Form/Space Atelier

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2012

2012-01-15T20:40:00.004-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2012

Exhibit Title: "9 Lives Of Karen Elson: A Feminist Eclat No. 9"

Exhibit Duration: February 1-March 3, 2012

Vernissage: 1st Wednesday, February 1, 6PM, Because First
Wednesday Is One Day Better Than First Thursday.

Last summer, while a scale model of Form/Space Atelier was installed in another art gallery enabling me to take my first vacation in five years; having been occupied with affairs operating an art gallery, I visited friends and colleagues in the Bay Area for two weeks. While there I was invited to visit SFMOMA with a Form/Space Atelier
represented artist by the name of Joanna Salska, who goes by Uba Owl. While having dinner in the massive old Victorian home she shares with her partner, archivist George McNeil, we made plans for the museum visit and watched the wildlife of Berkeley pass by across the backyards of the neighborhood. I returned to my friend's home in Rio
Vista, on the Sacramento River via BART, and entered the arms of Morpheus lulled by a choir of crickets. The next morning, I reversed my journey via BART and knocked on Joanna's always open door at the appointed hour. I tried several more times, semaphoring a rhythm eventually, to no avail. Hailing my cellular phone from my trousers, I called Joanna, and she informed me I had misunderstood, we were to
have met at the BART station. Sinking feeling had no time to take hold, she said it didn't matter, she would drive the short distance from the BART station and pick me up for the drive to San Francisco and the museum. When Joanna arrived, I settled in and we began our trip to the city. Before five minutes had elapsed, Joanna stated we
would be taking a slight detour on our way to the museum. She informed me we would be dropping off a painting, and pointed to the back of the car where the painting, wrapped in brown paper, was waiting for delivery. When we had gone a little further, I became curious and asked her precisely where the painting was to be delivered. Joanna said the painting was a portrait of San Francisco Police Chief Greg Suhr, and we would be personally delivering the portrait to the Chief's office. I outwardly stifled my considerable incredulity at this revelation, and soon had adopted Joanna's WTF attitude regarding the thrilling stunt of intervention of the most formidable of authoritarian spaces. In the city, a small bit of street theatre involved parking Joanna's Volvo seven blocks from the Police Headquarters, and hand-carrying the five-foot-square brown paper package across the sunny sidewalks of San Francisco; my
six-foot-three frame in front, Joanna's small Polish frame carrying the back. A spectacle for even San Francisco, certainly. Once at the station, I drew a deep breath, mounted the stairs and entered the bastion of bristling Law Enforcement. Immediately, we were directed away from the security checkpoint to a special area to await further instruction, and presumably, from there out of the HQ without making
the delivery to the Chief. Joanna wondered aloud why we had been ushered away, and I, feeling more than a little freaked out to be holding a mysterious large object in a Police Headquarters, could offer no explanation. With that, Joanna told me to hold the painting, she was going to get to the bottom of this situation, and, with her
familiar Polish directness, approached the checkpoint perhaps fifty feet from where I was standing. I couldn't hear what she was saying, but could see her talking with her hands, pointing to the painting, and before I knew it, she had returned to the spot where I was. She said we were in. We were now held in esteem and honor, the seas
parted and we found ourselves chatting amicably to the staff in the Chief's Office momentarily. We left the painting having never met the Chief, he was very busy dealing with a public relations issue, but victory was certainly ours and the journey was indeed it's own reward. Joanna said this was an aspect of her work, and had done the same thing with a portrait of Gloria Steinem, and, significantly for the
exhibit at Form/Space Atelier February 2012, she had also delivered, in person, an uncommissioned work of Karen Elson, perhaps known more for her marriage to musician Jack White. We decided we would exhibit Ms. Elson's portraits at that time, and this exhibit is the result of those exhibit proposal dialogues. -Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier

Uba Owl is a founding member of a new interdisciplinary art movement, Alterrealism. Passionate about political and social issues, she often touches these subjects in her art. Uba Owl's paintings' remarkable achievement, realized through her talent with color and line, is the creation of a sustained emotional effect despite multiple narrative tensions. There is a sense of quiet power, of emergence and beginnings, of wisdom against an anticipated struggle. This is a bold departure from much male-dominated Western art, which often chooses a concrete narrative image while creating sub-surface ambiguities of emotion. It is a painting of intuition itself, succeeding in the far more difficult and demanding task of capturing a way of feeling.
Uba Owl is one of 14 US artists chosen for the 4th Beijing International Art Biennale, 2010, taking place at the Beijing National Art Museum. She has exhibited widely in galleries and museums and throughout US, Europe and Asia. -Joanna Salska, as Uba Owl

2011-12-30T20:33:00.003-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For January 2012

Exhibit Title "Nothing"

Exhibit Duration: January 4- 28, 2012

Vernissage: January 4, 6PM, Because First Wednesday Is One Day Better Than First Thursday

"Nothing" is oil on canvas paintings by Ellen Picken, landscapes and other compositional subjects of the Kettle Range, 10 paintings roughly the same size ~ 20 x 24". Ms. Picken received her BFA from Eastern Washington University's Alternative Media Printmaking Department, is an Artist Trust GAP grant recipient and is anticipating a 2012 residency at Vermont Studio Center, Johnson VT in April. Exhibit is free. -Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier.

Statement:

“Nothing” is deceptive. I hear sometimes that I live out in the middle of nowhere and there is nothing to do in a town of 800. But this place is full of “something” which has filled the vacuum left by 20,000 prospectors in less than 100 years. You would hardly know they were here. Yet the human presence has not vanished. A gaze upon the woods embeds it with myth, of Eden, Big Bad Wolf, and potential. Most paintings are about observation. I consider my work to be an extension of my interaction with and participatory invention of a rural mountain town. -Ellen Picken

Form/Space Atelier Program For December 2011

2011-11-22T16:31:00.007-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For December 2011

Exhibit Title: Current Projects

Exhibit Duration: December 7-30

Vernissage: December 7, 6PM

Sam Birchman exhibits oil on canvas paintings, well-drafted, with figuration and other imagery in 2011's Current Projects. The raw, ubiquitous portraits taken with Birchman’s iPhone are the inspiration for the compositions of Current Projects. This is the sixth exhibit of Sam Birchman’s work curated by Paul Pauper, dating back to 2007, and his fifth consecutive solo exhibit. Sam’ and his father Fred Birchman recently exhibited as part of a father-son exhibit that also included work by Spike Mafford and Mike Spafford, at Francine Seders Gallery. This organizing principle zeitgeist seems to be haunting Seattle of late, Curator Paul Pauper and son have co-exhibited in the 2010’s Mystic Sons of Morris Graves, 2011’s Gallery 206 and other collaborative exhibits.
About his own work, Sam says “I live and work in downtown Seattle. I received my BFA in Studio Painting from the Evergreen State College in 2004. I am mainly interested in faces and figures. I find that I need to have a living being in my paintings in order for them to feel complete, whether it be a human, an animal, or just a suggestion of one or the other. I prefer my spaces to be somewhat undefined. The setting is less important to me than the interaction between the figures on the canvas. The process of painting itself is what I truly enjoy, from stretching and priming the canvas to applying paint and seeing what happens and how I respond to it.” Sam keeps a studio in the Vain Hair Salon Building.

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2011

2011-10-16T09:58:00.006-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2011

Exhibit Title: Some Songs Have No Words

Exhibit Duration: November 2-December 3, 2011

Some Songs Have No Words is a site-specific installation of multiple paper structures cretaed by Rumi Koshino. During dialogue organizing the exhibit, Ms. Koshino expressed interest in emphasizing the specificity of the water-motif linoleum sited at the lowest level of the vertically stratified Form/Space Atelier; the bottom of the
staircases and the perigee of the multiple gradients present in the space. As in previous sculptural objects created by Ms. Koshino for exhibits elsewhere, Ms. Koshino will cleverly use photographic prints folded, origami-like, to synthesize an object and photograph as one.

Ms Koshino received both her MFA (2010, 3D4M) and her BFA (2008, Ceramics) from the University of Washington School Of Art. This is Ms. Koshino's first solo exhibit at Form/Space Atelier. -Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator

All of my works are self-portraits. My creative process reflects how I live my life, and the product mirrors the accumulation of my cultures, history, thoughts, emotions, and everyday life experiences.

Making art is a way for me to learn about life and to understand the world I live in. I use my intuition to guide me through the creative process, which allows me to enter into unknown and unexpected territory unattached from the fixed material or formal identity an artist might settle in. I take pleasure in the surprises and learning
that takes place from this process.

Honesty is at the center of my art practice. From the place of truthfulness, I hope to create works that go beyond the visual, aesthetic, and intellectual aspects of art and reach the truly indescribable places of our being. -Rumi Koshino

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2011

2011-10-04T14:10:00.002-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2011

Exhibit Title: Back To The Head

Exhibit Duration: October 5-29, 2011

Vernissage: 1st Wednesday, October 5, 6PM

Back To The Head is site-specific installation by Ryan Horvath, the title is a jazz reference indicating the first and last chorus of a composition. This is the first exhibit of Mr. Horvath's as curated by Paul Pauper.
Ryan Horvath is a graduate of the University of Washington (MFA 2004) and the recipient of an Artist Trust WSAC Fellowship. Mr. Horvath's relevant work experience includes assistantship for ceramicist Jun Kaneko, and his current assistantship for Gary Hill. Mr. Horvath's work has exhibited at The Bemis Center, Omaha. -Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier.

Back To The Head is in reference to a term used in jazz and the approach I have taken for this exhibit. In music, the head is the first and last chorus of a tune.

For me, getting a place to show and having the exhibition/

Leaving time and space between to improvise/

The making, the playing, the meat/

Going off, getting out there and letting it out/

Improvisation is a spontaneous act of creating/

An experimental process/

Often a repeating cycle/

Continuous/

Circular/

A place for the inconspicuous to gather/

And share unlikely likenesses/

Where ideas go to manifest/

Gracious for having a place to play/

Whether in the studio/

A gallery/

Or my mind/

I nod/

And we are Back To The Head/

-Ryan Horvath

http://www.behance.net/rushfay

2011-09-16T20:56:00.000-07:00

http://www.behance.net/rushfay Designer RUsh Fay's Behance site. Go see it.

2011-09-02T18:05:00.003-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For September 2011

Exhibit Title: "1 Or 2 Unobtainable Sceneries"

Exhibit Duration: September 14-October 1, 2011

Vernissage: September 14, 6PM

1 Or 2 Unobtainable Sceneries is works on paper, drawings of fantastical scenes and bardo-state musings. 1 Or 2 Unobtainable Sceneries is the second exhibit of Yachin Bonny You as curated by Paul Pauper. You's first Pauper-curated exhibit was 2005's Smith Tower Gallery exhibit. 2011 has seen both You and Burgandy Viscosi's work exhibited at Form/Space Atelier, both artists exhibited at the Smith Tower Gallery, curated by Pauper from 1996-2005. Ms. You received a BFA from the University of Washington School Of Art Printmaking Department in 2005. -Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier.

Hi, my name is YaChin You. Lots of people call me Bonny. I’m a person who likes drawing stuff and sharing the stuff that I draw. Besides drawing, I also like (an unordered list):

My family and friends
Martial Arts
Improv Theater
Yoga
Designing for the web and devices
Lady Gaga
Dancing
Tea
Taiwan

Let’s be friends!

