...And It's Deep Too

I'm an artist (reminding myself here) ......Hey, don't take my word for it....

VISUAL ARTS

Students at UGA, Miami take bold tack with traditional forms

By JERRY CULLUM

For the Journal-ConstitutionPublished on: 07/09/2006

http://www.accessatlanta.com/arts/content/arts/stories/0709artstars.html

REVIEW "Next Hot Art Stars" Through July 22. 9:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Fridays. $850-$8,000. Fay Gold Gallery, 764 Miami Circle, Atlanta. 404-233-3843, www.faygoldgallery.com

Verdict: Excellent and sometimes pushing the edge.


Patrick Flibotte's two inflatable-figure "Superheroes" stretch to the ceiling at the Fay Gold Gallery entrance. They are your first clue that these "Next Hot Art Stars" from the University of Georgia and University of Miami might be a little different.

Justin Rabideau's exquisite wall piece "Once I Started Looking, I Could Not Stop Finding" — featuring pecans encased in hand-blown glass — is the next hint that this art strikes out in other directions.

After this, Claire Joyce's gaudily autobiographical 8-foot-tall paintings, done entirely in glitter, come as no surprise.

On the other hand, Amanda Crouse's hauntingly textured life-size ceramic figures are thoroughly traditional in the best sense. (Both she and Joyce will have solo exhibitions at the gallery later.) Crouse's works contrast prettily with Lori Neal's tentacular painted abstract piece on a nearby pedestal.

The whole show is a nice balance between tradition and experiment. Long art-world debates about the relationship between art and design, high and low, are encoded in Brent Cole's mica-filled glass vessels. Based on the shapes of dog chew toys, these lovely little pieces of geometry in "Mercurial" are beautifully arranged on a polished aluminum shelf.

These seductive objects based on commonplace things hang next to Hooper Turner's paintings of elegant "Reichenbach Porcelain" tableware and tchotchkes such as "Birds by Toikka."
The paintings also reproduce descriptive text with prices, indicating that these tasteful still lifes were set up not by the artist but by catalogue designers.

Among other paintings, Kent Knowles' dramatic "The Flood" uses Texas artist Robert Jessup's style and the epic sweep of 19th-century history painting. Jeremy Hughes' "Corridor and Typewriters" combines a scene from "The Shining" with vignettes of two vintage machines. Christopher Parrott, Annie Butrus and Justine Tzu-Chuan Lin demonstrate the range of possibilities these days between realism and pure abstraction.

Amid the frequently history-less flights of imagination, Rodrecas Davis makes (not keeps) it real with two oversize funeral-home fans. One bears a photograph of the murdered leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, the other of the murdered rappers Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. "Good Hope I (Martin and Malcolm)" and "Good Hope II (Big and Pac)" summarize a generation of changing expectations.

These artists, most of whom are fledgling Mason Murer Fine Art candidates, step into a world in which the gulf between the existing market and the expectations of contemporary art are enormous. Many talented figures find themselves too out-there for most buyers and too cautious for international art fairs and biennials. Let's hope for a happier outcome in these cases.