The Galleries @ CSU’s Animatopoeia Review

Detail from King of the Impossible by Adrian Hatfield. Mixed media | 80″x48″x36″, 2011.

Check out Cleveland Scene’s review of The Galleries at Cleveland State University’s current exhibition. It’s good. Here’s how it ends:

It is difficult to recall an exhibition in recent memory filled with as many surprises as this one. Yet the displayed items are not merely exciting for their newness, but have a power to keep viewers trying to figure them out long after leaving.

Check out the complete review here.

The exhibition also got noticed in cleveland.com’s photo of the day:

“Ceremony,” sculptures by Kate Clark are featured as a recent cleveland.com Photo of the Day.

ANIMATOPOEIA: A MOST PECULIAR (POST MODERN) BESTIARY – a thematic exhibition of works by 19 internationally recognized artists in various media, exploring animal imagery in contemporary art, curated by Omid Tavakoli.

Also on view: DANTE RODRIGUEZ: NEW WORKS – Graphic and conceptual works by one of Cleveland’s most promising emerging artists

The exhibitions run through March 2nd.

Gallery Hours:
Monday & Tuesday: By appointment
Wednesday & Thursday: 10am to 5pm
Friday: 10am to 8pm
Saturday: 12noon to 8pm

Visit the galleries’s website for more information.

 

Transformer Station Feature in the Plain Dealer

EXTRA! EXTRA!  TRANSFORMER STATION SET TO TRANSFORM CLEVELAND ART SCENE! SPUR GROWTH IN OHIO CITY! READ ALL ABOUT IT:

Of course, by now you know I’m excited about it. But it isn’t just your beloved (if slightly esoteric) photography professor that’s all fired up about it. Check out Steven Litt’s feature on the Transformer Station, the Bidwells, and the anticipated economic development for Ohio City. If I am in a position to do so, I will now make my official pronouncement: Contemporary art photography is no longer underrepresented in Cleveland. Along with many other recent developments, and a slew of upcoming exhibitions featuring area photographers, we are in the midst of a full-on photography renascence.

Now, if we can only get that photography festival. Actually, you can help with that by voting for Cleveland Museum of Art’s Cleveland Image Festival.between Feb 1 – 20. More information on that here.

The Transformer Station opens to the public on Friday, Feb 1st.

Admission: Free

Transformer Station
1460 West 29 Street
Cleveland, OH 44113
216-938-5429

Hint: bring your smart phone. The work is not labeled on the wall. You can learn more about the pieces you’re viewing at TSGUIDE.org.

The first weekend features extended hours:
February 1: Noon to 9pm
February 2: Noon to 9pm
February 3: Noon to 5pm

Regular Visiting Hours
Wednesdays: Noon to 5pm
Thursdays: Noon to 9pm
Fridays: Noon to 5pm
Saturdays: Noon to 5pm

Liz Maugans of Zygote Press on cleveland.com

 

Liz Maugans, 45, is the co-founder and executive director of Zygote Press a non-profit fine arts print making studio and gallery. Zygote won Cleveland Arts Prize this year. Maugans also won a creative workforce scholarship from the Community Partnership on Arts and Culture (CPAC). She currently has a show at Arts Collinwood called “Half Empty” and on Feb. 15 she will have another show called “Desperate Signs” at the 1point 618 Gallery. Check out Liz’s profile here.

Emmet Gowin Lecuture at CMA

Lecture: Emmet Gowin

Cleveland Museum of Art
2:00 p.m. Saturday, February 2, 2013

Recital Hall

Emmet Gowin, eminent photographer and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University, looks back and reviews his life’s work and involvement with photography. A survey of his images, which will serve as an outline of that experience, will be accompanied by first-hand stories reflecting on the influences, personalities, and ideas that have grounded Gowin’s life and work.

$15/$10 CMA members. Students are FREE (but still require tickets).
Call the Ticket Center at (216) 421-7350 to purchase tickets.
Click here for CMA’s webpage

Exhibition:
American Vesuvius:
The Aftermath of Mount St. Helens
by Frank Gohlke and Emmet Gowin

Sunday, January 13, 2013 to Sunday, June 2, 2013
Cleveland Museum of Art
Photography Gallery

In 1980 the first significant volcanic eruption in the continental United States since 1915 occurred on Mount St. Helens in Washington State. The force of the explosion was cataclysmic: the entire north face of the mountain slid away and entire forests were flattened. This exhibition brings together important series by two photographers who, working independently, took to the air to reveal nature’s terrifying transformation of the landscape. Emmet Gowin’s images were all shot in 1981; these aerial views became a central approach to his art. Frank Gohlke returned to the region numerous times between 1981 and 1990. His photographs testify to the volcano’s destructive force but also the stirrings of the land’s rebirth as the years passed.
This exhibition is made possible through the support of Nesnadny + Schwartz.
The Cleveland Museum of Art is generously funded by Cuyahoga County residents through Cuyahoga Arts and Culture. The Ohio Arts Council helped fund this exhibition with state tax dollars to encourage economic growth, educational excellence, and cultural enrichment for all Ohioans.