"About 1 Or 2 Unobtainable Sceneries"

This is the project that I’m currently working on. I’m drawing things that we yearn, remember or fear that are unobtainable, for example having my mother live forever, or driving on the highway backwards. A lot of the drawings are inspired from my vivid dreams that tell me very much of what I secretly want or am afraid of. It is sometimes a painful process to face these unobtainable sceneries, embrace them, scrutinize them and draw them down on paper. -Yachin Bonny You

Form/Space Atelier Program For August 2011

2011-08-17T17:32:00.002-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For August 2011

Exhibit Title: Dancing With Chaos

Exhibit Duration: August 18- September 10, 2011
...
Vernissage: August 18, 6PM

"Dancing With Chaos" are Dia De Los Muertos-themed prints by Alisha Baker. Ms. Baker graduated from the University of Washington School of Art, Drawing and Painting Department, in 2009. Ms. Baker was a gallery assistant at Form/Space Atelier during her study at UW. This is the first exhibit of Ms. Baker's work at Form/Space Atelier.
-Paul Kuniholm Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier

The show will feature 7 block prints (4 with hand-painted frames) and 5 paintings. While this is the first time I'll be showing most of the pieces, the series has been in process for the last two years.

This series began in the fall of 2009, when a fellow artist invited me to his house for an art-making day. It was an unusually warm day in October, and dancing skeletons flew from my brush as we got to know each other. That night was our first kiss, and that man has since become my fiancé.

My experience of falling in love has carried with it a great fear. I have grown up with stories of my good grandfather who died too soon. My grandmother never remarried because she had lost “the love of her life.” Facing my own true love, I have had to confront my desire for control over loss.

Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), a festival in Latin countries to honor the deceased, is a beautiful inspiration to me. They practice accepting death as a continuation of life. Each year they observe rituals of remembrance that invite the spirits that have flown to return for a visit.

I see how my relationship with death and loss affects my relationship to life and love. Trying to control only paralyzes life, so there is nothing left to do but let go and invite it to dance.

This show is a collection of vibrant, folk inspired paintings with acrylic on wood as well as linocut (linoleum block prints) on paper. Block-printing was used in Mexico during the Revolution, and is a powerful means to proliferate a narrative graphically. The technique appeals to me in its potential for variety, re-iteration and collaboration with each design. It has provided a means for me to open up my art process to my partner, sharing our ideas and working together to print them.

Alisha Baker was born in Northern California and grew up in Washington, currently residing in North Seattle. She has been showing and selling her work locally for the last nine years. She holds a degree in Graphic Design and Illustration from Seattle Central Community College (2000) and a BFA degree in drawing and painting from the University of Washington, where she graduated Cum Laude in 2009. She has taken additional courses at the Kirkland Arts Center and Gage Academy of Fine Arts. -Alisha Baker

2011-06-27T19:42:00.003-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For July 2011

Exhibit Title: (Con)Spire To Perfection

Exhibit Duration: July 2-August 4, 2011

!CAUTION! THIS EXHIBIT
IS CO-LOCATED AT ART NOT TERMINAL !

Opening Reception: July 2, 7-10PM at ART NOT TERMINAL 2045 Westlake Avenue

" (Con)Spire To Perfection " is a co-located exhibit of Greg Boudreau's " Spire " series, elements and aspects originally exhibited in November, 2008 at Form/Space Atelier.
Whereas the original exhibit festooned over 300 hand-cut hand-stenciled paintings on found wood (Boudreau's process) in Form/Space Atelier's unusually configured exhibit space, plus a site-specific intervention reminiscent of a construction-site crane, the updated retrospective " (Con) Spire To Perfection " turns the life-size gallery into a scale model, and situates the exhibit in another gallery across the city at Art Not Terminal gallery, 2045 Westlake Avenue.
The original klunky crow stencils are replaced with flimsy, gossamer archival inkjet prints of Boudreau's crows on parchment, and the scale of the prints is miniaturized to fit the scale model.
The scale model was constructed for an exhibit proposal for " Split Level ", by Paula Rebsom. August 2010's Split Level, Rebsom's most recent intervention at Form/Space Atelier, included a wall built down the center of the gallery, and was constructed in such a way as to allow Rebsom to return the 2x4's used to make the wall, back to Home Depot unscathed, for a full refund, a cost saving with integral design ingenuity. Pauper learned the value of reusing, making use of Rebsom's exhibit proposal model for " (Con) Spire To Perfection " .

The Art Not Terminal location will exhibit the " Spire series " prints in miniature, approximately 2 inches square, in the scale model. Hours are Mon-Sat 11:00 am - 6:00 pm, Sun. 12:00 p.m. - 5:00pm .

The Form/Space Atelier location will exhibit slightly larger prints, approximately 8x10 inches, of the Spire series, viewable through the gallery doors from the street-level entrance on 1st Avenue, round-the-clock.

http://twitpic.com/5b9r40

2011-06-26T21:48:00.002-07:00

http://twitpic.com/5b9r40 More images from the blockbuster Sketchbook Project continue to filter through to our delighted awareness. Thank you archiving participants of The Sketchbook Project and generous supporters of Form/Space Atelier. We HEART your photographs. -Gallery Team.

Sketchbook Project Addendum

2011-06-17T16:02:00.015-07:00

We received today from Corbett, OR a package that enhances the institutional memory of The Sketchbook Project. Photographs and a rather scathing criticism of the exhibit. We welcome strong wording, in this manner do we aspire to improve our programming, be it positive, or in this case mostly negative. The gallery team believes in the process of crit. In total, the photographs of the exhibit as delivered concomitantly with the essay represented, Assistant Curator Ms. Ohashi and I deduced, a most objective combination of qualitative resources. Thanks to you, our not always adoring public. We listen and respond as we see most beneficial. Photo Credit: Bobbie Hartung Bryan

UPDATE: Sketchbook Project continues it's meteoric rise through the cultural consciousness of the modern world, a post on Oprah's blog today by Amy Shear here Thank you Ms. Shear and Oprah on behalf of Sketchbook Project and Arthouse Co-op!

2011-06-14T11:39:00.001-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For June 2011

Exhibit Title: 1 Of The Finest

Exhibit Duration: June 16-July 10, 2011

Vernissage: June 16, 6PM

"1 Of The Finest" is the second solo exhibit of Burgandy Viscosi's acrylic paintings at Form/Space Atelier, her third exhibit overall, as curated by Paul Kuniholm Pauper. Ms. Viscosi is one of the few artists that has exhibited at three different venues associated with the curation of Paul Kuniholm Pauper; The Smith Tower gallery, the original 1907 2nd Avenue site of Form/Space Atelier, and the current site at 2407 1st Avenue. Ms. Viscosi displays elements of a visionary style, though her draftpersonship is consistently of the highest quality. Those familiar with the curation of Paul Kuniholm Pauper recognize the drafting skill of Ms. Viscosi as an aspect of her work which absolutely cements her position in the catalogue of artists being curated by Mr. Pauper. Ms. Viscosi is also currently artist-in-residence in a hostel near Form/Space Atelier where she is executing a mural commission.

Form/Space Atelier Program For May 2011

2011-05-15T12:03:00.001-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For May 2011

Exhibit Title(s): Under Seattle's Sky and The Sketchbook Project

Show Duration: May 19-June 9 (Under Seattle's Sky), June 10-11-12
(Sketchbook Project)

Opening Reception: May 19, 6PM (Iriana Shiyan)

Hours are, as usual, 12-4PM wed, thu, fri and sat. Both exhibits are free.

"'Under Seattle's Sky' is oil on canvas paintings by Iriana
Shiyan. This is Ms. Shiyan's first solo exhibit at Form/Space
Atelier. Ms. Shiyan's paintings are landscapes of the Northwest using
a fantastical technique and bright springtime colors. Ms. Shiyan was
born in Belarus, in Eastern Europe and grew up close to the capital
Minsk. Ms. Shiyan received her bachelor's and master's degrees in
economics and financial analysis from Envila University in Minsk. Ms.
Shiyan later completed a two-year certificate program at the art school,
becoming a certified art educator in painting and drawing.
'The Sketchbook Project' is the touring exhibit developed by Art
House Co-op, a Brooklyn, NY-based bookarts manufacturer and retailer.
"The Sketchbook Project" is a NCS exhibit based on the postal show
theme, having mailed about 30,000 sketchbooks to artists. The touring
exhibit counts over 10,000 completed sketchbooks. Other exhibit sites
include Brooklyn Art Library, Austin Museum of Art and Hillyer Art
Space, Washington, DC." -Paul Pauper, Curator.

"We all have our daily and monthly life patterns and routings. We take the same route to work, shop in the same store and love that restaurant on the corner. You get even deeper in to those tight self-imprisoning circles when Seattle’s sky cries for months. You drink more coffee and buy a happy light for your desk. Then if you escape is to Maui is not an option you download a happy photo of tropical paradise and wait for the spring.

May comes and some friend out of the state come to visit your Washington land. You take them to the Pike Market. Walking unexpectedly bright streets with a smell of coffee and cinnamon you catch yourself staring at the blue water and mountain range and suddenly remembering where you live and why you live here.

The first painting for “Under Seattle’s sky” began it’s life two weeks before Christmas when the water behind my window covered the sky, the earth, my house and myself. I was looking through the window and asking myself “How can I make my imagination stronger - see the world like I did when I was five years old, but with today’s experience and mixed up with some balanced fun?” In childhood we all have an amazing imagination; colors are bright, we discover everything for the first time, our excitement has no borders. I wanted to wake up this child in myself and bring new vision, a new version of Seattle to people who love it. That is how this series came to life. Seattle as a happy dreamscape where lights make your soul dance and skies take you back to your childhood. Streets are full imagination and excitement. New perspectives, fresh powerful colors and energy brings an image of an old Seattle to a new life." -Iriana Shiyan

Aaron Asis Designs

2011-04-29T19:58:00.002-07:00

Aaron at As Is Designs has been a consistent visitor to the gallery in 2011, he has also placed Form/Space Atelier prominently on his very well-constructed website. Aaron has an exhibit of his work at Spore Architecture on view until May 2011. Thank you and congratulations, Aaron.

Form/Space Atelier Flashmobbed By Barnstorm At Seasonal Sightings Vernissage

2011-04-22T15:25:00.003-07:00

Form/Space Atelier was delightfully ambushed during the vernissage for Seasonal Sightings, this month's exhibit, by a surrealist foursome promoting Shunpike's newest performative, Barnstorm.
Captained by Flavorwire's newly-minted Deputy Editor Bond Huberman, the grainy video almost shows the Magritte-inspired attire adorning the Barnstorm adherents.
Congratulations, Bond and Barnstorm, et al.

Seasonal Sightings by Kristen Elsbeth Dallum April 21-May 15, 2011

2011-04-20T23:33:00.001-07:00

Seasonal Sightings
April 21-May 15, 2011
Vernissage: April 21, 6PM

"Seasonal Sightings" are several landscape paintings by Kristen Elsbeth Dallum, acrylic on paper. This exhibit is the third consecutive solo exhibit by Ms. Dallum at Form/Space Atelier. Ms. Dallum's exhibit history at Form/Space Atelier has been distinguished by her consistent adherence to visually communicating the landscape; her two previous exhibits 2009's "Postc...ards From Footsteps: Explorations of Unique and Universal" and 2010's "54th Statehood Exposition" have been black and white photographs of the natural environment. Ms. Dallum is a graduate of the University of Washington School of Art, Interdisciplinary Visual Arts Department. -Paul Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier.

