Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Bill Fox in the High Altitude

Nevada Museum of Art
160 West Liberty Street
Reno

William L. Fox / “Aerial Photography and the Unmapping of the World
Thursday, June 28 – 7 pm to 9 pm

'Author and independent scholar William L. Fox has spent three decades studying and writing about the ways in which humans understand where they are in landscapes, often focusing on art, mapping, and cognitive science. Join Fox for this talk, which will focus on images on view in David Maisel: Black Maps.

Following Fox’s talk, please join us for a roundtable discussion about the intersections of art and environment with photographer David Maisel; writer Geoff Manaugh, creator of BLDGBLOG, and William L. Fox, author of, Making Time: Essays on the Nature of Los Angeles, The Void, the Grid & the Sign: Traversing The Great Basin and In the Desert of Desire: Las Vegas and the Culture of Spectacle.

This program is presented as part of the NMA’s Art + Environment program series, an initiative that brings community, artists, and scholars together to explore the interaction between people and their environments."

[image from NMA Web site]

Monday, June 25, 2007

Jackson Pollock Interactive

[with thanks to GC in CC for the great pointer!]

Jackson Pollock by Miltos Manetas, original design by Stamen. Move your mouse inside the browser window to start. Click the mouse to change colors.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Dada Motel

[The information below is quoted an article by Kat Kerlin in the May 31 Reno News & Review]

Dada Motel

"For three nights, June 28-30, dozens of independent artists are renting motel rooms in downtown Reno and turning them into art galleries.

Dianna Sion-Callender is wallpapering an entire room—bed and all—in collage. Chad Sorg is locking himself in a glass room and drawing on pallets. Bernie Beauchamp promises to “rip the lid off you childhood notions of puppetry.” Other visual artists include sculptor Greg Adams, printmaker Candace Nicol, painter Jim Zlokovich, muralist Erik Burke, and photographers Dean Burton, David Muskin and (RN&R contributor) Kris Vagner. San Francisco singer-songwriter Sonny Smith performs at the El Cortez’s Trocadero Room, as do local poets and actors. Artist Erik Holland, who ran against Reno mayor Bob Cashell in November’s election, is mayor of this three-day community. He’ll be giving a literal Stamp of Dada approval on the events and making speeches.

Most of the art will take place at the El Cortez. Other participating motels include the Townhouse, the El Rey and the Star of Reno. Downtown businesses, including a number of venues along First, Second and Fourth streets are also getting in on Dada, opening their spaces to visual and performance artists.

Free for spectators, the artists are doing it on their own dime—no sponsors, no promotion other than their own and a listing on the DaMM (Dada Motel Map). As Callender says, “It’s art for art’s sake.”

About six months ago, neon artist Jeff Johnson got the harebrained idea for this art show about everything and nothing.

“There was a whole bunch of art that wasn’t being represented at all,” he says. “Modern art and art that is on the living edge of time ... art that was alive and being spontaneously created, rather than the same old thing you know you can make money off.”

To keep this sense of spontaneity, Dada Motel doesn’t intend to become an annual event. “Annual event” is inherently not spontaneous.

Sorg, a Dada organizer and artist, says Dada Motel is about taking artistic expression into one’s own hands.

“I think artists are sitting around waiting for things to happen—waiting for another gallery to open up or waiting for someone to like their slides, and we think everybody should just be doing it,” he says.

“It’s all just for us so that no one can say somebody else ruined it for them because they didn’t share our vision,” says Johnson. “It’s foolproof. … At Dada Motel, you get to do it on your own initiative.”

DaMMs will be distributed around Reno and printed in Sierra Arts magazine.

[image from a google image search for 'dada,' from the Wikimedia Commons entry "Dada-1920." Caption: "1920 - le mouvement dadaïste. Auric, Picabia, Ribemont-Dessaignes, G.Everling, Casella et Tzara."]

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

UNR Sheppard Exhibition

Sheppard IN Sheppard: An Exhibition of the Work of J. Craig Sheppard
From the Permanent Collection of the Department of Art

July 9 - August 2, 2007
Opening Reception July 12, 5:30-7:30 p.m.

J. Craig and Yolande Sheppard Gallery
University of Nevada, Reno
Church Fine Arts Building

Robert E. Blesse, Curator

"The Sheppard Gallery, Department of Art, University of Nevada, Reno is pleased to announce an exhibition of artwork by J. Craig Sheppard. Sheppard was a Nevada artist and is considered by many to be the father of the university's art department. The work in this exhibition will be drawn exclusively from the Department of Art's permanent collection, and will contain a wide range of Sheppard's work, reflecting varying styles and subjects. It also includes recently donated work.

