Contemporary Works by Josh George at Gallery C in Raleigh continues through September 7, 2010

Recently I had the great pleasure of interviewing Lump‘s Bill Thelen.  I approached him with a few questions and (which Bill was gracious enough to answer even hanging in through my rather convoluted, circuitous, and stop-and-go e-mail trail) as I was curious to learn more about the early days of Lump, memorable exhibitions from those days as well as its importance in the current art scene in North Carolina.  My timing was also fortuitous as this September’s coming season marks Lump’s 15th year so it seems an appropriate time to share a little history about one of the Triangle’s most adventurous art venues…

Dave Delcambre:  Can you tell me a bit about the founding of Lump, who all was involved and the decision to start the gallery?

Bill Thelen:  I moved to Raleigh in 1995. I was looking for a studio space in the downtown area and Med Byrd found a building that was available for sale, not for rent. It made more sense to buy the building instead of just renting, so we proceeded to purchase it. The building was divided into two halves so we decided to use one side for studios and to have exhibitions on the other side. We quickly rented the studios and Michael Salter was one of our first tenants.

Q:  So from the very beginning, the building was purchased as a collaborative effort? Did you always see it as some sort of joint / artist group effort?

A: Not really, it was much more organic than having a curatorial viewpoint or a specific mission. In the beginning, I just saw the gallery as a space where people could explore ideas and be used for things to happen. We were just responding to what was going on in the art world. The collaborative aspect of the gallery and the conception of Team Lump didn’t happen until much later.

Q:  What about the the very earliest shows in the space? Were they explorations then by your new tenants that you had just met through renting studio space to them?  I’m curious about the oversight of the space and if in the beginning you were picking work based on what seemed interesting or timely and then mixing up shows for variety?

A: The earliest shows were simply about getting work up on the walls. Our very first show was a collection of eight local photographers, the second show featured the three tenants, the show after that was “Snap, Crackle, Pop” which featured work by Andrea Lekberg, Dale Flattum, Kate Anthony, and Paul Friedrich. But I felt we really hit our stride with the 4th show with an installation by Laura Sharp Wilson, who was a grad student at UNC. This was our first solo show and artists began to see the potential in the space. I believe this was the turning point where I started to deviate from the thought of being a commercial gallery and began to see us more as an artist’s space.

Q:  What about the gallery’s audience and their reaction in those early days?  Did the Wilson show also prove successful with regards to expanding the gallery’s reach into a wider community as well?

A: It is a difficult time for me to look back on. On one hand it was a lot of fun, but on the other hand people were pretty dismissive of the work we were presenting. It was very disheartening. You worked so hard to find interesting artists, help out with the installation and I understand once the show is up you want to celebrate. But, we were noticing that after the keg was empty so was the gallery. We really had to re-evaluate what kind of audience we were cultivating. All of us were working full-time, going to grad school, making our own work, etc… I mean really struggling, but we knew we were onto something pretty unique to this area. We kind of just gave up caring what people thought of us and that’s when things started to became more interesting.

Q:  Once you reached that point and were able to let go, did you have any one particular moment you can point to that led you to believe that you were really on to something?  I’m thinking of say a particular work that might have clicked in its reception or maybe a critical reaction that stands out in your mind.  That sense of not caring anymore about what others thought must have been so freeing I would think.

A: Every show has been a success on many different levels. Having access to artists come and stay with us has been the most fulfilling aspect of running the gallery. I mean we ask a lot of the artists who come and do shows. We can’t even afford to make cards for them, ship their work or help them get down here. All we can offer is total artistic control over their exhibitions, a place to stay, help with the installation if they need it and home cooked meals.