"The cherry blossoms are already making an appearance here on Orcas Isle - I dare say Spring is making an early appearance this year, and that is a joy in itself. The extended daylight hours don't hurt either!

Attached you will find three images from my recent works - this winter has been a highly productive one for me, art-making wise, and I've got about 7 paintings in the works at the moment. I even found a great deal on some beautiful wood frames that I think will work nicely. They are all 11x14.

Each piece is composed of acrylic and pigment, on BFK Rives paper. The collection has been a meditation on environment: exploring naturally occurring elements and human interventions, and I have been particularly drawn to landscape silhouettes, rendering a sense of place (especially in the light of dusk and dawn)."- Kristen Elsbeth Dallum.

A Feminist Eclat 5

2011-04-20T23:24:00.003-07:00

Current Exhibition
Show Title: A Feminist Eclat: Art and Artifacts From The Office Of Gloria Steinem
Show Duration: March 17-April 17, 2011
Vernissage: March 17, 6PM

A Feminist Eclat:... is the fifth installment of Form/Space Atelier's feminist-themed programming which have showcased feminist artists such as 2010's exhibit by Juliette Fretté and 2008's lecture by Margie Livingston.

As a gallery exhibit, 2011's iteration focuses on three types of museology, fine art (prints), crafts (screenprinted costumes) and historical artifacts (letters from Ms. Steinem to Jesse Jackson, Sr., and other documents).

The exhibit consists of objects gifted to Form/Space Atelier by the office of Gloria Steinem.

"For the four or five years surrounding the birth of Ms., I was traveling and speaking as a team with a black feminist partner: first Dorothy Pitman Hughes, a child-care pioneer, then lawyer Florynce Kennedy, and finally activist Margaret Sloan. By speaking together at hundreds of public meetings, we hoped to widen a public image of the women's movement created largely by its first homegrown media event, The Feminine Mystique.... Despite the many early reformist virtues of The Feminine Mystique, it had managed to appear at the height of the civil rights movement with almost no reference to black women or other women of color. It was most relevant to the problems of the white well-educated suburban homemakers who were standing by their kitchen sinks justifiably wondering if there weren't 'more to life than this.' As a result, white-middle-class movement had become the catch phrase of journalists describing feminism in the United States..., and divisions among women were still deep."
-Gloria Steinem, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions (1983), pp. 5-6

Extent Garners Positive Criticism From Art Writers

2011-03-14T19:36:00.004-07:00

We were somewhat surprised by the amount of attention EXTENT recieved from the local and national press, though Beili Liu had won us over at hello.
Local art writers Poorworm and The Monarch Review
and national art criticism publications Daily Candy and Visual Art Source were unanimously critically favorable to EXTENT.

Beili Liu At Form/Space Atelier Reviewed By Erin Shafkind

2011-02-28T14:02:00.003-08:00

This excellent review touches on a buddhist tradition of entering the temple on one's left foot, mindful of the awkwardness of the outside world. Many thanks to Erin Shafkind for her poignant insights and eloquent descriptions.

Domicile Performative

2011-02-28T13:57:00.002-08:00

Domicile is the current performative cycle presented by Project; Group: Collective . Form/Space Atelier archival background of this artist found here.

Form/Space Atelier Blueprints

2011-01-25T16:13:00.002-08:00

Blueprints Of Form/Space Atelier by Sarah Hadley, UW 3D4M

2011-01-25T16:11:00.003-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2011

2011-01-22T17:24:00.005-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2011

Show Title: Extent

Show Duration: February 20-March 13, 2011

Beili Liu Solo Exhibitions

2011 Beili Liu Solo Exhibition, Hå gamle prestegard, Norwegian National Art and Culture Center, Norway (forthcoming)
Solo Exhibition, Form/Space Atelier, Seattle (forthcoming)
Beili Liu Solo Exhibition, Women and Their Work Gallery, Austin TX (forthcoming)
Beili Liu Solo Exhibition, Robert Hillestad Textiles Gallery, University of Nebraska, Lincoln (forthcoming)
2010 Beili Liu: Fray, Asia Unlimited Gallery, Berlin, Germany
Beili Liu: half empty.half full, Site-Specific Installations, Nordisk Kunst Platform Gallery, Brusand, Norway
One, Another, Buffalo Arts Studio, Buffalo, New York
2009 Mapping Memories, Beili Liu and Takafumi Ide, (two person exhibition), Castle Gallery, The College of New Rochelle, NY
In Between, Elisabeth De Brabant Art Center, Shanghai, China
Bound, d berman Gallery, Austin TX
Beili Liu: Miasma, Three Walls Gallery, Blue Star Contemporary Art Center, San Antonio, TX
Beili Liu: Three Thousand Troubled Threads, Tarryn Teresa Gallery, Los Angeles
2008 LURE, Chinese Culture Center of San Francisco
Beili Liu Solo exhibition—LURE, Urban Institute of Contemporary Art, Grand Rapids, Michigan
2007 Ashen, Video Installation and Dance Performance, Beili Liu & Nightfire Dance Theater, Vitosha Guest Haus, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2006 Recall (shadow), Gallery One, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Recall (barn), A site-specific installation, Djerassi Foundation, Woodside, California
Aline, Ann Arbor Art Center, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2005 Breadth, A site-specific installation, Lloyd Hall Scholars Program, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2004 The little House Stands on the Prairie, A site-specific installation, Art Farm, Nebraska
Resurrection, Matrix Gallery, in collaboration with Mark Nelson, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2003 In-prints—Recent 2-D work by Beili Liu, Center for the Education of Women, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Fixtures, in collaboration with Kendall Babl, The Institute for the Humanities, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2002 Wayfinding, Michigan Guild Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Solid State, Warren Robbins Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

Selected Group Exhibitions
2010 Art Prize Exhibition, Urban Institute of Contemporary Art, Grand Rapids, MI
Nature/Culture, Castle Gallery, New Rochelle, NY
5x7, Art House at Jones Center, Austin TX
Unraveling Tradition, 516 ARTS, Albuquerque, NM 87102
Mind, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
By A Thread, San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art
2010 People’s Gallery Exhibition, Austin City Hall, Texas
2009 IT IS BEAUTIFUL HERE, Granary Gallery, Fiskars, Finland
IF/ELSE, Detroit Industrial Project, Detroit, MI
2009 People’s Gallery Exhibition, Austin City Hall, Texas
A Strange Land, Creative Research Lab, Austin, TX
The Storm Show, Work.Ann Arbor Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI
2008 East Austin Studio Tour, Creative Research Lab, Austin, TX
Fall Faculty Exhibition, Creative Research Lab, University of Texas, Austin
San Francisco International Arts Festival
11th Annual United States of Asian America Festival, Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center,
San Francisco
Ying-Inspired by Chinese art ad History, Museum of Art and History, Santa Cruz, California
Aging with Attitude, Slusser Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2007 Earth World, Bu-Con, Russell Industrial Center, Detroit
Turning Point, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Transparent, Granary Gallery, Onoma foundation of Finland, Fiskars, Finland
in.stal.la.tion, Anton Art Center, Mount Clements, Michigan
"Ay, madam, it is common." Detroit Industrial Projects
10th International Exhibition, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
75th Anniversary All-Media Exhibition, Detroit Artist Market
Water Media +, curated by Maria Ruggiero, Riverside Art Center, Ypsilanti, Michigan
2006 Open House—Experiments with Material and Process, Djerassi Foundation, Woodside, California
12+12, Washington Street Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
5th Lessedra World Art Print Annual, Lessedra Gallery & Contemporary Art Projects, Bulgaria
Minimal and Maximum, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Just a squirrel, trying to find a nut, Forum Gallery, Cranbrook Academy of Art
Adam and Eve, Holland Arts Council, Michigan, Creative Arts Center, Pontiac, Michigan, Riverside Arts Center, Ypsilanti, Michigan
2005 Collaborators’ 2, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
The Nature of Paper, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago
Plexus, 4731 Gallery, Detroit
Interform, 212 Miller Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2004 Art Harvest, Art Farm, Marquette, Nebraska
42nd Annual Ann Arbor Film Festival installations, Historical Michigan Theater, Ann Arbor
2003 Sound, Image, Story, Media Union Art Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
41st Annual Ann Arbor Film Festival installations, Historical Michigan Theater, Ann Arbor
MFA Thesis: Above, Below, J. P. Slusser Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2002 A Room of Your Own, Michigan Guild Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Works in Progress: Spiral, J. P. Slusser Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Earplay, Media Union, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Individual’s Culture, Warren Robbins Gallery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2001 Revisioning the Great Lakes, Media Union Art Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Air Bubble (two person show), 1010 Gallery, Knoxville, Tennessee
54th Annual Competition Award Exhibition, Ewing Gallery, Knoxville, Tennessee

Artist Residency Fellowship

2009 Fundación Valparaíso, Spain
2007 Onoma Foundation Fiskars Artist Residency, Finland
2006 Djerassi Foundation, California
2005 Visiting studio artist, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2004 Art Farm Artist residency, Nebraska

Awards and Prizes
2010 3rd Place, ArtPRIZE 2010, Grand Rapids, MI
Austin Critics Table Awards—Outstanding Solo Exhibition, Bound, D Berman Gallery
Summer Research Stipend, College of Fine Arts, University of Texas, Austin
Summer Research Grant, Center for Asian American Studies, University of Texas, Austin
2009 Artist of the Year (3D) Award, Sponsored by the Austin Museum of Art and Austin Visual Arts Association
Summer Research Assignment Grant, University of Texas, Austin
Special Project Grant, University of Texas, Austin
Faculty Research Travel Grant, University of Texas, Austin
2008 Ronald Colins Distinguished Faculty Award for Creative Activity, Eastern Michigan University
Josephine Nevins Keal Fellowship, Eastern Michigan University
2007 Artistic Recognition Award, Eastern Michigan University
World College Travel Grant
Faculty Research Fellowship SSM Award, Eastern Michigan University
Best of Show—75th Anniversary All-Media Exhibition, Detroit Artist Market
Josephine Nevins Keal Fellowship, Eastern Michigan University
2006 Dean’s Travel Award, College of Art and Science, Eastern Michigan University
Efellows Grant, Eastern Michigan University
Josephine Nevins Keal Fellowship, Eastern Michigan University
2005 Provost’s New Faculty Award, Eastern Michigan University
Graduate School Research Support Award, Eastern Michigan University
2002 Barbour Scholarship, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Rackham Discretionary Funds Award—Europe Research Travel, Rackham Graduate School, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Rackham Discretionary Funds Award—New York Research Travel, Rackham Graduate School, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Elsie Choy Lee Scholarship, Center for the Education of Women, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
2001 Best of Show Award and Fine Art Purchase Award
54th Annual School of Art Competition, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
2000 First Prize, 2-D Exhibition Competition, Union Center, University of Tennessee, Knoxvill

