Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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12 UCW APRIL 28 - MAY 4, 2021 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Artists combine traditional, new print techniques to bring works 'Off the Wall' for new Gallery 208 exhibition by SONI MARTIN e process of duplicating images goes back several thousand years to the Sumeri- ans (c. 3000 B.C.), carving designs on ceramic cylinders made of dried clay or stone, then rolling the cylinders over clay tablets to leave impressions. In lieu of clay tablets, the artists in Off the Wall: An Ap- proach to the Print were asked to combine an illusionary printing process with, or as, a 3-dimensional form. Off the Wall: An Approach to the Print opens May 4 at Gallery 208 in Fayetteville. Artists from various disciplines (photogra- phy, ceramics, printmaking, painting and the graphic arts) were asked to take the me- dium they usually work in, but successfully integrate 2-dimensional, reproductive print imagery with a 3-dimensional form. One of the eight artists, Shane Booth, a professional photographer, has been explor- ing the cyanotype photograph for several years and decided to explore the cyanotype image as a sculptural form for the exhibit. Booth noted, "as a photographer I'm at- tracted to pattern, negative space and tex- ture- visual texture, not the physical tactile. In thinking about how to integrate my latest cyanotypes of animals into a sculptural form, it was necessary to think about space in a very different way than I usually think about it." After experimenting with ways to create a sculptural form, Booth's prints are rolled into cylinders as reliefs on the wall. e projected blue and white surface has cut- out shapes, that relate to the animal in some way, attached to the surface. Booth noted, "the result of rolling the print as a relief actually enhanced the character of each animal. e 3-dimensional photograph tells a better story to emphasize the whimsical aspects I want the viewer to see – even more than if they were framed and hanging on the wall framed behind glass." In comparison, ceramicist, and sculp- tor Skylor Swann, revisited an idea he had abandoned twenty years ago – how to in- tegrate ceramic decals with his sculptural forms. As an undergraduate student study- ing ceramics at Southern Utah University, Swann briefly experimented with the pro- cess, but abandoned the idea to focus on and practice the sculptural form in clay. Visitors to the gallery will see how the art- ist, years later, has integrated ceramic decals with his mature style of working with clay. "New Kelp City" is a stoneware sculpture combined with laser printed decals. Swann refers to his 22"x23"x10" sculpture in the round as "a type of fractal form, organic in nature, also a symbolic city scape or neigh- borhood emerges." Swann refers to his ar- chitectural form as a "colony of skyscrapers." e ceramic decals are fired into the glazed surface, silhouettes can be seen within the miniature images of office windows placed upwards along the tubular skyscrapers. Artists Angela Stout and Beverly Hender- son both practiced integrating their prints into folded forms using matboard and is exhibiting two early works, "Arbor Day" by Henderson, and "Torn" by Stout, to com- pare how both artists moved to permanent material for their final works. Henderson, a sculptor raised in Colorado, has always been fascinated by nature and the science of nature. Seeing "form first" Henderson stated, "my printed patterns from nature are natural combinations with the intricacy and repeating patterns of organic chemistry." e original paper sculptures resulted Hen- derson interfacing her printing her organic patterns on folded metal wall reliefs. "New Kelp City" by Skylor Swann COVER "Mule" by Shane Booth