Click here for CMA’s webpage

Vaughn Wascovich Discuss His Pinhole Photographs

Texas art photographer Vaughn Wascovich  has found himself at the center of Cleveland’s photography renascence . In this video Vaughn talks about his influences and process for his large-format pinhole photographs. He currently has a solo exhibition at the Cleveland Print Room, and will be one of two shows opening the Transformer Station gallery on Feb 3 (see previous post for more info).

Transformer Station Opening Weekend Extended Hours

CLEVELAND (January 11, 2013) – Transformer Station, Cleveland’s newest art museum owned and operated by the Fred and Laura Ruth Bidwell Foundation, announces a weekend open house from noon to 9:00 p.m., Feb. 1 and 2 and noon to 5:00 p.m. on Feb. 3. Visitors will have the opportunity to tour the recently renovated space and be the first to view two premiere exhibitions of contemporary photography and photo-based art. Admission to the Transformer Station is free.

During the weekend open house, gallery tours will be held throughout the day and evening. Rising Star Coffee Roasters, a coffee shop located directly across the street in the Ohio City Firehouse, will remain open during Transformer Station’s inaugural weekend hours. Touch Supper Club will park their food truck outside the museum Friday and Saturday evening and visitors will be encouraged to explore the exciting Ohio City restaurant and bar scene.

Light of Day:  Photographs from the Collection of Fred and Laura Ruth Bidwell 
February 1 – May 4, 2013
Light of Day is an overview of the state of photo-based art today. Bidwell Projects collection focuses on acquisitions of new work by living artists, so many works in this show will be seeing the “light of day” for the first time. Featured artists include internationally recognized photographers Hiroshi Sugimoto, Adam Fuss and Abelardo Morell as well as younger artists who are now gaining recognition for their work. Works on view include traditional photographic processes that are repurposed, large-scale digital images and conceptual work that challenges images’ relationship to reality. Light of Day examines the accelerating changes in the technology, uses and meanings of photography that are explored by leading contemporary artists.

Bridging Cleveland:  Photographs by Vaughn Wascovich 
February 1 – May 4, 2013
Dramatic, large-scale panoramic images of landmark Cleveland bridges by Vaughn Wascovich were commissioned by the Bidwell Foundation for the inaugural exhibition of the Transformer Station. These works recall both the grandeur of 19th-century American landscapes and the action painting of Abstract Expressionism. Wascovich used handmade pin-hole panoramic cameras to capture the images and then manipulated the large-format paper negatives through a variety of media and techniques as they developed in the darkroom. Bridging Cleveland intends to evoke the historic majesty of the physical infrastructure of Cleveland and suggest the importance of spans yet to be crossed in the city’s future.

Transformer Station
A recently renovated transit substation of the now defunct Cleveland Railway Company, Transformer Station is an 8,000 square foot museum in Cleveland’s Ohio City neighborhood that provides an additional opportunity for exposure to contemporary art in Northeast Ohio. While owned and operated by the Bidwell Foundation, a private collection focused on contemporary photography and photo-based art, for six months each year Transformer Station will host events and exhibitions curated by the Cleveland Museum of Art. Both Bidwell Foundation and the Cleveland Museum of Art will feature internationally recognized contemporary artists in Transformer Station programming.

After the open house, Transformer Station will be free and open to the public on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays from noon to 5:00 p.m. and Thursdays from noon to 9:00 p.m.

Visit the Transformer Station website.

Community Meeting on Image Submission for Pull!

Cleveland Print Room Hosts Info Session for Local Photographers

Tuesday, January 22, 2013, 7:00PM – 8:30PM

Do You Have Pictures of Work in Cleveland?

Internationally renowned performance artist William Pope.L and SPACES invite any and all Clevelanders to send us pictures of your experience with work in Cleveland.

These images will be shown as part of Pull!, a 3-day-long community performance taking place June 7-10, 2013. The images will be projected out the back of an 8-ton truck, that will be manually pulled through the city-from the east to the west side-by teams of Clevelanders.

Pull! will be a living reminder that there is no shame in hard work (especially when we do it together), and a chance to stir up a city-wide conversation about work.

Do you have contemporary or historical images related to working (or not working) in Cleveland? Photos of you or your family members’ occupations or workplaces? Images of any of the many sectors of labor that have built Cleveland? We would like these to be a part of this historic performance project, made by and for the people of Cleveland! Photographers of all skill levels and ages are welcome to submit images.

Find out more about how to submit images for Pull! at an informational meeting at the Cleveland Print Room, a community dark room and photography workshop in downtown Cleveland http://clevelandprintroom.com.