Selected Reviews
2010 "Inn i kunstnen"/In Side the Art, Sigrun Hodne, 06.09.2010, Stavanger Aftenblad, Norway
From Berlin to Brusand, John Pertter Nordbo, 05.14.2010, Jærbladet, Norway
"Threads" at ICA San Jose tugs at a loose idea, Maureen Davidson, 04.06.2010, KUSP 88.9 Central Coast Public Radio
Threads Bared in SoFA at MACLA and ICA, Jane Prybyz, 04.06.2010, ArtShrift San Jose
‘Ties That Bind, Colin Dabkowski, 01.22.2010, The Buffalo News
Buffalo Arts Studio Review: Beili Liu and Tom Hughes, Sandra Williams Gordon, 01.26.2010, Buffalo Rising
2009 Beili Liu at D Berman Gallery, Lauren Adams, 10.09.09, …Might be Good, Austin TX
East is bound to West in artist's work, Jeanne Claire van Ryzin, 09.27.09, Austin American Statesman
Interview: Beili Liu Exhibition, In Between, Shanghai TV program "City Beat” ICS
Spirits Summoned for artist’s abstract discourse, Zhang Kun, 08.22.09, China Daily
Dialog, conversation with Beili Liu, Elisabeth de Brabant, Nine Dragon magazine, Shanghai, China
The Fun is in the Making, Charles, iLOOK Monitor, Shanghai, China
What's On... Art, In Between: Solo Exhibition of Beili Liu, 08.15.09 Shanghai online, China
In Between: Beili Liu Solo Exhibitionr, 08.09, Yishu, Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, China
Vackra vardagliga a ting med sting, 05.09.09, HBL Hufvudstadsbladet, Finland
Fran skimrande siden till fron spräk for telefoner, 05.09.09 Västra Nyland, Finland
Beili Liu/Tarryn Teresa Gallery, Janet Koplos, 04. 09 Art in America
Beili Liu at Three Walls Gallery, Sarah Fisch, San Antonio Current, Curblog, San Antonio, TX
Beili Liu, Three Walls Gallery, San Antonio, Wendy Atwell, ... Might Be Bood, Austin, TX
The Wafting Bouquet of Artistic License, Sandra Vista, 02.09, ArtSlant Los Angeles
Three Thousand Troubled Threads, Beili Liu, Los Angles, Steven Irvin, 02.03.09, Buzzine, Los Angeles
Tarryn Teresa Gallery Exhibition—Beili Liu, 02. 09, Citizen LA, Los Angeles
'A Strange Land' is a changing land, Robert Faires, 01.30.09, The Austin Chronicle, Texas
The human impact on our 'Strange Land', Francisco Marin, 01.29.09, The Daily Texan, Austin, Texas
2008 Beili Liu Lures Audience with Red String, Traci Vogel, 05.14.08, San Francisco Weekly
Legend made visible, Janos Gereben, 05.20.2008, The Examiner, San Francisco
San Francisco International Arts Festival, KangCheng Ge, 05.04.2008, International Daily News
LURE: Installation Art by Beili Liu, DeWitt Cheng, 05.18.08, ArtSlant San Francisco
Change Dynasty, Maureen Davidson, 04.23.08, Metro Santa Cruz, California
Art: Exploring life's fragility, threads linking lovers, Molly Kimelman, 04.20.08, The Grand Rapids Press
Exhibit Opening UICA, Paul Kraus, 04.01.08, Revue, Grand Rapids, Michigan
Great Inspirations, Christa Martin, 03.12.08, Good Times Santa Cruz, California
2007 Fiskarsin ruukin kesänäyttelyt ovat avoinna syyskuun loppuun, 05.17.07, Turun Sanomat, Finland
Läpi pintojen ja rakenteiden, 05.25.07, Helsingin Sanomat, Helsinki, Finland
A master of water,William Zilke, 01.18.07, Heritage Newspapers, Ypsilanti, Michigan
2006 On Display—Liu at WCC, John Carlos Cantu, 10.08.06, Ann Arbor News
Beili Liu Exhibits at GalleryOne, Katherine Mohammed, 09.11.06, The Voice, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Exhibit Compares and Contrasts, John Carlos Cantu, 07.16.06, Ann Arbor News
Big Picture Minimalism at Gallery Project, John Carlos Cantu, 04.09.06, Ann Arbor News
'Adam and Eve' theme unites varied works, John Carlos Cantu, 01.22.06, Ann Arbor News
Stage & Canvas, Robert del Valle, 01.18.06, Real Detroit Weekly
Hang On, Beili Liu suspends our pleasure, Nick Sousanis, 01.18.06, Detroit Metro Times
Beili Liu @ Ann Arbor Art Project, thedetroitor.com (images)
Mixed-Media Marvels, John Carlos Cantu, 01.14.06, Ann Arbor News
2005 Wall of bread: A tasty art form, Joanne Nesbit, 09.08.05, The University Record, University of Michigan
“Breadth” at U-M, Susan Selasky, 09.27.05, Detroit Free Press
Plexus @ 4731, Nick Sousanis, 08.02.05, The Detroiter
Rebuilding Memories in Adobe Brick, Janet Miller, 03.20.05, Ann Arbor News
Art teacher connects to her roots, 03.13.05, AP Daily News/Asian American Village
04.06.05, The Detroit News, 04.10.05 Asian Correspondence—the World News Network
2004 Weekend’s Art Harvest, MikeBockoven, 09.01.04, The Independent, Grand Island, Nebraska
A Path to Her Past, Chinese artist building a replica of her parent’s home at Art Farm, Krystal Overmyer
08.01.04, The Independent, Grand Island, Nebraska
Artist building replica of rural Chinese home, 08.08.04, World Herald, Omaha, NE
Artist builds Chinese-style hut, 08.08.04, Lincoln Journal Star, Lincoln, Nebraska
Chinese voice (interview), Amy Seetoo, Chinese Voice, WSDF Radio, 01/02/04
2003 Inventive work involve shifting physical elements, John Carlos Cantu, 11.23.03, Ann Arbor News
2002 Wayfinding through space and time, John Carlos Cantu, 11.23.03, Ann Arbor News

Publications
2010 Methodology, Teaching of Visual Art and Design in the U.S.A., Author of chapter: 3D Foundations.
Edited by Shun YanYan. Higher Education Press, China
Unraveling Tradition, Exhibition catalog, 516 ARTS, Albuquerque, NM
2009 Mapping Memories, Beili Liu and Takafumi Ide, Exhibition catalog, Castle Gallery, The College of New Rochelle, NY
In Between, Exhibition Catalog, Elisabeth De Brabant Art Center, Shanghai, China
Beili Liu Artwork, Ffffound!, 01.27.09
2008 Beili Liu: Mining the material, Exhibition catalog, Chinese Culture Center of San Francisco
Red Thread, a video documentary, Jim Choi and Chihiro Wimbush, produced by Chinese Culture Foundation of San Francisco
The making of Lure, a video documentary, Jim Choi and Chihiro Wimbush, produced by Chinese Culture Foundation of San Francisco
2007 Transparent, Exhibition catalog, Granary Gallery, Fiskars, Finland
2006 Installation Series, Exhibition catalog, GalleryOne, WCC, Ann Arbor, MI
Breadth, One Small Project, onesmallproject.com by Wes Janz
Lessedra World Art Print Annual 2006, Lessedra Gallery & Contemporary Art Projects, Bulgaria
2005 The Little House Stands on the Prairie, Beili Liu describes a site-specific installation/sculpture project in Nebraska, USA, Ceramics Art and Perception (Technical), Australia, issue 21, November, 05

Lectures

2010 Gallery talk, 516 ARTS, Albuquerque, NM Panel Discussions,
The Mona Lisa Project, Women and Their Work Gallery, Austin, TX2009
Mining the Materials: Time and Process, Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas at Austin
Bound, Gallery Talk, d berman Gallery, Austin TX
Gallery Talk, Elisabeth De Brabant Art Center, Shanghai, China
A Strange Land Panel Discussion, Creative Research Lab, Austin, Texas
2008 LURE, Artist lecture, Chinese Culture Foundation, San Francisco
Artist Lecture, Santa Cruz Public Library, California
Artist Lecture, University of Texas, Austin
Artist Lecture, Wayne State University
2007 Artist-in-Residence lecture, Fiskars Artist Residency, Finland
Art and Art Education in America—to Chinese art students, Jilin University, China
Artist lecture, Garden City Fine Arts Association, Garden City, Michigan
2006 Gallery talk, presentation, and artist lecture, GalleryOne, WCC, Michigan
Resident artist lecture, Djerassi Foundation, Woodside, California
Curators’ Talk, Minimal Maximum Exhibition, Gallery Project, Ann Arbor, Michigan
2005 Visiting artist lecture, LHSP, Rackham, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Artist Lecture, Cleveland Institute of Art, Ohio
Relating to contemporary Chinese art, Eastern Michigan University
2004 Time based installations, Art Farm, Marquette, Nebraska
2003 Interchange: Materials and Process, The Institute for the Humanities, University of Michigan
Fixtures artist talk, Undergraduate Research Opportunity Group, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

Teaching Experience
2008-present Assistant Professor, College of Fine Arts, University of Texas, Austin
2005-2008 Assistant professor, Department of Art, Eastern Michigan University
2003-2005 Visiting artist, Lloyd Hall Scholars Program, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Adjunct assistant professor, School of Art and Design, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Lecturer, Washtenaw Community College

Degrees
2003 University of Michigan, Ann Arbor MFA Mixed Media
2001 University of Tennessee, Knoxville BA, Magna Cum Laude Graphic Design
1994 Shenzhen University, China Assoc. BA Chinese Literature and Communication

BETWEEN SILENCE-PAINTINGS BY JOHN MONSON-FORM/SPACE ATELIER

2010-12-30T14:45:00.009-08:00

John Monson, Bed VII, 2010

BETWEEN SILENCE-PAINTINGS BY JOHN MONSON-FORM/SPACE ATELIER
JANUARY 20 THROUGH FEBRUARY 13, 2011-
VERNISSAGE 1/20/2011 6PM

Between Silence is John Monson’s second solo show at Form/Space Atelier and his third overall. Monson keeps a studio in picturesque Fall City. His work for this exhibit moves from the seascapes of 2010’s The Water Poet to the hardscapes of the most domestic of interiors. -Paul Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier.

While perhaps suggesting emotional content beyond the work itself, the subject matter of this show is also a formal technique that provides a means of visually activating the surface of the paintings. Similar to the waves in my water series, the fabric folds provide a way to modulate and divide the canvas while creating a relatively shallow depth of space. Keeping the space shallow allows the viewer to quickly shift attention between the content of the forms and the fact of the paint on the surface. The black voids are interesting to me in that they can either visually dominate (suggesting ideas about silence or infinity), or disappear completely. My hope is that the viewer will have an emotional response to each painting and to the show as a whole, but it is not my place to prescribe what those emotions should be. What most interests me right now is the movement of attention within, between and beyond content, ideas, and silence.

I live and work near Seattle, Washington. I received my BFA from Western Washington University. Awards include top honors in ten juried art competitions. I draw heavily upon natural, organic forms, and move easily between realism and abstraction. I like to establish a dialog between carefully worked realism and impulsive, organic forms. This broad and inclusive integration of diverse styles reveals my belief that art plays a role in creating our worldview. Hopefully my work reflects a view that is not exclusive and fragmented, but rather more complete, more tolerant and integrating. -John Monson

Form/Space Atelier Program For December 2010

2010-12-03T17:53:00.009-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For December 2010

Exhibit Title: New Stuff

Exhibit Duration: December 16, 2010-January 16, 2010

Vernissage: 6PM December 16, 2010

Holiday Hours: Closed Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. Wed-Sat 12-4PM and Sundays Message 206-349-2509 For Personalized Viewing.

