As Gary Lichtenstein took in his fill of the artwork around him in the studio of New York City artist Charles Hinman, he said his gaze settled on a series of watercolor images."I took a look at these works, which had been done many years ago, and I thought, those are really nice," he said of the airy abstract images that were reminiscent of kites.
Lichtenstein, a master printer and artist based in Ridgefield, has collaborated with many artists. He and Hinman first started working together in 2011.As the artist and printer looked a bit more deeply at Hinman's work, a creative concept began to take flight -- their next collaboration would be inspired by these images.
"He never lets any piece go out of the studio without a title," Lichtenstein said of Hinman. "So, he said, `Let's call these kites.' "After months of work, the project has landed at the Silvermine Arts Center in New Canaan. "Kites," which features multiple silkscreen prints, is the second major collaboration between Hinman, a painter who is considered a pioneer in the art of sculpted, three-dimensional canvases, and Lichtenstein. Their first project, "Gems," came out in 2011. As with that exhibition, the two worked to employ color and subtle hand embossments to ensure that the suite of prints would maintain the dynamism of Hinman's sculpted canvases.
"It certainly was not the norm," Hinman said of his practice of repurposing the traditional canvas into a sculptural form, by stretching the canvas over multiple frames, creating contours and employing color for sculptural effect. "I like to make work that is a new experience for me and for others."It is a philosophy he has employed since he first made a splash in the early 1960s when he was in his 30s. At 80, he said he continues to look for new ways to create and express himself.
"He happens to be one of the most inventive individuals I know," said Lichtenstein of Hinman.The duo's collaboration appears to foster respect, breed creativity and spur innovation. Both cite the other's knowledge of color as a crucial connection.
"We love discussing color," said Lichtenstein. "It's fascinating because I love drawing out of an artist colors that they really do love ... I get a lot of enjoyment in the interplay."Lichtenstein can draw on his own experience as an abstract painter who has attracted critical praise for the way he layers multiple colors.
Lichtenstein grew up near Waterbury, but has spent much of his 35-year artistic career in California. In 1978, he opened a printmaking studio, SOMA Fine Art Press, which became a hub of artistic collaborations. About 12 years ago, he returned east and has since worked out of his home studio in Ridgefield.
When he works with Hinman, whether in Ridgefield or New York City, Lichtenstein said it is a fluid experience, as Hinman is open to new ideas and ways of expressing his art."After we've made a few prints ... we'll ask ourselves what if we did this or oil painting reproduction," Hinman said. "Much can arise through experiment. Sometimes, we don't know ourselves where we are headed."
A similar quandary awaits visitors to another of the center's galleries, where works from members of the guild are featured in "Where are We (going)?," Silvermine's second summer exhibition. It also will close Sept. 7.New York City artist Emily Cheng curated the exhibition, using the work of guild members as her starting point. After going over hundreds of images, she settled on Easton artist Susan Sharp's abstract painting "Where are We?" and then got to work finding threads that would tie together multiple artists and media.
"I also was taking into consideration that Charles Hinman would be in the next gallery, so I wanted a show that could be different, but compatible," she said. "I wanted it to feel like a continuation or elaboration of a thought."Sharp's piece is abstract, constructed with multiple panels. It was spurred by a photograph in a magazine, an interplay of shadows and water, that Sharp turned on its side. Suddenly, she was inspired.
"I began to pour layers of paint," Sharp said, of the process that begins all of her works. As shapes formed and colors intersected, a landscape formed, albeit one without the concrete shapes and point of perspective of a more traditional scene."I enjoy this sense of disorientation," Sharp said. "It probes this question of where are we ... and further, where am I and where am I in my life.
"For me, what makes this painting exciting is that you can have different interpretations," she said. "You are not able to nail it down."The exhibition features photographs, prints and paintings. As for the theme, Cheng said "Where are We (going)?" is less a statement about the content of the work and more about the state of mind brought on by viewing it -- it's about what you might find when you peer around the corner.
Read the full products at http://www.artsunlight.com/!