Informational Meeting on Image Submission Pull!
Tuesday, January 22, 7:00 p.m.
Cleveland Print Room
2550 Superior Avenue
Cleveland, Ohio 44114

CMA Caporali Missal Student Exhibition

The Cleveland Museum of Art has an exciting opportunity for visual arts students at universities within a forty-five-mile radius of Cleveland to exhibit their work at the Museum this Spring semester. The Museum is planning a juried exhibition titled Connecting with Caporali for which students will be asked to create artwork in response to the exhibition The Caporali Missal: A Masterpiece of Renaissance Illumination, which opens February 17, 2013. This is an excellent opportunity for students to showcase their work to a diverse audience, as well as gain significant professional experience.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: Monday, March 4 by email
Rebecca Michaels, Kress Interpretive Fellow rmichaels@clevelandart.org – 216-707-2473

Download more information here:
4.Connecting with Caporali-student info package

Download the application form here:
6.Connecting with Caporali Entry Form

To learn more about the Caporali Missal:
5.Caporali Missal-links to images-CMA website

Jobs and Internships in the Arts

Creative Compass lists  part-time, full-time, temporary, internship and apprentice experiences for individual artists.

• Professional Teaching Artist
• ArtWorks Site Coordinator
• Assistant Teaching Artist
• ArtWorks Apprentice (Student Paid Internship)
• VP of Community Engagement and Education – PlayhouseSquare
• Office Assistant – SPACES
• Visitor Services – Part time – Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage
• Education Intern – Cleveland Botanical Gardens
• Image Preparation, Videography and Video Editing Interns
• Assistant Professor of Scenic & Lighting Design
• Marketing Intern
• Photographers and Videographers
• Graphic Design Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Media Program Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Youth and Family Education Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Public Programs Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Development Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Membership Intern – MOCA Cleveland
• Exhibitions Intern – MOCA Cleveland

Animatopoeia @ The Galleries at CSU

 

The Galleries at Cleveland State University
Opening Reception Jan 18, 5-8pm
January 18 – March 2, 2013

 

ANIMATOPOEIA: A MOST PECULIAR (POST MODERN) BESTIARY – a thematic exhibition of works by 19 internationally recognized artists in various media, exploring animal imagery in contemporary art, curated by Omid Tavakoli. Also a solo exhibition by one of Cleveland’s most promising emerging artists Dante Rodriguez.

ANIMATOPOEIA: A MOST PECULIAR (POST MODERN) BESTIARY

 

This exhibition explores animal imagery in the works of 19 contemporary artists and is based on an obscure list of categories of animals that comes to us through Michel Foucault, the postmodern thinker, and social theorist, in a groundbreaking book on Postmodernist thought The Order of Things, by way of a quote by Jorge Luis Borges who claims that it came from a translation from an ancient Chinese encyclopedia.

 

The list goes as follows:

 

The list divides all animals into one of 14 categories:

 

• Those that belong to the emperor
• Embalmed ones
• Those that are trained
• Suckling pigs
• Mermaids
• Fabulous ones
• Stray dogs
• Those that are included in this classification
• Those that tremble as if they were mad
• Innumerable ones
• Those drawn with a very fine camel hair brush
• Et cetera
• Those that have just broken the flower vase
• Those that, at a distance, resemble flies

 

With this ‘most peculiar’ list of categories as a starting point, the exhibition curator Omid Tavakoli brings together a number of works that strangely echo the unfamiliar ideas presented in the ‘list.’ Whereas each exhibiting artist has a unique take on animals as a subject in their art, the exhibition as a whole presents a certain mood of postmodern anxiety and uncertainty that is reflective of the state of contemporary culture.

 

We live in a moment of history when the natural world seems both fragile and furious – imperiled, cornered, doomed; torn apart by climate change, invasive species, genetic engineering, culture wars, the clash of civilizations, depletion of natural resources, and global anxiety expressed in post apocalyptic scenarios. We expect mutants and zombies to populate our future and we have a keen sense that we might end up in the caves from which our distant ancestors emerged.

 

The works in this exhibition comprise the Animatopoæa, the Most Peculiar (Post Modern) Bestiary – a collection of works that will, it is hoped, edify, amuse, and engage, and bring some light to the darker recesses of the human imagination.

 

Robert Thürmer, Director, Galleries at Cleveland State University

 

Inluded Artists are:

 

• Randy Bolton
• Stephanie Craig
• Steve Ehret
• Adrian Hatfield
• Timothy Hawksworth
• Laurietta Hogin
• Susan Jamison
• Jim Leach
• JenMarie Zeleznak
• Roberto Osti
• Katy Richards
• Anne Siems
• Deborah Simon
• Gamble Staempfli
• Beth Cavener Stichter
• Rob Tarbell
• Julia Unkel
• Pamela Valfer