Sam Birchman exhibits oil on canvas paintings, well-drafted, with
figuration and other imagery in 2010's "New Stuff". Sam Birchman has been integrating sculptural elements in his paintings for at least two years. This is the fifth exhibit of Sam Birchman’s work curated by Paul Pauper, dating back to 2007. Sam Birchman returned to Seattle after spending months in New York City recently. About his own work, Sam says “I live and work in downtown Seattle. I received my BFA in Studio Painting from the Evergreen State College in 2004. I am mainly interested in faces and figures. I find that I need to have a living being in my paintings in order for them to feel complete, whether it be a human, an animal, or just a suggestion of one or the other. I prefer my spaces to be somewhat undefined. The setting is less important to me than the interaction between the figures on the canvas. The process of painting itself is what I truly enjoy, from stretching and priming the canvas to applying paint and seeing what happens and how I respond to it.” Sam keeps a studio in the Vain Hair Salon Building, along with Form/Space Atelier-exhibited artist Michael Lane and others. Sam’s father is artist Fred Birchman, represented by Francine Seders.

Exhibitions
October–November 2009
Wright Exhibition Space (Group Show), Seattle, WA
May 2009
Café Verite, Seattle, WA
March 2008
26 Brix, Seattle, WA
December 2007
Angle Gallery, Seattle, WA
July 2007
Form/Space Atelier, Seattle, WA
June 2007
Form/Space Atelier (Group Show), Seattle, WA
January 2007
Caffeine Café, Seattle, WA
July 2006
JAS Cabinet Shop, Seattle, WA
April 2005
Le Voyeur (Group Show), Olympia, WA
May 2004
The Evergreen State College Gallery 4 (Senior Thesis), Olympia, WA

Paul Pauper, Curator
Form/Space Atelier
2407 1st Avenue
Seattle, WA 98121-1311
206-208-9843

Form/Space Atelier
Presents Vernissage Each
Third Thursday

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2010

2010-11-15T11:06:00.005-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2010

Exhibit Titile: Connecting Knots

Exhibit Duration: November 18-December 12, 2010

Vernissage: November 18, 6PM

"Connecting Knots is non-objective landscapes, wrought in 2D and sculptural mixed-media objects, created by Megan M. Hosch-Schmitt. Connecting Knots is a solo exhibit, the first by Ms. Hosch-Schmitt at Form/Space Atelier. Ms. Hosch-Schmitt is an art educator at both The Childrens Museum of Seattle and the Seattle Country Day School. Ms. Hosch-Schmitt received both her MFA and BFA in Art Education from Nothern Iowa University." -Paul Pauper, Curator, Form/Space Atelier

Exhibit Description:

"Connecting Knots is a mixed media exploration of a Midwest artist's journey to discover 'self' and a sense of home in Seattle's urban landscape.

In this visual journey, the artwork moves through a structure of patterns and knots which contain links to the natural world, decorative arts and human life. Within this structure is another connecting layer of images that symbolize personal and universal struggles faced along the way. For example, the audience may find an antlered doe laboring over issues in gender equality, a bird fleeting to or from feminine stereotypes, and a tree removed from the forest to
experience autonomy.

In the exhibition, Connecting Knots, it is undeniably the struggles of the artist's passage that led to the shaping of the knots and patterns to form. However, the artistic process of retelling the story is what allowed for the knots to heal and unwind and the patterns to break, giving this exhibition its true context and visual interest." -Megan M. Hosch-Schmitt

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2010

2010-10-10T21:11:00.004-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2010

Exhibit Title: Steel: A Symphony of Industry

Exhibit Duration: October 21-November 13, 2010
...
Opening Reception: October 21, 6PM

Steel: A Symphony Of Industry is photographer Dan Hawkins fourth solo exhibit and his fifth overall at Form/Space Atelier. The exhibit consists of photographs, sculpture and sound, and video installation.

Hawkins narrative for Steel: A Symphony of Industry:

In 2008 I began traveling to the rusting furnaces of the Bethlehem Steel Mill in Bethlehem, PA. This is a manufacturing organization whose origins reach back to the mid 19th century. The plant is oriented around a series of four blast furnaces towering over the city at a height of 285ft each. This industrial relic tells a story of a different time and I felt compelled to document these remains as part of an attempt to convey the sense of transition and history that was embedded within its walls. After rising to become one of the industrial giants of the US the plant closed its doors forever in 1995. Visiting the site, it came as a great surprise for me to discover that the grounds on which the steel works had once forged the girders that were used to support structures such as the Golden Gate Bridge, were now being cleared for the construction of a new enterprise: The Sands Casino Resort - Bethlehem. I am endlessly fascinated by these demonstrations of our collective will.
This exhibit will consist of a series of photographs taken at the site over the last two years along with a sculptural sound piece and a video work that was created using archival footage for which a new score has been composed. In my work I attempt to speak to the hidden hand that enacts the grand course of our culture and society. It seems that these narratives sometimes do not match the views we hold of ourselves. This leaves us with an interesting question: Who then is doing this? It is my hope to address this question by interpreting the landscapes and enterprises we have enacted as evidence of this deeper impetus.

Kellie Patricia Lynch Performative Happening October 15,6PM

2010-09-30T18:35:00.001-07:00

*Domicile* is the current performance cycle presented by Project; Group: Collective. It will take place over the course of five days. Each performance is sufficient in it's self and also part of the whole. The focus of Domicile is the materializing patterns in everyday life to extract the beauty and purpose of our collective motions in modern humanity. The performance on October 15th at Form/Space Atelier is the second to last ...installment of Domicile.

Domecile marks the second performative exhibition of artist Kellie Patricia Lynch at Seattle gallery Form/Space Atelier. Lynch's first exhibit, Dinner For One, occurred in November 2008 in a parking lot adjacent to Form/Space Atelier. Lynch uttered the rosary for about two hours on the rough asphalt, she had rendered poetic text on her back, it was cold, sad and pure.

http://formspaceatelier.blogspot.com/2008/11/kellie-patricia-lynch-dinner-for-one-at.html

*Project; Group: Collective* is a group of progressive multifaceted artists that align their similar interests sporadically to create tangible evidence of gedanken experiments within the Art:Life conversation.

Artists for Fall 2010:
Spencer Philip, actor/visual artist
Nick Carlson, actor/musical engineer
Kellie Patricia Lynch, dancer/publicity
Shanessey Scott, double bassist

Full Domicile schedule:
Tuesday, October 12th - Bike So Good, Georgetown 8pm
Wednesday, October 13th - the intersection of
Spokane St. and Airport Way 7pm
Thursday, October 14th - TBA
Friday, October 15th - Form/Space Atelier, 2407 1st Ave. 7pm
Saturday, October 16th - Gallery 1412 8pmSee More

Form/Space Atelier Program For September 2010

2010-09-16T07:45:00.002-07:00

Show Title: "Split Level"
Show Duration: September 17-October 16, 2010
Vernissage: September 17, 6-8PM
Closing Reception: October 16, 6-8PM

Split Level is a site-specific sculptural introgression narrating the hubris of built-environment largesse contaminating landscape. Split Level is the third exhibit of Paula Rebsom at Form/Space Atelier. Prior Paula Rebsom exhibits at Form/Space Atelier: Designated Landmarks(2007), Outskirts(2009).

Paula Rebsom Statement For Split Level:

In October of 2008, a house in Southwest Portland slid 300 feet down a hill, crashing into the houses below with a woman inside of it. No one was hurt, although several homes were damaged and others red flagged, deemed unsafe for human occupancy. It was later determined that the landslide was triggered by water from an underground sprinkler system.

Seattle is no stranger to urban landslides and Form/Space Atelier’s unusual exhibition space is perched on a hillside, descending into a basement. This interior architecture presents a perfect opportunity for me to explore urban housing developments, landslides and the intersection between the natural and built environments.

Split Level explores the negative unforeseen results that occur when, often in an attempt to live closer to nature, humans attempt to defy the laws of gravity and forces of nature by building where the land is unstable. There are a wealth of documentary images showing houses that are a foot away from falling over the edge of a steep hillside, houses that have sunk into their foundations, or that have completely smashed into a pile of rubble. These images, which I find both haunting and beautiful, served as a starting point for this work helping to inform the shifts of planes that the siding takes as it plunges into the basement and collapses under the weight of a small boulder. The gray planes immerse the viewer in an environment that recalls the flat, gray surfaces of photographs documenting landslides in the Pacific Northwest.

Form/Space Atelier Program For August 2010

2010-08-06T18:37:00.006-07:00

Mick Lorusso, Work Of The Ant People, 2010.

Form/Space Atelier Program For August 2010

Show Title: Essence of Light/Essence of Life

Show Duration: August 19-September 5, 2010

Vernissage: August 19, 6PM

Essence of Light/Essence of Life are new drawings and photos mostly
inspired by a journey to the Peruvian Amazon. This exhibit is Mick
Lorusso's first solo exhibit at Form/Space Atelier, his third overall. Lorusso participated in 2008's An Exhibit Of Robert Storr's Autograph And Other Work at Form/Space Atelier, also 2007's Countdown/Build To Destroy at Form/Space Atelier.

More information on Mick Lorusso:
www.micklorusso.net

Form/Space Atelier Program For July 2010

2010-07-05T17:14:00.005-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program for July 2010

Show Title: "1 Eightfold Six Trinity"

Show Duration: July 15-August 15, 2010

Vernissage: July 15, 2010, 6PM as part of 3rd Thursday www.BELLTOWNARTWALK.com

1 Eightfold Six Trinity is large scale works on paper, calligraphic
elements rendered in ink, over grounds of orange/silver or blue/gold. Shinto clerics collaborated as a group anonymously to produce the parchments; the objects were collected by Curator Paul Pauper during a recent trip to San Francisco’s Japantown.

1 Eightfold Six Trinity seeks to alter Form/Space Atelier into a shrine-like edifice where refuge from the incomprehensible agitations of the material world will evaporate, diminish and disappear forever.

Shinto has very ancient roots in the Japanese islands. The recorded history dates to the Kojiki (712) and Nihon Shoki (720), but archeological records date back significantly further. Both are compilations of prior oral traditions. The Kojiki establishes the Japanese imperial family as the foundation of Japanese culture, being the descendants of Amaterasu Omikami. There is also a creation myth and a genealogy of the gods.
The Nihonshoki was more interested in creating a structural system of government, foreign policy, religious hierarchy, and domestic social order.
There is an internal system of historical Shinto development that configures the relationships between Shinto and other religious practices over its long history; the inside and outside Kami(spirits). The inside or ujigami (uji meaning clan) Kami roles that supports cohesion and continuation of established roles and patterns; and the hitogami or outside Kami, bringing innovation, new beliefs, new messages, and some instability.
Jomon peoples of Japan used natural housing, predated rice farming, and frequently were hunter-gatherers, the physical evidence for ritual practices are difficult to document. There are many locations of stone ritual structures, refined burial practices and early Torii that lend to the continuity of primal Shinto. The Jomon had a clan based tribal system developed similar to much of the worlds indigenous people. In the context of this clan based system, local beliefs developed naturally and when assimilation between clans occurred, they also took on some beliefs of the neighboring tribes. At some point there was a recognition that the ancestors created the current generations and the reverence of ancestors (tama)took shape. There was some trade amongst the indigenous peoples within Japanese islands and the mainland, as well as some varying migrations. The trade and interchange of people helped the growth and complexity of the peoples spirituality by exposure to new beliefs. The natural spirituality of the people appeared to be based on the worship of nature forces or mono, and the natural elements to which they all depended.
The gradual introduction of methodical religious and government organizations from mainland Asia starting around 300 BCE seeded the reactive changes in primal Shinto over the next 700 years to a more formalized system. These changes were directed internally by the various clans frequently as a syncratic cultural event to outside influences. Eventually as the Yamato gained power a formalization process began. The genesis of the Imperial household amnd subsequent creation of the Kojiki helped facilitate the continuity needed for this long term development through modern history. There is today a balance between outside influences of Buddhist, Confucian, Taoist, Abrahamic, Hindu and secular beliefs. In more modern times Shinto has developed new branches and forms on a regular basis, including leaving Japan.