In terms of earlier shows…off the top of my head, Ludwig Schwarz shows just blew our minds, Kirsten Stoltmann videos and Willie Gregory installing from Chicago, Barnstormers (hauling over a hundred speakers down from Brooklyn and dancing all night), Andrew Jeffrey Wright and Barry McGee totally wrecking the gallery in the most awesome way, David Ellis inside the gallery and out, elin slavick o’Hara’s 400 lb light box, taking Shephard Fairey around in broad daylight and night to bomb the city, Dana Raymond’s total transformation of the gallery, Jen Talbot’s performance…

Q:  Have the shows evolved along the lines you thought they might? I’m curious if the gallery’s development has been anything like what you might have dared imagine when Lump was just starting out.  Were you able to allow yourself any preconceptions about what form the shows might take?  The variety you just described just seems so incredibly vibrant and it must have been very invigorating to see these shows get up and going…

A: The exhibitions have exceeded my expectations in many ways. When we first opened the space, I only wanted a studio, but there was no place in the budget to allow me one. Curating the gallery made me temporarily shift my focus from my own studio practice to facilitating the works of others. So in a sense, I thought I really needed to be working with artists who I found interesting, challenging and inspiring.

In terms of my own preconceptions, I was an open book and really did my research. Before coming to Raleigh, I was living in San Francisco and was pretty immersed in the local art scene. I didn’t have a tv and spent all my free time going to exhibitions, lectures,  openings and reading about contemporary art. I also volunteered and interned at New Langston Arts, Kiki and Build. Before that, I traveled extensively through Europe, worked at the Milwaukee Art Museum, completed my BFA and was ready for  new challenges.

Q: Have you noticed a change in the audience over time? Has the gallery’s evolution coincided with different audiences embracing the work and various exhibitions?

A: I am proud to say we still have some of the people attending our exhibitions from the very first opening! People have been very loyal to us. I hope our audience is evolving as the space does. I think our audience recognizes that we are a pretty adventourous space and have come with an open mind. We are also aware that people may latch on to some shows and not to others. It ‘s the nature of the beast.

Q: Has working with the various artists you mentioned also invigorated your own artistic practice as well? I hope that curating the gallery hasn’t been too much of a shift away from your own work but I imagine at times it must be hard to strike a balance between the two?

A: With every show we do, I am inspired in some way or another. I get excited to be around other artists and see how their work transforms from a proposal to the studio to the gallery.  I tend to compartmentalize my own life a lot, so this schematic seems to work for for me. Every free moment I have I am usually thinking about art, whether it’s my own work, something I saw, or an artist we are considering for the gallery – gears are turning.

Lump’s upcoming season starts on September 3, 2010 with an exhibition by Thad Kellstadt

 Our Stories, In Focus, a public art project now on exhibit at the ArtsCenter in Carrboro through August 31, by Leah Sobsey and Lynn Bregman Blass seeks to celebrate the connectivity of people.  The premise for the artwork is simple both simple and complex. Remember the party game a few years back, particularly popular among film and TV buffs, called Six Degrees of Separation?  The challenge was to link the actor Kevin Bacon to every other screen, stage, or TV personality by finding shared media moments.  So and so was in this film with what’s his name, whose daughter was in a TV episode with whosiwhatzit, who was in this movie with Kevin Bacon.  The more arcane the connections, the more fun it became.  Although this is only a game, I think we are all hard wired to seek connections to others.   A news event half way around the world is intentionally localized by the reporter discovering connections back in their own community.   

No matter your gender, ethnicity, age; whether you are a long-term resident, a student, here for just a few years, or a recent transplant from another state or country, there is a shared, at least for a moment, geographical connection.  Our individual or family histories have some how brought us to this place at this time.  Our personal histories are told through stories as well as our squirreled away photos, letters and other mementos that visually capture who we are as individuals and collectively, who we are as a community.

 Through the medium of photography, xerography and encaustic on paper, the artists’ have visually documented who we are as a community.  People were invited to bring any form of memento to a series of workshops held in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. The objects were scanned and then those scans became part of a large “tapestry” that literally weaves together all the varied stories those objects represented into a cohesive whole.  The 13’ x 8’ circular curtain was created by transferring the scanned images onto strips of adding machine tape.  Some 1000 images, some repeated, tell amazing stories through both sentimental and seemingly mundane images.  A yearbook picture from the 1960s shows the first Native American to attend a Chapel Hill school.  A subway map of Seoul, Korea represents a story about a university student who was lost in that city and through her own ingenuity and the kindness of strangers found her way.  That the student was from Ghana and chose to study at UNC adds another connective layer to that scrap of paper.  Another woman contributed the image of a sash emblazoned with buttons and other memorabilia collected at the inauguration of President Obama.  Imagine what stories and connections are imprinted on both the cloth and the owner.  A simple thread, tied in a knot, holds significance to a woman who tearfully told how in a time of personal crisis, she was taught how to weave, which helped her through the hard times.  Her instructor, who had become a life-long friend, had just passed away.

