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Reviews
May/June 2015 Pima Community College Photographers & Printmakers Tucson Jewish Community Center Fine Art Gallery |
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Pima Community College art students and their professors have been treating Tucson art lovers to some very special exhibits in recent weeks. First there was the Bernal Gallery student art show on the Pima CC West Campus. Now a select group of Pima CC photographers and printmakers is currently exhibiting at the Tucson Jewish Community Center (Tucson JCC) Fine Art Gallery.
Unlike the Bernal Gallery exhibit which included a wide variety mediums by a large number of artists, the Tucson JCC exhibit has been narrowed to only photography and printmaking, and to only a few artists in each category.
Unlike the Bernal Gallery exhibit which included a wide variety mediums by a large number of artists, the Tucson JCC exhibit has been narrowed to only photography and printmaking, and to only a few artists in each category.
Karen Hymer_Remnants I_
Tom Webster opens the exhibit with two stunning large scale archival pigment prints of botanical forms. The Datura blossom is quite beautiful, and it’s amusing to think of this beauty by the plant’s more common name of “loco weed.” Karen Hymer presents subdued and moody still life and figurative work in her photogravures, each of which seem to have a romantic story behind each image.
Doug Rautenkranz takes a new approach to still life with her triptych Metaphors. Unlike the much more common vision of still life presented as flowers, fruits and vases on drapery, here we see carefully constructed, rather geometrical displays on patterned backgrounds. The colorful displays include fruits, bowls of grain, tea pots, and game playing pieces. There is a strong Asian (Japanese?) sensibility to the work that is quite unlike our Western typification of “still life.”
Doug Rautenkranz takes a new approach to still life with her triptych Metaphors. Unlike the much more common vision of still life presented as flowers, fruits and vases on drapery, here we see carefully constructed, rather geometrical displays on patterned backgrounds. The colorful displays include fruits, bowls of grain, tea pots, and game playing pieces. There is a strong Asian (Japanese?) sensibility to the work that is quite unlike our Western typification of “still life.”
DRautenkranz_Metaphors_
T.J. Marsh shows us some dramatic close up portraits of raptors….and gorgeous birds they are with their piercing eyes always on alert. Marsh also has included several large photos of rock climbers hanging from rocks, perhaps on Mount Lemon. Far more contemplative are Brett Starr’s color night photos in which we see stellar displays of delicate beauty.
Urban landscape photography is especially interesting when it reveals aspects of an urban area that we often overlook. Eric Fernstrom’s Coin Wash and TT6, a capture of a rundown house and carport in a desert town are compelling. The competing horizontal and vertical lines, the color blue of the sky and orange of lettering on the building, remind us that beauty can be found in the most mundane places.
Urban landscape photography is especially interesting when it reveals aspects of an urban area that we often overlook. Eric Fernstrom’s Coin Wash and TT6, a capture of a rundown house and carport in a desert town are compelling. The competing horizontal and vertical lines, the color blue of the sky and orange of lettering on the building, remind us that beauty can be found in the most mundane places.
BStarr_Fiery Nights_
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EFernstrom_Coin Wash_
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KDawes_Fractured Reflextions_
Vanessa Barboa shares some night scenes, color photos made after dark in the Old Pueblo. Among them are photos of the Hotel Congress downtown and Old Main on the University of Arizona campus that will no doubt bring back some reveries on times spent in these locations. That is also true of Steven Perkins and his lovely black and white landscape photos such as his Oak Creek scenes. They invite out into the natural world to explore.
Kate Dawes plays with our perceptions in her intriguing “reflections” series. It takes a moment to realize we are not seeing a photographer’s intentional distortion of a scene, but instead a photo of a reflection that gives us a whole new perception of a common street scene.
PBatelli_Grasping_
Printmakers are fewer in number in this exhibit, but their art contributes significantly. Norma Galindo shares two especially well-done prints, an intaglio and a relief print. Her Pot Shed reminds us of the beauty in simple scenes and also of the nature of that beauty capture in a relief print. Chris Dawdy’s etching Shawl is one of the few figurative works in the exhibit and it gives us a new and colorful look at a familiar subject.
Marika Szabo’s Sediments was created of stained, printed papers that have been collaged into a lovely abstract image. Lynne McCullen’s work, Harvest Hills, is not identified by medium. It appears to be a very precise, almost abstract, linocut or woodcut image.
Monotype is a form of relief printing making that we don’t see as often as other methods of making prints, and regretfully, not many artists fully explore its possibilities. Penny Batelli doesn’t make that mistake. Her triptych Grasping clearly shows that she has taken advantage of the ability to layer images in a monotype. In addition she has added a level of texture and surface design that makes for a compelling image.
This exhibit by Pima Community College photographers and printmakers will be on exhibit through June 16 at the Tucson JCC Fine Art Gallery, 3800 E. River Road, Tucson. http://www.tucsonjcc.org/
Marika Szabo’s Sediments was created of stained, printed papers that have been collaged into a lovely abstract image. Lynne McCullen’s work, Harvest Hills, is not identified by medium. It appears to be a very precise, almost abstract, linocut or woodcut image.
Monotype is a form of relief printing making that we don’t see as often as other methods of making prints, and regretfully, not many artists fully explore its possibilities. Penny Batelli doesn’t make that mistake. Her triptych Grasping clearly shows that she has taken advantage of the ability to layer images in a monotype. In addition she has added a level of texture and surface design that makes for a compelling image.
This exhibit by Pima Community College photographers and printmakers will be on exhibit through June 16 at the Tucson JCC Fine Art Gallery, 3800 E. River Road, Tucson. http://www.tucsonjcc.org/
