Kay Holloway (Spirit House Glass), and ceramic work by Courtney Peters who owns the Fondren interior design retail store Mosaic Interiors.  It is an incredibly diverse show with pottery, printmaking, drawing, painting, and glass work, but it all comes together nicely.  The spots of bright color contrasts well with the frequent black and white graphic pieces.  

Just down the street is a show at Fischer Galleries with photography by Gretchen Haien, and paintings by Vicksburg resident Martha Ferris.  Gretchen teaches photography at Belhaven University with David West, and this series of "Incidentals" showcases her ability to combine quiet, meditative, and minimalistic images with her vast technical knowledge.  Martha's series of European architecture inspired pieces are some of my favorite things I have seen in the area in the past couple of years.  She had a show of work from the same series last year at Fischer.  The flat shapes of color and play with perspective have a nice connection to her recent mosaic and tile work.  There is a particularly strong connection with the fountain mosaics she did at the Mississippi Museum of Art.  They are beautiful, playful, and very well executed which to me makes them very strong.  

 Pottery by Ky Johnston and painting by Jerrod Partridge (me)

 Mixed media piece by David West

 Main room at the Cedars

 Glass work by Spirit House Glass

 "Incidentals 041.10" by Gretchen Haien

 "Berlin" by Martha Ferris

 "Italy" by Martha Ferris

David West's Digital Cartography

Hanging right now at Belhaven's Bitsy Irby Visual Arts and Dance Center Gallery is a body of work called Digital Cartography by Baton Rouge artist David West. The description of the show is pretty well stated on Belhaven's website and I don't think that there is any reason for me to try to rewrite it. It says... "David West combines traditional print techniques with digital media to create a space that exists partly in the analog world, and partly in the digital. By borrowing motifs from architecture, mapmaking, and computer code, this recent work highlights the influence of the digital age on traditional art making practices." David recently received his MFA degree from LSU in Printmaking; however, printmaking is only one of several mediums used to construct this work. One of the pieces is an interactive projection called "Shift into Place" which places the viewer into the artwork by recording a wall graphic and projecting it on the opposite corner of the space. Several of the other pieces combine printmaking with silkscreen applied to plexiglass creating a multi-layered graphic that, like the projection, can only be fully experienced in person. The industrial imagery such as telephone poles and maps contrasted with strong abstract designs create a sense of urban decay with a beautiful promise for the future. Here's some of the work, but again you should really see these in person. I believe that the show will be up through October.

"Shift into Place" Wall Graphic

"Shift into Place" projection

"Chiba City II"

"Dead Television Channels I"

"Digital Sprawl II"