Form/Space Atelier Program For June 2010

2010-06-07T18:11:00.005-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For June 2010

Show Title: Recent Studies and Paintings

Show Duration: June 17-July 11,2010

Vernissage: June 17, 6PM as part of the www.BELLTOWNARTWALK.com

Recent Paintings and Studies is a solo show of paintings by master artist Michael Lane. Subjects of the exhibit include images of the artists recently deceased mother.

Michael Lane was given private art lessons all throughout grade and middle school. He was exhibiting as semi-professional artist from the age of 11, and as a professional artist by age 14.

His concentration in art throughout high school focused on printmaking under guidance of Tyler School of Art trained instructor William Luber (stone lithography, screen printing, intaglio, relief printmaking techniques and illustration).

After leaving high school in 1984, he worked as a professional portrait and wedding photographer and in dark rooms for commercial printing companies in Philadelphia, PA while training at night in traditional figurative painting techniques at Fleisher Art Memorial in Philadelphia during the week and at The Philadelphia Sketch Club on weekends.

He began full-time fine art study on a full scholarship at The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1988 as a painting major with a sculpture minor, studying under Ben Kamahira, Roswell Weidner, Sidney Goodman, Lou Sloan, Elizabeth Osbourne and Arthur De Costa.

In 1994, he went on to assist the great artist/chemist/art historian Arthur De Costa in his studio, and in 1995 Lane began a two-year private apprenticeship with celebrity portrait painter Nelson Shanks at his home and studio in Andalusia, PA. "This was the most important phase of my training. Nelson taught me to paint," Lane says.

While executing commissioned portraits and teaching drawing over the next 10 years, he began designing sets for theater, film and TV, and went on to work for Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Santa Fe Opera, Seattle Opera, Pacific Northwest Ballet and many other companies and as designer, painter and sculptor.

He also ran a print shop, mural company, faux-finishing studio, mold-making service and sculpture department for fabrication companies.

Lane is now happy to be a full-time painter and part-time fine-art teacher in Seattle, WA. He is represented by Seattle gallery Form/Space Atelier.

Artist's Statement
People make art in order to enlarge their means of expression. Art is a powerful means of communication which can convey things to an audience which using words alone cannot. We are artists because we have a strong desire to interest others in what has interested us. We render an object and/or convey our feelings to make those feelings or that object real to another person. Our art can be said to be successful in the proportion that it produces these shared feelings of reality in a viewer.

In taking up the study of any art a vast field is unfolded. To the earnest student, it means unlimited possibilities and endless sources of delight. Robert Henri said ‘When the artist is alive in any person, he or she becomes an inventive, searching, daring, self-expressing creature.’

The artist applies much careful thought when choosing what to include in a work of art. It is in the value of what we think that we develop as artists. We develop our thoughts along with our eyes.

The true artist must be a careful workman. We work towards a true mastery of our materials and tools and strive for a complete understanding of the medium in which we work. The more we study art the more we realize that materials are of great importance in the expression of thought.

But we are not only artists when we have a tool in hand. We are always artists, and are busy seizing impressions and suggestions and storing them in mind for a later time. We learn, as artists, to be interested in and to derive great pleasure from seeing what other people have not learned to see so that we can then share these feelings and impressions.

It is a field which requires vital, intense effort but one which affords us all the chance to grow as unique individuals. Ernest Dimnet, the great French writer and lecturer declared “the thinker, whether he or she wishes to or not, is a leader…The thinker is preeminently a person who sees where others do not’.

For additional information and images of Michael Lane's work, please visit
www.michaellane.net.

Photos By Carl Herbert

2010-06-01T19:07:00.004-07:00

At Elara Tanguy's opening reception, Carl Herbert took some photos of the gallery, Elara, and Curator Paul Pauper. Thanks, Carl.

Form/Space Atelier Program For May 2010

2010-05-08T13:59:00.002-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For May 2010

Show Title: "For M."

Show Duration: May 20-April 13, 2010

Vernissage: May 20, 6p.m. as part of the !NEW! Third Thursday Belltown
ArtWalk. See www.belltownartwalk.com for details.

The exhibit "For M." is paintings of botanical subjects using
watercolor and other media.

Elara Tanguy describes the simple, affectionate organizing principle
of "For M.":
"M, for my grandmother, Mary. She's a painter (almost 90 now, and can't
paint anymore) and has been a big influence on my work."

"For M." is Elara Tanguy's first exhibit at Form/Space Atelier.
Curator Paul Pauper made his first studio visit to Elara at the Bemis
Building in 2009.

A Seattle-based artist and illustrator, Elara Tanguy has created
original, hand-drawn art for companies such as: Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice
Cream, Storey Publishing, Workman Press, Garden Way, and Brown Shoe Co.,
Inc. She received a BFA from Parsons School of Design in 2003.

The Lost Video...

2010-03-19T20:33:00.000-07:00

http://video.filestube.com/watch,c2dee000ec046bfb03ea/Seattle-Art-Museum-Exhibits-Paul-Pauper.html

Form/Space Atelier Program For April 2010

2010-03-18T18:11:00.004-07:00

photo: K.E. Dallum, all rights reserved.

Form/Space Atelier Program For April 2010

Show Title: 54th Statehood Exposition

Show Duration: April 15-May 16, 2010

Vernissage: April 15, 6p.m. as part of the !NEW! Third Thursday Belltown ArtWalk. See www.belltownartwalk.com for details.

54th Statehood Exposition consists of new black-and-white photographs and a co-located new media exhibition by Kristen Elsbeth Dallum. Curator Paul Pauper frames the exhibit by hypothesizing creation of a 54th state, somewhere in the South Pacific Ocean, where utopia exists, limited only by the bounds of imagination.
Kristen Elsbeth Dallum graduated from the University of Washington School of Art with a BFA in Interdisciplinary Visual Arts. She has worked with youth artists at Arts Corp, Seattle, finding creative solutions to individual and group efforts, and at Camp Sealth, Vashon Island, where Form/Space Atelier Curator Paul Pauper lived from 10 years old until he was 25, and Pauper still has many family members living there. "54th Statehood Exposition" is Kristen Elsbeth Dallum's second solo photography exhibit at Form/Space Atelier. The photographs are editions of one, and are 8x10 inches. Prices are $200 each. Exhibit is free.

Juliette Fretté: Comparative Essay In Regard To Ascribing Primitivist Attributes To Her Art

2010-02-06T12:49:00.011-08:00

Plates: Top: plate 1, Hecate Rising, Middle: Plate 2, Resurrection, Bottom: Plate 3 Plaything. All images, Juliette Fretté, all rights reserved.

Looking critically at the paintings of Juliette Fretté, a position could be established that her work has much in common with primitivism, both as images and as philosophical examples of primitivist thought. Her background is as an art outsider, outside of matriculated academic experience, lending credence to the position Juliette Fretté is primitivist.

A greater number of self-taught artists have been defined as primitivist than the minority of degreed artists practicing primitivist artforms. At one time, Pablo Picasso was most likely the most well-known practitioner of primitivism, in summation; his academic experience began very young under the direction of his artist father. When Pablo was 13 he spectacularly entered the Barcelona Academy of Arts. While most students needed a week to study for the entrance exam, Picasso used a week. He blew the examining body away despite his adolescent age. Next, his father and uncle decided to send 16-year-old Pablo to the Madrid Academy "San Fernando", known later as the School of Art. Picasso's attendance lasted not a long time (less than one year). He never received a degree. Ten years later, one figure in Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon is a likeness of a primitivist African tribal mask, and Picasso ushered in the crossing over of primitivism to mainstream contemporary art with the advent of Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.

Images within the global vernacular of Juliette Fretté are consistent with forms enunciated by Picasso's primitivist period, generally attributed to Picasso during the period of 1907-1909. Figures resembling petroglyphs in plate 1, titled Hecate Rising demonstrate Fretté as a primtivist painter, if the painting imagery had been less densely composed and her pigments applied to a cave wall, the genre study would be complete. The figural forms in this painting have dimensions of tribal earmarking.

Next in Resurrection, at Plate 2, we find a highly consistent congruence in the compositional characteristics from the first painting to the next. To be more specific, Juliette Fretté has a strong uniformity of expression through her paintings, one of the prime reasons her work was chosen to be exhibited by Seattle-based curator and gallerist Paul Pauper in March 2010. But each work finds a highly original and distinctly unique method of conveying the visual information Juliette Fretté has chosen to communicate. In Resurrection, African primitivist influences and Indonesian indigenous styles are echoed.

Finally, the simplified symbolic, rune-like image of Plaything, at Plate 3, has reduced the primitivist aesthetic to the gestural sublimation of a Maori tattoo. From the selections exhibited here, Juliette Fretté displays the formal attributes of primitivism.

We have made the argument for establishing Juliette Fretté as a primitivist artist, her images contain the formal parameters circumscribing primitivism. Juliette Fretté's philosophical description posesses primitivist attributes as well. Juliette Fretté has established herself as a feminist columnist for the San Francisco Examiner. From this subjective position, she has espoused a tribal viewpoint, and by association, a primitivist viewpoint. The attribution is not hers, it must be clarified, but rather this essayist's opinion, that the tribal/primitivist connection might be hypothesized. Basques, Minangkabau, Mosuo, Berbers or Tuareg are examples of matriarchical or matrilocal tribal cultures. Strongly matrilocal societies sometimes are referred to as matrifocal, and there is some debate concerning the terminological delineation between matrifocality and matriarchy. Note that even in patriarchical systems of male-preference primogeniture there may occasionally be queens regnant, as in the case of Elizabeth I of England or Victoria of the United Kingdom. From this point of view, the theory is established for a philosophical primitivism on the part of Juliette Fretté.