2013年8月19日星期一
2013年5月21日星期二
Assigning spiritual brews to 1990s card sets
Last week, as we at SB Nation gathered to spit nonsense about beer, I stumbled upon the idea that beers, as they stand today, bear lots of similarities with baseball cards of the 1990s. Throughout most of their histories, both beer and baseball cards were very very simple things. Then the craft brew revolution/baseball card boom was brought forth, and both industries exploded into a big weird diverse pastiche.
Baseball card companies got carried away by all the "collectability" and gimmickry and price-guide nonsense, and as a consequence, almost none of them make baseball cards today. The craft-brew scene breeds plenty of nonsense in its own right; thankfully, it seems to be doing well.
My point is this: when I was a kid, I collected baseball cards, pored over the stats on the back, and traded with friends. As an adult, I drink beers, pore over lists and reviews, and drink and talk about them with friends. Beers are baseball cards I can drink.
By the mid-'90s, baseball card collectors began fretting over the concept of "collectability," mostly because card companies told them to. The idea was that a baseball card was more valuable if there were only 50,000 of it in existence. The set that ushered in this mode of thinking, more than any other, was 1991 Donruss. These cards were everywhere. Donruss made 67 trillion billion trillion of them. Trading them with your friends was useless, because every person in North America owned the Lenny Dykstra/Dale Murphy "DR. DIRT AND MR. CLEAN" in quadruplicate.
Pretty much everyone who took baseball cards seriously in the 1990s was a total mark, myself included. If you want to spot the marks in the craft brew world, look for the people who roll their eyes at Sam Adams' Boston Lager. Yes, it's everywhere, and just like 1991 Donruss, you can probably find packs of them hanging from a peg at room temperature in the toy aisle of oil painting reproduction.
But it's fine! There are better and more interesting beers out there, and hopefully you are in a position to procure those beers. Boston Lager is available in virtually any gas station, though, and if a gas station is all you've got, you'll be happy it's there.
Even in the 1990s heyday of completely inflating arbitrary values for baseball cards, a complete set of 1991 Donruss was only listed at about $12, which meant every card was "worth" an average of 1.5 cents. But just as Boston Lager is not meant for snobs, 1991 Donruss was not made for anyone who gave a damn about the arbitrary space-borne pseudo-values assigned to baseball cards. Sometimes you want to open a bottle and find a perfectly drinkable beer, and sometimes you want to open a pack of cards and find a puzzle piece of Willie Stargell's groin.
Every bottle of Guinness contains a plastic widget, and at age 19, my friend and I grew so consumed with finding out what a widget looked like that we broke it by throwing it off the balcony. Years earlier I would tear apart packs of 1995 Fleer Ultra, which promised an insert card in every single pack.
I was underwhelmed in both cases, because the widget is plastic and translucent white and looks like a bottle fetus, and the Fleer inserts sort of devalued the nature of an insert card. "Insert" used to mean a special set of cards you'd find once in 2,000 packs, like Donruss' Elite Series. This cheapened them to the point at which we were left with an insert set called "On-Base Leaders." This card is worth negative money.
Nonetheless, I bought tons and tons of Fleer Ultra, just as I've drank tons and tons of Guinness. Both are kind of fake-upscale and hold a special place in my heart. Sometimes I just really wanna drink a Guinness.
At every beer festival there's one stand manned by a guy who has been brewing in his friend's garage for four months. Your cup either has no head, or is 85% head, depending on how he screwed up, because he definitely did screw up. A half-inch of residue sits at the bottom of the cup. "Heh, I'm kind of a hop-head," he says. You take a gulp. It tastes like he dissolved five bouillon cubes' worth of earwax in some Michelob Ultra.
"Yeah, me and my buddy, we're gonna start up our own brew house on Floyd Street. Just gotta wait for the serving license from the city." He has not and will never mail his application for said license, because he's not really a having-stamps kind of person.
Police-issued baseball cards were also freely distributed, and they were the very worst baseball cards. They look like they were made for prisoners, and they weren't even cut down to standard card size, so they wouldn't fit in any of your sleeves or binders.