When Craig Sheppard arrived at the University of Nevada in 1947 he took over an Art Department had offered six classes the previous academic year. As first art department faculty with academic credentials, his job was clear, he was to build a significant art program from the ground up. During his first academic year fourteen classes were offered in studio art and art history. For the next twenty-six years Sheppard would oversee an art department that saw major growth and changes. This included numerous exhibitions and the opening of the Church Fine Arts Building. At the time of his retirement in 1973 the department had eight regular teaching faculty and was offering forty-six classes.

Craig Sheppard was extremely well-known as a Western, regional artist. He painted in both watercolor and oil, executed sumi ink drawings, and also sculpture pieces. His subjects were varied, but the Nevada desert landscape was an important part of his work. Sheppard's styles varied, from the dark, allegorical Dead Horse series, the semi-abstract work done in France, to the sensual dreamlike washes in the post European period. His work reflects different periods of experimentation, contemplation, and questioning. In the later years of his life, this former rodeo cowboy returned almost exclusively to watercolor and the Nevada landscape, filled with his iconic horses and cowboys."

[image: "Rabbit Hole Springs, 1849" from the Special Collections Department on the UNR University of Nevada Art Collection web site]

Monday, June 18, 2007

CCAI Downtown! Open Saturdays!


Following a spirited opening this weekend, CCAI Downtown! continues its exhibition of works by Paul Ford, Milan del Vecchio, Claire Ponn and Jake Peterson. CCAI Downtown! is open Saturdays through July 7. Check the June 7 post below for details.

[photograph from the very early moments of CCAI Downtown!]

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Welcome Grayspace!

[CCAI congratulates CCAI Staff Alumna Sara Gray on the opening of Grayspace.

Grayspace
26 Cheney
Reno

Opening fundraiser
Saturday June 30
noon to 7 pm



[image by Natalie Rishe from Grayspace Web site:
Memory Curtain, video still, 2007]

Friday, June 08, 2007

Welcome Christina!

We're delighted to announce that Christina Bruce has joined the staff of CCAI as our new Assitant Program Director. Christina graduated with a BA in Art from Sierra Nevada College in 2005. Her work has been included in a number of local exhibitions She lives in Gardnerville, NV with her family and Labrador Diesel. Welcome Christina!

Thursday, June 07, 2007

CCAI Downtown!

Save the Date June 16!

CCAI will be opening a new temporary space, "CCAI Downtown!," with an exhibition by the same name, on Saturday, June 16, from 5:30 to 9 p.m.

The opening is free. The public is cordially invited.

Featured artists in the exhibition are painter Paul Ford and fashion designers Milan del Vecchio and Claire Ponn.

The opening is part of the 13th "Taste of Downtown," an annual fundraiser for Advocates to End Domestic Violence, a local non-profit social service agency that provides a wide variety of services designed to protect and support battered women and their children.

details|press release

[image: "Breakfast Heels" by Claire Ponn]

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Invitation to a Dance II



The first of a number of remarkable images of Three Minutes of Intimacy, Spring 2007 CCAI dance/performance art project by Elaine Tin Nyo, CAP artist.

See April 22 post for details.



[CCAI and Elaine Tin Nyo thank photographer Hannah Nicholson.]

14 LAYERS


14 LAYERS
Sheppard Fine Arts Gallery
University of Nevada, Reno

Wednesday, June 6, 5-7 p.m.

"The students of the University of Nevada, Reno's art course, Wallworks, are pleased to announce the opening reception and exhibition of 14 Layers; a group exhibition on display in the Sheppard Fine Arts Gallery, Wednesday, June 6 from 5-7p.m. This exhibition is the culminating project an intense three-week art class that challenges upper division art students to create new work specifically for a gallery space. This year's artwork ranges from colorful murals and digital projections to interactive marionettes and engaging sculpture.

The concept of this exhibition is centered around the idea of layering, whether it is executed through the layering of paint or as a layering of perspective, the show is intended to physically activate the gallery and psychologically engage the audience. This was developed in collaboration between the students and instructor"

Rachel Armstrong | Brett Blagen | Brie Boles | Yu Chou | Jolene Duthie | Kevin Ghiglieri | Leah Habermehl | Abbey Henry | Tonya Howard | Julie Lee | Shawn Lemmon | Jenny Luong | Jaime Neal | Laura Spohr

Jeff Erickson, [Instructor]

[graphic from a google image search for 'layers']