Matthew Kandegas At Form/Space Atelier February 2010

2010-01-22T11:43:00.003-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program for February 2010

Show Title: Trombones Bleu

Show Duration: February 12- March 7, 2010

Opening Reception February 12, 6PM as part of the Belltown ArtWalk
www.belltownartwalk.com

Matthew Kandegas exhibits his third and final solo show at
Form/Space Atelier. Kandegas moved to Vaasa, Finland January 1, to
join an intentional community of Suomi (Lapplanders) endeavoring to
re-establish Suomi customs, language and culture in an urban milieu (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korsholm ). The community has built in
the city a lichen farm, which, as fodder, will sustain a herd of
caribou. Kandegas will retain representation by Form/Space Atelier at
the request of his collectors located in Seattle, though as of press
time, Kandegas was unable to say whether he would continue to create
new paintings while in Finland, but said the move to Scandinavia was
"permanent and irrevocable...".
Matthew Kandegas has been described as a Post-Minimalist painter,
his subjects have been figural in response to stadium rock, but in the
last decade he has created only images of paperclips. Curator Paul
Pauper discovered Kandegas during research for organizing a
performative spectacle exhibition of Kyle MacDonald at Form/Space
Atelier in November of 2007. MacDonald is an artist and author of One
Red Paperclip... , an account of MacDonald's success in trading 14
times from a simple paperclip to a two-bedroom house.
Form/Space Atelier donated a Kandegas painting from his series
Trombones Jeunes to Strangercrombie 2009, his work is also in the
collections of MacDonald, Lindsey Daniel, The Low Income Housing
Institute, Cascade People's Center and several other charitable
organizations.
Trombones Bleu translated from the French is blue paperclips, the
paintings exhibited are the latest series which began with Trombones
Rouge (red paperclips) followed by Trombones Jeune (yellow
paperclips). Trombones Bleu are oil on panel, mostly large scale (4
feet by 9 feet) oriented portrait. The panels constructed by Kandegas
for the paintings are reclaimed 1970's-era basement rumpus room
paneling which had been slated for a landfill by Kandegas'
ex-girlfriend's mother. The composition of the panels is mahoghany, or
more precisely shorea. Shorea is a genus of about 196 species of
mainly rainforest trees in the family Dipterocarpaceae. The genus is
named after Sir John Shore, the Governor-General of the British East
India Company, 1793-1798. They are native to southeast Asia, from
Northern India to Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. In west
Malesia and the Philippines this genus dominates the skyline of the
tropical forests. The tallest documented tropical angiosperm is a 88.3
m tall Shorea faguetiana in the Tawau Hills National Park, in Sabah on
the island of Borneo, and in that park at least 5 other species of the
genus have been measured to be over 80 m tall: S. argentifolia, S.
gibbosa, S. johorensis, S. smithiana and S. superba. Borneo is also
the hotspot ofShorea diversity with 138 species, of which 91 are
endemic to the island. One hundred and forty eight species of Shorea
are currently listed on the IUCN Redlist. The majority of which are
listed as being critically endangered. Most all of the Shorea
Mahoghany has been logged using elephants and Matthew Kandegas reveres
the wise leviathans that elephants are. Consequently, he valued very
highly the 1970's-era rumpus room panelling that his ex-girlfriend's
mother was going to take to a landfill, and immediately rescued the
wood which had been, through the insurmountable agony of an elephant,
been delivered to the 1970's-era oblivious ones seeking to remain
status-quo with their bridge-and-tunnel neighbors. Kandegas feels the
mahogany must live on, with a new purpose, that being to punctuate the
art object he was creating, defining the rescued wood as would a vegan
pointing to a trophy head on a hunters wall. Paper comes from trees.
Paperclips are the steel fetters on the trees children, paper.
Handcuffs on the babies of mighty larch.
The current level of exploitation for trade is not sustainable, and
current forestry practices may be harmful to the survival of the
species. And even low levels of mahogany harvest can be problematic
because of the secondary effects of logging enterprises: they create
roads that provide access to farmers and migrants who clear the forest
for agriculture. Finally, conservationists are concerned about
big-leaf mahogany because Honduran mahogany (S. humilis) and Caribbean
mahogany (S. mahagoni) already have been over-harvested and are now
considered commercially exhausted.
Currently, mahogany populations are in decline in every range
state. Many scientists feel that big-leaf mahogany is at risk of
suffering the same fate as Caribbean and Honduran mahogany if trade in
the species is not more carefully regulated, and if forest management
techniques are not significantly improved. The Brazilian Botanical
Society and the Brazilian Institute of Environmental and Renewable
Natural Resources have both listed S. macrophylla as endangered.
IUCN-The World Conservation Union lists the species as vulnerable.
Mahogany has been popular for centuries. With a well-established
reputation on the international market for beauty and durability,
mahogany is traded worldwide as sawn wood, in plywood, as veneer, and
as finished furniture products. The hardness and deep reddish-brown
color of the wood make it a popular material for furniture, inlays,
veneers, and musical instruments.
At the 12th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on
International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora
(CITES) in November 2002, big-leaf mahogany was listed on Appendix II
of the convention. CITES is an international treaty, with more than
160 signatory nations, that regulates international wildlife trade.
Under the provisions of Appendix II, international trade is strictly
regulated - an exporting state must determine that any big-leaf
mahogany (including logs, sawn wood, veneer sheets, and plywood) has
been legally obtained and that harvest was not detrimental to the
survival of the species; only then can a CITES export permit be
issued. States importing the products must not accept shipments that
are not accompanied by a CITES permit issued by the exporting country.
Prior to the listing of big-leaf mahogany on CITES Appendix II,
the mahogany trade was to be conducted according CITES Appendix III,
on which it was previously listed by Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa
Rica, Mexico, and Peru. Evidence exists, however, that much of the
trade was not in compliance. Disparities in trade data - importing
countries reporting more mahogany imports than exporting countries
declared - indicate that there may be substantial illegal logging and
trading of mahogany. Illegally logged mahogany is exported out of
range states without proper CITES certification, and is almost
certainly harvested at levels that are unsustainable.
There is also evidence that mahogany is being harvested in
violation of local timber regulations, particularly in Brazil and
Peru, the world's largest exporters of mahogany. Mahogany is being
harvested from lands belonging to indigenous peoples, in violation of
Brazilian and Peruvian law. Recent press reports indicate that in some
cases indigenous groups are allowing illegal logging on their lands
and charging a premium to the loggers. In other cases, loggers
manipulate the indigenous groups into giving up their hardwood.
Conservationists estimate that more than half of the mahogany coming
out of Brazil and Peru may have been extracted from indigenous lands.
Until recently, the United States and the United Kingdom were by
far the largest importers of mahogany, together importing 80 percent
of the world's mahogany in trade. In the early 1990s, a consumer
boycott of mahogany in the United Kingdom drastically reduced that
country's share of the mahogany trade; however, the United States has
increased imports in recent years and made up the difference. Other
importing nations include the Dominican Republic, Argentina, Mexico,
Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands,
Spain, Finland, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia. A great deal of
mahogany is also consumed domestically by the range states and, in
addition, range states trade mahogany with each other.
Between 1992 and 1998, the United States imported an average of
80,000 cubic meters of mahogany every year. Between 1989 and 1995, a
similar period, global mahogany trade averaged 111,000 cubic meters
per year. U.S. imports of mahogany account for the majority - nearly
60 percent - of total global trade. Most of the mahogany imported into
the United States comes from Brazil, with Peru and Bolivia important
secondary sources.
Because the United States is the world's largest consumer of
mahogany, U.S. consumers can play a powerful role in protecting the
species from over-harvesting, by purchasing only those timber and
mahogany items that have been "green-certified" by an organization
such as the Forest Stewardship Council. Certified timber has been
harvested in a sustainable and legal manner, with minimal destruction
to surrounding forests. By purchasing only sustainably harvested wood,
consumers can help prevent big-leaf mahogany from suffering the same
fate as Caribbean and Honduran mahogany.

Form/Space Atelier Program For January 2010

2009-12-28T15:48:00.004-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For January 2010

Show Title: The Water Poet

Show Duration: January 8-February 7, 2009

Opening Reception: January 8, 6PM, as part of the Belltown ArtWalk
www.belltownartwalk.com

John Monson exhibits new acrylic on canvas abstract seascapes and other imagery at Form/Space Atelier. This exhibit marks Monson’s first solo show at Form/Space Atelier and his second exhibit overall with the gallery. John keeps a garret–looking studio overlooking a wooded knoll in bucolic yet picturesque Fall City, where he also works out inventions, owning several patents. The title of the show refers to another John, English poet John Taylor (1580-1654), who assumed the sobriquet "The Water Poet" because Taylor for a long time was a waterman on the Thames. John Monson's visual poems of water reference the title. About his own work, Monson says; “I received my BFA from Western Washington University. Awards include top honors in ten juried art competitions. I draw heavily upon natural, organic forms, and move easily between realism and abstraction. I like to establish a dialog between carefully worked realism and impulsive, organic forms. This broad and inclusive integration of diverse styles reveals my belief that art plays a role in creating our worldview. Hopefully my work reflects a view that is not exclusive and fragmented, but rather more complete, more tolerant and integrating.”

Sam Birchman Exhibits At Form/Space Atelier December 11- January 3, 2010

2009-12-08T14:32:00.001-08:00

Sam Birchman exhibits oil on canvas paintings, well-drafted, with figuration and other imagery. This is the fourth exhibit of Sam Birchman’s work curated by Paul Pauper, dating back to 2007. Sam Birchman returned to Seattle after spending months in New York City recently. About his own work, Sam says “I live and work in downtown Seattle. I received my BFA in Studio Painting from the Evergreen State College in 2004. I am mainly interested in faces and figures. I find that I need to have a living being in my paintings in order for them to feel complete, whether it be a human, an animal, or just a suggestion of one or the other. I prefer my spaces to be somewhat undefined. The setting is less important to me than the interaction between the figures on the canvas. The process of painting itself is what I truly enjoy, from stretching and priming the canvas to applying paint and seeing what happens and how I respond to it.” Sam keeps a studio in the Vain Hair Salon Building, along with Form/Space Atelier-exhibited artist Michael Lane and others. Sam’s father is artist Fred Birchman, represented by Francine Seders.
Exhibitions
October–November 2009
Wright Exhibition Space (Group Show), Seattle, WA
May 2009
Café Verite, Seattle, WA
March 2008
26 Brix, Seattle, WA
December 2007
Angle Gallery, Seattle, WA
July 2007
Form/Space Atelier, Seattle, WA
June 2007
Form/Space Atelier (Group Show), Seattle, WA
January 2007
Caffeine Café, Seattle, WA
July 2006
JAS Cabinet Shop, Seattle, WA
April 2005
Le Voyeur (Group Show), Olympia, WA
May 2004
The Evergreen State College Gallery 4 (Senior Thesis), Olympia, WA

Juliette Fretté Exhibits At Form/Space Atelier March 13-April 4, 2010

2009-12-08T14:24:00.003-08:00

Juliette Fretté exhibits her original paintings March 13-April 4, 2010 at Form/Space Atelier, 2407 1st Avenue, Seattle. Vernissage for the exhibit is March 13, 8PM.
The organizing principles for this exhibit originate with exhibit Curator Paul Pauper, founder and Director of Form/Space Atelier. Pauper's prime organizing principle embraces the idea of curating artists first, and the the marks artists make secondarily. As this precept applies to the upcoming exhibit of Juliette Fretté's paintings, Pauper began thinking in terms of an exhibit by a feminist artist timed to coincide with International Women's Day March 8th. His research into artists defining themselves as feminists led him to data about Juliette Fretté. As more was revealed during the initial inquiry, it became evident that Juliette Fretté would be the only artist capable of fulfilling the entire vision being espoused by Pauper for an exhibit by a feminist artist. Additionally, Pauper's curation has been associated indivisibly with artists who use figuration, found in imagery of the paintings of Juliette Fretté, and in other aspects, notably Fretté's career as a model, as it applies to the curation scheme of this exhibit.
As research deepened and broadened, Pauper established contact with Juliette Fretté, and Fretté became an equal partner in the process of building the finalized organizing principles for the March 2010 exhibit. Specifically, Pauper and Fretté established the number of Fretté's art objects that could be most effectively exhibited, details regarding exhibit systems, framing the artwork, the potential for Fretté to create artwork in situ while in Seattle (Fretté is currently based in California), and moving the artwork and packaging and promotion of the exhibit. Artist and Curator made every effort to nurture a synergistic approach to building the exhibit.
As the organizing principles were established, Fretté and Pauper began to think in terms of establishing a narrative to support the exhibit. Pauper interviewed Fretté, included below. Additional corollary narrative is being written and will be available by the time of the exhibit March 2010, packaged together with archival materials such as previous interviews and the artist's parallel narratives regarding her artwork.