They invariably had some sort of "don't do drugs or else you will die and the Earth will explode and kill your dog" message on the back. Back then, our eight-year-old selves would look at them and shudder at the doom that might befall us in the future. Today, we look at this cup with a mouthful of liquefied tree bark, realize we're completely hammered at three in the afternoon, and wonder how the hell we got there.
We should all thank the sports card industry for collapsing under the weight of its bullshit, because I can't imagine the tomfoolery we'd be experiencing if they kept pushing the envelope. At some point they probably would have started selling giant wooden wagon wheels with "RAUL MONDESI" burnished on the spokes. Before they crashed and burned, Pinnacle did manage to market a thing called "Cards In A Can." That's it. A pack of cards inside of a can. Your stepdad needs somewhere to ash out his GT Ones, and you need some four-buck piece of chintz that will make you feel loved. Two birds, one stone.
My only real question is, "WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY," which is the same question I would ask of Brew Dog's Tactical Nuclear Penguin. Its ABV is 32%, which is about 2.5 times as strong as wine, and not all that far off from most liquors. I've never had it, because they charge 70 damn dollars for a bottle.
If this beer were steeped in some sort of tradition, or marketed with some air of dignity, I might not be so down on it. Instead it's called Tactical Nuclear Penguin, which is the most craft-beer name. May as well call it Captain Zombie Baconpirate Ninja Stout Webbrowser.
So yes, 2010s craft beer and 1990s baseball cards both suffer from gimmickry, but at least modern beer keeps that grade of bullpucky at the margins. Cards In A Can was front and center. Oh God, and then you'd hear collectors say things like, "you shouldn't open the cans, they'll lose their value." Oh God oh God oh God oh God oh God I ****ing hate the baseball card industry so much.
Baseball card companies got carried away by all the "collectability" and gimmickry and price-guide nonsense, and as a consequence, almost none of them make baseball cards today. The craft-brew scene breeds plenty of nonsense in its own right; thankfully, it seems to be doing well.
My point is this: when I was a kid, I collected baseball cards, pored over the stats on the back, and traded with friends. As an adult, I drink beers, pore over lists and reviews, and drink and talk about them with friends. Beers are baseball cards I can drink.
By the mid-'90s, baseball card collectors began fretting over the concept of "collectability," mostly because card companies told them to. The idea was that a baseball card was more valuable if there were only 50,000 of it in existence. The set that ushered in this mode of thinking, more than any other, was 1991 Donruss. These cards were everywhere. Donruss made 67 trillion billion trillion of them. Trading them with your friends was useless, because every person in North America owned the Lenny Dykstra/Dale Murphy "DR. DIRT AND MR. CLEAN" in quadruplicate.
Pretty much everyone who took baseball cards seriously in the 1990s was a total mark, myself included. If you want to spot the marks in the craft brew world, look for the people who roll their eyes at Sam Adams' Boston Lager. Yes, it's everywhere, and just like 1991 Donruss, you can probably find packs of them hanging from a peg at room temperature in the toy aisle of oil painting reproduction.
But it's fine! There are better and more interesting beers out there, and hopefully you are in a position to procure those beers. Boston Lager is available in virtually any gas station, though, and if a gas station is all you've got, you'll be happy it's there.
Even in the 1990s heyday of completely inflating arbitrary values for baseball cards, a complete set of 1991 Donruss was only listed at about $12, which meant every card was "worth" an average of 1.5 cents. But just as Boston Lager is not meant for snobs, 1991 Donruss was not made for anyone who gave a damn about the arbitrary space-borne pseudo-values assigned to baseball cards. Sometimes you want to open a bottle and find a perfectly drinkable beer, and sometimes you want to open a pack of cards and find a puzzle piece of Willie Stargell's groin.
Every bottle of Guinness contains a plastic widget, and at age 19, my friend and I grew so consumed with finding out what a widget looked like that we broke it by throwing it off the balcony. Years earlier I would tear apart packs of 1995 Fleer Ultra, which promised an insert card in every single pack.
I was underwhelmed in both cases, because the widget is plastic and translucent white and looks like a bottle fetus, and the Fleer inserts sort of devalued the nature of an insert card. "Insert" used to mean a special set of cards you'd find once in 2,000 packs, like Donruss' Elite Series. This cheapened them to the point at which we were left with an insert set called "On-Base Leaders." This card is worth negative money.