 For those 500 people who contributed to the artwork, recognition that their personal history is a shared part of the community connects them to your neighbors.  If you are just viewing the stunningly visual work for the first time, there are probably images that resonate with you and evoke your own memories.  It is also fun just to speculate on the meaning of certain scanned object.

 While the scanned objects only visually represent stories, a video component offers edited segments of people telling stories about themselves and their objects.

An opening reception will be held Friday August 13^th from 6-9 p.m. as part of the Carrboro/Chapel Hill 2^nd Friday Art Walk.  The ArtsCenter is located at 300 E. Main St., Carrboro.

 Our Stories, In Focus was jointly organized by the Town of Chapel Hill Public Arts Office and the UNC Program for Humanities and Human Values.  The Orange County Art Commission, the Chapel Hill Historical Society also contributed funds to the project.

The Excelsior Barber Shop in Durham wins the award for the Doing the Right Thing show in the area this month I think: thinking outside the box with an innovative concept, plus a great story to boot.  NY artist Rory Golden on a visit to Durham recently stopped in for a haircut by proprietor Howard Liverman (pictured cutting former UNC-CH instructor James Gadson’s  hair below) and was so inspired by the shop he along with Adrian Schlesinger decided to organize a fundraiser/benefit exhibition they called the “Pop Up Art Show”.  Here’s Golden’s description of the event from the Pop Up Show’s facebook page:  ”I got my hair cut by Howard this week on my visit to Durham. He is a wonderful person and I was inspired by meeting him. His space is awesome. I asked him if he’d host a show, bring in people to exhibit art and have a party. He said yes! It’s an opportunity to create community, support Howard and have a great time in a space filled with artwork – for sale!”

So there you have it.  Submission requests were sent, works were promised, the show was hung and the event was a rousing success on the local scene if in nothing else but the spirit of it all.    The artists were able to show their work, maybe sell a few pieces and get some attention, event attendees come out for fun evening of entertainment and a small local proprietor in business for 40 years gets some much-needed support and attention.  The best aspect of the entire deal was the community building bar none.  It goes to show you don’t have to move a mountain to help the community- just show a little caring, put out a little effort and do the right thing.

On the surface there don’t necessarily seem to be that many similarities between Galia Gur Seev‘s large format Table and Seder works and Park McArthur‘s Presence is Progress – all of which are on display at Through This Lens this month.  Yet there are intriguing parallels running through all the work, particularly as related to identity and our considerations of one another.

Zeev’s photo installation here holds together extremely well (Seder is in fact a continuation of the Table work) and the works evolve along similar story lines- the theme of the family (and the individual body as well) the home, centering, and ritual.  The theme of a meal is used in some ways a placeholder;  a device that unites the figures and dinner table accoutrements for the purpose of composing the photographic tableau.   The scale of Zeev’s photos enhance the narrative- writ  here larger than life even- and magnifies the impact of several dynamics at work: tension, drama, joy and routine.  Ultimately the work is meant to probe the viewer’s own experiences and interrelations.  And in this I think the work succeeds in pulling you in.   Zeev’s drama compels as much as it dramatizes.

Galia Gur Seev’s Table and Seder photographs are on view at Through This Lens, 303 E. Chapel Hill Street in Durham

You have to head on down to Through This Lens in Durham kinda quick to catch this show as it ends this weekend.  But the trek is worth it.   A recent addition to the art blog’s very own contributor list, artist Park McArthur is the driving force behind Presence is Progress, a community based art event I like to think of it.  The original incarnation of the show (eloquently described by Jeff York here),  organized to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, was rooted in the civic realm and dealt with how those with disabilities negotiated spaces and how public space and infrastructure responded.  It’s advocacy, performance, outreach and innovative public art all wrapped up into one.  It’s also an affirming show and for me the notion of interactivity on the part of both viewer and participants is the strongest facet of the Presence project.   This concept also happens on many different levels so it leaves you something to ponder long after you’ve left the images.  (I’m still thinking about some of those things…)  Since  a strong component to the original project was its  visibility, you might think of the gallery show as another sort of demonstration project- one that shows both sides of a story within a more traditional setting but still exploring how that story plays out in the public sphere.

