Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Artbeat

CRAFTERS WANTED: AAL is still taking applications for people who want to sell crafts at our bazaar which will be held Saturday, November 20, from 9:00 to 5:00 at the fairgrounds in the Potlatch building. A ten-by-ten booth is $20. Contact Heidi Richards at 401 Sherwood, Prescott, or call 887-0140 or 887-8214.

ART QUIZ: Which is art? A marble sculpture by Michelangelo or the arch of St. Louis? Answer: both. Different, certainly, but whether it's traditional or contemporary, whether or not a traditional material is used or the artist used something unusual, art is the expression of feelings, a means of communication those feelings with someone else.

While studying screen writing I learned that a way to create sympathy for a character is to make him and his problems familiar. Consider Star Wars (which I've never seen, because it's too pardon the pun far out there for me). None of us know what it is like to live in outer space. But we know people who perhaps don't know their fathers, or have problems with their fathers, and we certainly understand war. So we buy into the fantasy, because the writer gives us enough familiarity to cling to while we're introduced to all the new and different elements.

I say all this to say the contemporary geometric metal sculptures leave me cold. Since I live in an almost hundred-year-old house and like vintage clothes, clearly I' m not a contemporary kind of girl. I don't understand what the artist is trying to say, because it isn't familiar. Perhaps the problem is that my vision is too limited, my mind set and world view too narrow. It doesn't matter. I can't relate to it, so it isn't for me. First, metal in such simplistic 'bare bones' form is, to me, cold and impersonal. But if metals are melted and poured into molds, creating forms of people, animals, etc., that have shadows familiarity which I find acceptable. On the other hand, wood is a warm medium. It was once alive and it has texture and grain and color, which is why Butch Ellis' work is so fantastic and you don't believe it, watch the Antiques Roadshow. Hmm. Maybe texture, grain and color is why I find marble and other stone a more acceptable medium for sculpture than metal.

Another sculpture that appealed is one I saw of a life-size mermaid. What made it so wonderful was that the artist had used bits and pieces of broken china, old jewelry and other seemingly worthless memorabilia. The scales were cola bottle lids. The

hair was chain necklaces. It was a wonderful piece, because of the 'familiarity' and the fun of discovery we had finding all the different things the artist used.

Questions or info? Call me at 887-6241 or 324 E. Main, Prescott.