Nonetheless, I bought tons and tons of Fleer Ultra, just as I've drank tons and tons of Guinness. Both are kind of fake-upscale and hold a special place in my heart. Sometimes I just really wanna drink a Guinness.
At every beer festival there's one stand manned by a guy who has been brewing in his friend's garage for four months. Your cup either has no head, or is 85% head, depending on how he screwed up, because he definitely did screw up. A half-inch of residue sits at the bottom of the cup. "Heh, I'm kind of a hop-head," he says. You take a gulp. It tastes like he dissolved five bouillon cubes' worth of earwax in some Michelob Ultra.
"Yeah, me and my buddy, we're gonna start up our own brew house on Floyd Street. Just gotta wait for the serving license from the city." He has not and will never mail his application for said license, because he's not really a having-stamps kind of person.
Police-issued baseball cards were also freely distributed, and they were the very worst baseball cards. They look like they were made for prisoners, and they weren't even cut down to standard card size, so they wouldn't fit in any of your sleeves or binders.
They invariably had some sort of "don't do drugs or else you will die and the Earth will explode and kill your dog" message on the back. Back then, our eight-year-old selves would look at them and shudder at the doom that might befall us in the future. Today, we look at this cup with a mouthful of liquefied tree bark, realize we're completely hammered at three in the afternoon, and wonder how the hell we got there.
We should all thank the sports card industry for collapsing under the weight of its bullshit, because I can't imagine the tomfoolery we'd be experiencing if they kept pushing the envelope. At some point they probably would have started selling giant wooden wagon wheels with "RAUL MONDESI" burnished on the spokes. Before they crashed and burned, Pinnacle did manage to market a thing called "Cards In A Can." That's it. A pack of cards inside of a can. Your stepdad needs somewhere to ash out his GT Ones, and you need some four-buck piece of chintz that will make you feel loved. Two birds, one stone.
My only real question is, "WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY," which is the same question I would ask of Brew Dog's Tactical Nuclear Penguin. Its ABV is 32%, which is about 2.5 times as strong as wine, and not all that far off from most liquors. I've never had it, because they charge 70 damn dollars for a bottle.
If this beer were steeped in some sort of tradition, or marketed with some air of dignity, I might not be so down on it. Instead it's called Tactical Nuclear Penguin, which is the most craft-beer name. May as well call it Captain Zombie Baconpirate Ninja Stout Webbrowser.
So yes, 2010s craft beer and 1990s baseball cards both suffer from gimmickry, but at least modern beer keeps that grade of bullpucky at the margins. Cards In A Can was front and center. Oh God, and then you'd hear collectors say things like, "you shouldn't open the cans, they'll lose their value." Oh God oh God oh God oh God oh God I ****ing hate the baseball card industry so much.
2013年5月19日星期日
Diebold to showcase emerging technology
As consumers continue to demand more from financial institutions than ever before—instantaneous service, enhanced convenience and more control of their money—Diebold, Incorporated, a global leader in providing integrated self-service solutions, is meeting these demands with emerging technology that is transforming the self-service channel and the way consumers bank.
Diebold will showcase its Millennial-inspired automated teller machine (ATM) concept and two-way video technology, Concierge Video Services at the 2013 Cards & Payments Middle East, the region's largest smart card, payments and ID card event, on May 14-15 at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre in Dubai, UAE.
The Millennial-inspired ATM concept integrates mobile devices, allowing consumers to complete secure, card-less transactions. The ATM features a conceptual user interface that enables touch gestures, such as flick and drag which are commonly used with smart phones and tablet devices.
Card-less withdrawals and person-to-person payments are two possible transaction scenarios via the Millennial-inspired ATM concept. To complete a card-less withdrawal, preregistered bank customer could scan the ATM's QR code using their smart phones. When the devices sync, a transaction screen would appear on the smart phone and then the user could select a withdrawal amount. A one-time code would then be sent to the smart phone, which the customer enters on the ATM screen to authenticate the transaction and receives cash. In addition, pre-staging a transaction that authorizes access to cash by a third party would be another possible transaction scenario. The customer would simply input the payment amount and recipient's contact information, which could easily be selected directly from his or her phone's contact list. Then the recipient would receive a one-time code that could be used at an ATM or branch to oil painting reproduction.