Presence is Progress is at Through This Lens in Durham through August 7, 2010

It’s nice to see a public library support the visual arts, especially the really adventurous, unexpected kind. Following up on her Text/Image work recently shown at Lump in Raleigh, fellow Independent critic and artist Amy White has offered up precisely that kind of work. It is an exercise in multiplicity as her paintings,  text work and sculptural elements all combine to form a cluster of installations with notions of process interwoven throughout.  It is also immersive, as the work commands your attention at the main lobby and winds its way down the stairwell through the lower level corridor.

The library has some challenging spaces to deal with in terms of installing art and White has taken on the challenge in a big way.  A neglected exterior courtyard was offered up for her use (big kudos to the library’s Steve Wright for a very flexible progammatic sense regarding installing work on site.)  This courtyard piece is incidentally the first exterior installation in the library’s series of gallery shows.  The artist spent an entire day cleaning it out and prepping it for her work (staying after 9:00 p.m. one night on the task) and has meticulously lined the top edges of several retaining walls cutting across the space with white river rock to form a poignantly meditative work.   Interior spaces are no easier in many ways as all the stuff of contemporary public use space- pay telephones, light switches, water fountains, electrical outlets, signs, fire alarms, etc. all have to be negotiated.   In many ways all that interior infrastructure informed the work in that it became a stage with which the art could interact and play itself out.  For White the library became the antithesis of the typical white cube gallery space; a municipal opportunity for an integration of her work with the most public of viewing spaces. The result is that the hanging system of rods and hooks, frames, and paintings and photos themselves coalesce and in the process free themselves up.

White’ s intention was to invite the public into full participation and I think she has succeeded.  Make a visit to her installation and you may never look at an electrical outlet or light switch the same way again.

Former Ackland director Charles Millard did not exactly slip quietly into his retirement. Graced by the good fortune of fortuitously owning an artwork in his own personal collection that gained signfiicant value through the years, Millard decided when the time was right to sell off that work and put the funds to prudent fiscal use.  Through his own dedicated collector’s eye and dedication to the task he amassed a significant collection of artworks spanning some 2500 years.  The best part is that in a stunning act of philanthropy Millard set up a foundation with the goal of ultimately donating the collection to the Ackland to shore up its holdings.  The resulting exhibition honoring Millard’s generosity is now up and reads like a giant thank you card.

Millard’s tastes, fittingly for a museum director, ranged far and wide and the 51 works in the show include 19th century documentary photography, ancient Greek statuary, works from the Northern Wei and Tang Dynasties of China, Buddhist deities, 18th century Chinese calligraphy, German altarpieces from the 16th century, Flemish ink drawings, paintings and an amazing pair of angel that date from an early 18th century altarpiece, the list goes on.  A large installation of mesmerizing color field screenprints by Jules Olitski represents the modernera.

The Ackland I’m sure was head over heels to acquire such a trove of works but the best part of the gift is that, coming from a former director, it could be, and was, specifically selected to bolster the Ackland’s holdings:- filling in gaps where needed and illuminating deficient areas.   Is it the perfect gift?  I’ll leave that debate for the insiders but if not, it must come pretty darn close.  A few particular delights of the show: a Charles Burchfield painting from 1946 whose lively brushwork and earthy color palette dances alongside a tour de force woodcut from 2000 by Neil Welliver culled from some 35 individual color passes.  In a more literary vein, keep an eye out for author Allan Gurganus’s contributions in the show’s catalogue.  His poetic riffs on the individual works enliven the page and the show itself in a soulful way.