Diebold will also showcase its Concierge Video Services, which enables users to connect face-to-face with the financial institution's customer service representatives via two-way video. During transactions, consumers have the option to initiate a video call to customer service representatives to complete activities that are not traditionally conducted at the ATM, such as account maintenance, new account setup and savings product renewals. This immediate access to support enriches consumers' ATM experiences and saves them time.
"Consumers demand speed and convenience, but also a more personalized banking experience. Bringing video support and other emerging technology to the ATM offers financial institutions the ability to enhance their self-service capabilities and improve user experiences," said Dave Wetzel, Diebold vice president and managing director, Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). "Diebold partners with financial institutions to deploy technology that meets consumers evolving demands and also the business priorities of the intuition."
In last week's On the Spot column, letter writer Nancy Jones said she was going to London and expressed concern about whether her credit cards would work because they are not Chip and PIN (personal identification number). She said she didn't want to carry a load of cash. What should she do? It turned out to be a more complicated answer than I expected, but I did find a card that I think will work.
The issue with many U.S. credit cards is that they use a magnetic stripe. In many parts of Europe, Asia and Latin America, the standard is a smart card or EMV, short for Europay, MasterCard and Visa. Many of those cards use a PIN.
U.S. cards are beginning to come with a smart chip, but they often are Chip and Signature cards — that is, instead of using a PIN, you sign your card slip and the signatures are compared. David Hogan, executive director with Heartland Payment Systems, one of the largest credit-card processors in the U.S., told me a prominent retailer told him, "'Dave, can't remember the last time we hired a handwriting expert.'"
Before you begin your quest for such a card, let me note that I've used my magnetic stripe card in Europe and Asia within the last year and had issues only once — at the unmanned London Tube kiosk at Paddington Station — and a request for a smart card with a PIN only once when I was making a purchase at a mobile phone store.
So before I made myself crazy, I decided to follow the advice of Seth Eisen, a vice president at MasterCard: He suggested checking your credit cards and calling to see whether they were smart cards.
The results: None of the cards I carry (American Express, Visa and MasterCard) has the chip. One card company told me it could give me a PIN but also said the card would act like a cash advance card, and I would start accruing big interest and transaction charges right away. That is not what I wanted.
Travelers who go abroad need to have alternatives — money tools, I call them — in case they get into a jam. Cash works (U.S. plus the small amount of foreign currency you'll change before you go); sometimes, traveler's checks work. Debit cards used in ATMs usually work, although you may incur foreign transaction fees. Magnetic stripe cards often work, but again, watch out for those fees. And sometimes a smart card with a PIN will work, but you can run into problems using it for online purchases.
As technology changes, this discussion may become moot. "Some places might skip the PIN-versus-Signature debate altogether," said Rick Clemmer, chief executive of NXP Semiconductors, whose chips are used in cards and passports. They'll go to a smartphone that uses NFC, or near field communications, and provides a "contactless" purchase experience.
Diebold will showcase its Millennial-inspired automated teller machine (ATM) concept and two-way video technology, Concierge Video Services at the 2013 Cards & Payments Middle East, the region's largest smart card, payments and ID card event, on May 14-15 at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre in Dubai, UAE.
The Millennial-inspired ATM concept integrates mobile devices, allowing consumers to complete secure, card-less transactions. The ATM features a conceptual user interface that enables touch gestures, such as flick and drag which are commonly used with smart phones and tablet devices.
Card-less withdrawals and person-to-person payments are two possible transaction scenarios via the Millennial-inspired ATM concept. To complete a card-less withdrawal, preregistered bank customer could scan the ATM's QR code using their smart phones. When the devices sync, a transaction screen would appear on the smart phone and then the user could select a withdrawal amount. A one-time code would then be sent to the smart phone, which the customer enters on the ATM screen to authenticate the transaction and receives cash. In addition, pre-staging a transaction that authorizes access to cash by a third party would be another possible transaction scenario. The customer would simply input the payment amount and recipient's contact information, which could easily be selected directly from his or her phone's contact list. Then the recipient would receive a one-time code that could be used at an ATM or branch to oil painting reproduction.
Diebold will also showcase its Concierge Video Services, which enables users to connect face-to-face with the financial institution's customer service representatives via two-way video. During transactions, consumers have the option to initiate a video call to customer service representatives to complete activities that are not traditionally conducted at the ATM, such as account maintenance, new account setup and savings product renewals. This immediate access to support enriches consumers' ATM experiences and saves them time.
"Consumers demand speed and convenience, but also a more personalized banking experience. Bringing video support and other emerging technology to the ATM offers financial institutions the ability to enhance their self-service capabilities and improve user experiences," said Dave Wetzel, Diebold vice president and managing director, Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). "Diebold partners with financial institutions to deploy technology that meets consumers evolving demands and also the business priorities of the intuition."
In last week's On the Spot column, letter writer Nancy Jones said she was going to London and expressed concern about whether her credit cards would work because they are not Chip and PIN (personal identification number). She said she didn't want to carry a load of cash. What should she do? It turned out to be a more complicated answer than I expected, but I did find a card that I think will work.
The issue with many U.S. credit cards is that they use a magnetic stripe. In many parts of Europe, Asia and Latin America, the standard is a smart card or EMV, short for Europay, MasterCard and Visa. Many of those cards use a PIN.
U.S. cards are beginning to come with a smart chip, but they often are Chip and Signature cards — that is, instead of using a PIN, you sign your card slip and the signatures are compared. David Hogan, executive director with Heartland Payment Systems, one of the largest credit-card processors in the U.S., told me a prominent retailer told him, "'Dave, can't remember the last time we hired a handwriting expert.'"
Before you begin your quest for such a card, let me note that I've used my magnetic stripe card in Europe and Asia within the last year and had issues only once — at the unmanned London Tube kiosk at Paddington Station — and a request for a smart card with a PIN only once when I was making a purchase at a mobile phone store.
So before I made myself crazy, I decided to follow the advice of Seth Eisen, a vice president at MasterCard: He suggested checking your credit cards and calling to see whether they were smart cards.
The results: None of the cards I carry (American Express, Visa and MasterCard) has the chip. One card company told me it could give me a PIN but also said the card would act like a cash advance card, and I would start accruing big interest and transaction charges right away. That is not what I wanted.
Travelers who go abroad need to have alternatives — money tools, I call them — in case they get into a jam. Cash works (U.S. plus the small amount of foreign currency you'll change before you go); sometimes, traveler's checks work. Debit cards used in ATMs usually work, although you may incur foreign transaction fees. Magnetic stripe cards often work, but again, watch out for those fees. And sometimes a smart card with a PIN will work, but you can run into problems using it for online purchases.
As technology changes, this discussion may become moot. "Some places might skip the PIN-versus-Signature debate altogether," said Rick Clemmer, chief executive of NXP Semiconductors, whose chips are used in cards and passports. They'll go to a smartphone that uses NFC, or near field communications, and provides a "contactless" purchase experience.
2011年5月29日星期日
Three-person art show on view in Norman
Viewers can choose between the contemporary and classic, between bodies of water in Oklahoma and in China, complemented by superb nature studies, in a show at Mainsite Contemporary Art. The exhibit by Norman artists Carol Beesley, Alan Atkinson and Debby Kaspari will have a reception from 6 to 10 p.m. June 10.
A shift from Southwest landscapes to central Oklahoma bodies of water, sometimes made even more dramatic, is found in the oil paintings of Beesley, who returned to Norman from Santa Fe in September 2009.
Clouds reflect in nearly turquoise-hued water, broken only by two thin strips of land, and the distant green shoreline, in Beesley's oil of “Indian Point, Lake Thunderbird near Norman.” Punctuating the masterful handling of water in this large canvas is a long horizontal log, lying across and casting its shadow on pinkish-brown rocks in the foreground.