Fortune Smiles: The Tyche Foundation Gift is on view at the Ackland in Chapel Hill through August 29, 2010

For the most adventurous gallery show of the Triangle’s summer you need look no further than Flanders Gallery in Raleigh for this rambunctious show of  photographers (Sam Falls, Lucas Blalock, Thomas Hauser, and Bill Sullivan) working across a variety of subjects and styles.  The show is accompanied by a splendid catalog as well with a thought provoking essay by Lauren Turner and exquisite reproductions of the artists’ work.  Turner’s writing goes to great lengths to engage the art historical precedents of the concepts of genres, in particular those of André Félibien (a preeminent man of letters in his time who served as the court historian to Louis XIV.)  Her essay stirs some engaging precedents as many tried and true art historical concepts- composition, precedent à la still life, portraiture, the relentless advent of technological advance, even nature photography- are detailed and explored via each artist’s work.  Most intriguingly the show opens a vein of dialogue in contemporary work that extends well beyond our own little art world here in the Triangle.  While the show is vast in scope it presents a precise curatorial statement; honed such that it offers a glimpse into the workings of contemporary photography in both an international and a more local sense.  The exhibition is precise and intellectually rigorous yet is also admirably open ended enough to present the spectrum of many of the issues which contemporary photography must engage (the interdisciplinary, identity, and digital manipulation among them.)

The show engages you to look again and again which is I think its greatest strength. It also helps that this is flat out stunning work.   I dare say it’s a must-see show and I only hope that the traditional summer gallery slowdown hasn’t been too harsh on reducing the viewership of the  exhibition.  If you have seen it, kudos to you for making the trek. If you haven’t, I suggest you do what you have to do to take it in before the show closes August 28th.

New Genre Pictures is on view at Flanders Gallery, 302 S. West Street in downtown Raleigh through August 28, 2010

I gotta give some credit to Golden Belt for taking on the task of this exhibit of NC Chapter American Institute of Architects (AIA) design award winners.  Goodness knows in this economic climate that the suffering architecture biz can use all the good publicity it can get. But if you do go see the show, be prepared for a presentation long on design exuberance and individual firm expertise but lacking in overall presentation and cohesiveness.  But that’s what goes with the territory in these design award shows.  The work holds together only in that all the entries on display adhere to the same submission board format.   From there anything goes…

The group of presentation boards as a whole suffers from too much complexity and contradiction (to borrow some famed verbage  from  noted architect Robert Venturi)  which I suppose is unavoidable in a display of the work of firms whose practices are spread all across the spectrum.  These type of design award affairs are juried occasions (the jury this go-round consisting of design professionals from Austin, Texas area)  and the selection of the best of the past year’s design work in the state is of course the raison d’être for the show in the first place.   No submissions = no awards = no show.   But I always wonder when I see design shows like this whether an exhibition of such work wouldn’t benefit from maybe a little video projection (there must be some animation flyovers and walk-throughs made for clients on some of these so why not show ‘em off to the general public once in awhile?)  Or at least a few larger prints dispersed about the gallery that might set off the honor awards in a more distinguished manner?   A few of the panels nonetheless do stand out, design award or no.  Kenneth Hobgood‘s presentation of a pair of recent house designs are splendidly rendered (and utilize genuine non-digital architectural models no less!)  and Tonic Design’s Bickett Studio board is for me one of the most effective (and understated) architectural photography presentations in the show.  Their boards embrace their pared-down aesthetic while simultaneously exhibiting sincere presentation restraint.  Perhaps the understated and minimal feel to the Tonic and Hobgood presentations are what lend them a little extra appeal- as if they’re aren’t working so hard to outdo their competitors.

Times are tight of course and no one’s budget for printing and framing and all that is growing so perhaps I’m wishing for too much.  Golden Belt has done the architecture profession a favor in providing a forum for showing some design work in the first place.  But this show would benefit from a little more attention to interactivity and presentation chutzpah to both show off what the firms spend so much time pondering in the design studio and to engage the general public more effectively.  After all what is architecture but an immersive art?

The exhibition of AIA 2010 Design Award Winners is at Golden Belt’s Room 100 in Durham through September 12, 2010