Equally quiet and almost meditational are two oils of Lake Hefner. Scattered rocks in the foreground lead the eye back to a broad expanse of red beach and a bit of blue water in one of them, done just before sunset, while a “bright moment” turns the lake's waters purple in the other.
Transforming an apparently mundane scene in an even more spectacular fashion is Beesley's oil of a “Detention Pond Near St. Elijah Orthodox Church” in Oklahoma City. Pink-red rocks create a magical cove for pale, jewel-like pink and aqua-tinted waters, basking under a distant strip of foliage, in this composition, which has a sublime impact in spite of its lowly subject.
A miniature female figure pulls back a theatrical curtain, “revealing” contemporary snapshots and a Renaissance portrait, illusionistically taped to the sky, in a pastel-colored pencil drawing. The Revealing” is one of three excellent mixed media works on paper, described by Beesley as an “art history lesson,” on view with five oil drawings on paper, based on the backyard of her house in Santa Fe.
Beesley is a professor emeritus at the University of Oklahoma who is represented by the JRB Art at The Elms gallery in Oklahoma City.
An artist who calls his work an homage to the ancient Chinese painting tradition, Atkinson provides us with a quietly memorable, almost scroll-like depiction of a “Warbler on a Pine Tree” branch.
Even more impressive are four acrylic canvases from Atkinson's “Don't Drink the Water” series. Depicting Chinese lake or river scenes, the stylized waves in these paintings emerge from rich, stained, brown-hued backgrounds, in almost dreamlike fashion.
Kaspari offers 11 exquisite mixed media drawings on paper of flora, fauna, birds, rocks and landscape elements, plus one large acrylic and graphite painting on birch panel. The latter is especially noteworthy, depicting a tropical looking tree or plant, with two exotic, yellow and black birds perched on its branches (one of whom seems to be saying something to the other).
A shift from Southwest landscapes to central Oklahoma bodies of water, sometimes made even more dramatic, is found in the oil paintings of Beesley, who returned to Norman from Santa Fe in September 2009.
Clouds reflect in nearly turquoise-hued water, broken only by two thin strips of land, and the distant green shoreline, in Beesley's oil of “Indian Point, Lake Thunderbird near Norman.” Punctuating the masterful handling of water in this large canvas is a long horizontal log, lying across and casting its shadow on pinkish-brown rocks in the foreground.
Equally quiet and almost meditational are two oils of Lake Hefner. Scattered rocks in the foreground lead the eye back to a broad expanse of red beach and a bit of blue water in one of them, done just before sunset, while a “bright moment” turns the lake's waters purple in the other.
Transforming an apparently mundane scene in an even more spectacular fashion is Beesley's oil of a “Detention Pond Near St. Elijah Orthodox Church” in Oklahoma City. Pink-red rocks create a magical cove for pale, jewel-like pink and aqua-tinted waters, basking under a distant strip of foliage, in this composition, which has a sublime impact in spite of its lowly subject.
A miniature female figure pulls back a theatrical curtain, “revealing” contemporary snapshots and a Renaissance portrait, illusionistically taped to the sky, in a pastel-colored pencil drawing. The Revealing” is one of three excellent mixed media works on paper, described by Beesley as an “art history lesson,” on view with five oil drawings on paper, based on the backyard of her house in Santa Fe.
Beesley is a professor emeritus at the University of Oklahoma who is represented by the JRB Art at The Elms gallery in Oklahoma City.
An artist who calls his work an homage to the ancient Chinese painting tradition, Atkinson provides us with a quietly memorable, almost scroll-like depiction of a “Warbler on a Pine Tree” branch.
Even more impressive are four acrylic canvases from Atkinson's “Don't Drink the Water” series. Depicting Chinese lake or river scenes, the stylized waves in these paintings emerge from rich, stained, brown-hued backgrounds, in almost dreamlike fashion.
Kaspari offers 11 exquisite mixed media drawings on paper of flora, fauna, birds, rocks and landscape elements, plus one large acrylic and graphite painting on birch panel. The latter is especially noteworthy, depicting a tropical looking tree or plant, with two exotic, yellow and black birds perched on its branches (one of whom seems to be saying something to the other).
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