Pauper: What inspires your paintings?

Fretté: I find that the painting 'itch' often gets me going in terms of creating a new piece. In terms of what inspires me, I would say that certain events in my life can definitely influence the images that materialize. As every painting is entirely improvised, the end result is always a surprise. Otherwise, I would say that my work has spiritual and otherworldly muses :)

Pauper: What does painting make you feel?

Fretté: Painting forces me live in the moment unlike anything else. I find that painting is actually an addiction for me -- once I begin a new piece, it usually demands my attention until every detail is fully expressed.

Pauper: Who do you respect as an artist?

Fretté: I love the work of several artists. Growing up, my favorite artist was Ora Tamir, whose work is spiritual, passionate, and surreal. But my taste is relatively broad and I also enjoy the work of the celebrated pinup artist Olivia de Berardinas.

Pauper: Have Any Heroes in General?

Fretté: Heroes? Well, there are a lot of people that I respect, including every inspirational figure from Oprah to J.K. Rowling to Da Vinci to Barack Obama (and maybe Buffy the Vampire Slayer).

Pauper: Can You Think of Any People Who Need Cultural Enlightenment?

Fretté: Everybody! We all need to constantly immerse and enrich ourselves with culture, innovation, creativity, and progress.

Form/Space Atelier Supports The Punk Rock Flea Market Which Supports The Low Income Housing Institute

2009-12-07T17:33:00.002-08:00

Paul Pauper, Dickensian Carny Barker and Curator, Form/Space Atelier

New Work By Sam Birchman

2009-11-29T13:18:00.002-08:00

Seattle's Best Painter Exhibits at Form/Space Atelier December 11, 2009- January3, 2010. Vernissage December 11, 6PM as part of the Belltown Artwalk; www.belltownartwalk.com . Second Friday!

Vladmaster Installation

2009-11-18T18:54:00.002-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2009

2009-11-10T10:55:00.003-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2009

Show Title: Actaeon At Home

Show Duration: November 13- December 6, 2009

Opening Reception Friday November 13, 6PM, as part
of the Belltown ArtWalk www.belltownartwalk.com

Experimental Filmmaker Vladimir exhibits her 5th interactive film experience
Actaeon At Home. Vladmasters are handmade View-Master™ reels designed,
photographed, and hand-assembled by Vladimir. They make use of toys, neglected
household objects, and odd ephemera to tell 28-picture tales of train chases,
missing steam shovels, disastrous dinner parties, and overly adventurous
cockroaches.

Actaeon, to the ancient Greeks, was a hunter unlucky enough to get a good look
at Artemis bathing naked amongst her nymphs. For his trespasses, Actaeon was
transformed into a stag and then devoured by his own hounds. Our Actaeon, may
or may not have anything to do with the historical Actaeon. He is a small man
in a room with striped wallpaper and antlers and a typewriter and a collection
of Currier & Ives prints. Oh, also there is a train chase.

This new Vladmaster is narrationless. Instead of talk there is the Apt
Ensemble, a trio of musicians who lead you through the Vladmaster story
playing a variety of instruments and providing the odd sound effect. Listen
carefully and you will hear everything from a pump organ to a tuba to a
musical saw to a train whistle. This is also the first Vladmaster set
photographed entirely in glorious black and white.

This Vladmaster was made to debut in a live performance with the band and
emcee Tim Nickodemus for the 2005 PDX Fest Invitationals where Vladimir was,
with some tongue in cheek, crowned the World Champion of Experimental Film.

This set consists of four handmade Vladmaster reels, the box to keep them in,
and the mini-cd soundtrack. The music was written by Peter Broderick and
Nathan Crockett; performed by the Apt Ensemble (Peter Broderick, Nathan
Crockett, and Branic Howard) and recorded by Peter Broderick. Tim Nickodemus
introduces the CD. Douglas Jenkins is the human star of the photographs. The
story was written and photographed by Vladimir who also designed the reels and
box.

Interview by Ross Simioni
Illustration by Tony Millionaire

http://www.vladmaster.com/press/articles.php?article=9

"MOST OF THE TIME DURING MY SHOWS, I'M LOOKING AWKWARDLY DOWN AT THE FLOOR AND
WAITING FOR THE SOUND TRACK TO END."

Inspirations for Vladmasters:
Galaga
Frogger
Gertie the Dinosaur
EarlyFritz the Cat

The artist who goes by the name Vladimir is one of the only known filmmakers
working with View-masters, which, if you remember, are those cheap-looking toy
binoculars usually filled with images of zoo animals or dinosaurs. Instead of
watching her so-called films on movie screens, audience members hold
"stereoscopic viewing devices" up to their eyes and click through picture
reels of dioramas, action figures, and abstract photographs of trains. She
calls them Vladmasters.

Through her website, Vladimir mails her handmade films around the world, each
one accompanied by a spoken-narration CD and sound track. Her "picture
stories" have included adaptations of Calvino and Kafka, along with some of
her own writing, like the one about the pseudo-mystical congregation of
farming machinery. She claims to "seek out the forgotten, the discarded, and
the overlooked objects of this world...and [takes] tiny, tiny photographs in
order to tell their stories."

Since 2003, she's become and anomalous staple in the independent film festival
circuit, winning the World Champion of Experimental Film title on multiple
occasions. She remains active in her hometown of Portland, Oregon (also the
home of the View-Master), where she works as a projectionist, creates her own
scretch-it Vladlast lottery tickets, builds Super 8 film experiments, and
works as a quality assurance engineer at a software company.

This interview took place over email, with Vladimir responding from both
Portland and Brisbane, Australia, where she was participating in the Other
Film Festival. —Ross Simioni

I. MOVIE PROJECTION AS SELF-ABNEGATION

THE BELIEVER: When you set up a performance — or is it better to call it a
screening? — what happens, exactly?

VLADIMIR: Sometimes I compare my performances to synchronized swimming. At a
performance, everyone in attendance is given a viewer and a set of my handmade
disks. There is a brief instructional introduction, and then we begin the
sound track, which leads everyone through a tiny private screening experience
just past the end of their nose. There are ding noises on the sound track to
cue the turning from one image to the next. Sometimes there is a narrator and
sometimes there's just music. Perhaps the most exciting moment is
participating in the ker-think of tens or hundreds of View-Masters turning
simultaneously after that very first ding.

BLVR: Would you say that’s the ideal scenario for someone to experience the
vladmaster? In a theater, like most films? I just received the vladmasters you
sent me in the mail, watched them all in my living room all day, and really
enjoyed the private storytelling feeling. It felt almost like reading.

V: I like both the theater and the personal experience. The great thing about
the theater is that there is a sort of euphoria and excitement that comes from
the experience of just being in a crowd of people who are all holding
View-Masters and all experiencing this sort of simultaneous media for the
first time. The crowd experience is really wonderful, but I think that the
more personal private experience that you had in your living room is probably
more conducive to reflection and paying attention to the story. Perhaps you
could call one a roller coaster and one a scenic drive?

BLVR: A little while ago, I heard David Lynch talking about his appreciation
of the laptop computer, how it has completely transformed cinema by
encouraging people to watch films alone, more like the intimacy of books. It
also encourages people to use headphones, which brings a renewed appreciation
to the way sound and music function in a film.

V: I really like this idea. The intimacy of the viewmaster viewing experience
is very important to me. I’m a projectionist and one of the wonderful things
about projecting movies is that you get to hold every part of them in your
hand. You get to see the film as an object and to see the individual frames. I
think the View-Masters present a similar experience: you can view them
narratively, as time-based, alongside the soundtrack, but you can also hold
them in your hand, see their individual parts, and appreciate them as craft
objects.

BLVR: That reminds me of how Stan Brakhage painted directly on his film. When
I first realized what he was doing, my idea of film was suddenly transformed
from an abstract thing, with images floating in the air, to the idea of actual
physical film stock. He broke that “fourth-wall” of physicality.

V: I’m sad to say I haven’t seen very much Stan Brakhage, but I was fortunate
to see two nights of films by his close friend and collaborator Phil Solomon
when he visited Portland. He treats the surfaces of his films chemically so
that you see the surface layers buckling and peeling. The original images
decay and fray and become submerged beneath the layered surface so that his
films are filled with a sense of beauty and loss. There is also a Bay Area
collective called SILT who often work with the decay of the film image by
leaving their films in holes in the ground to get moldy and be eaten by
creatures. I saw a wonderful 8mm film they hand-fed through a broken
projector, sometimes holding it too long in front of the lamp so that you
could see the image start to melt.

Perhaps at the other end of the film-as-object spectrum, there are Bruce
McClure’s films. He strips film down to its most basic elements: light and
dark. He does multi-projector performances in which each projector is running
an identical film loop that consists of several black frames followed by a
single clear frame. He uses dimmers, the focus on the projectors, and
occasionally gels or different shaped gates to manipulate the stroboscopic
shapes created by the film. The sound for his performances is generated by
passing the sound of the frames running through the projector through various
pedals to create a rhythmic pulse that matches the pulse of the visuals. They
are without doubt the most physiologically affecting films I’ve ever
experienced.

BLVR: The concept of viewing a film has always been so removed from the idea
of performance, but with your work and, say, McClure's, there's that element
of it's-happening-right-now — something you don't get with pre-recorded films.
Do you think this connection with film comes from your work as a
projectionist, where you're sort of "performing" the film?

V: When you’re a movie projectionist, the goal is actually one of
self-abnegation. A good projectionist is an unnoticed projectionist. This is
perfect for me because I’m always trying to make myself disappear. I’ve always
just used the word “performance” for lack of a better alternative with my own
shows. Most of the time during my shows, I’m looking awkwardly down at the
floor and waiting for the soundtrack to end. If anyone can be said to be doing
the performing, or the projecting, during my shows, it would be the individual
audience members.

The thing I’ve taken from projecting is just the intimacy with the medium.
Because we tend to show older prints, before we show a film, I pass every reel
through my gloved hand to check for damage. When you do this, you become
hyper-aware of the individual frames and of the process of these discrete
pieces becoming a fluid whole. It is exactly like calculus.

I think that there are many people who turn their films into performances and
also make the audience hyper-aware of film’s construction and mechanism. Bruce
McClure is certainly one of them. I’ve just been lucky to see three of his
performances in the space of a week and a half at the utterly amazing
OtherFilm Festival in Brisbane Australia. Almost every film there had a
performative element. The projectors were always in the same room as the
audience and mostly projected by the filmmakers.

I saw two wonderful multi-projector performances by the great Australian
filmmaker Dirk De Bruyn. He began each of his shows by shining a flashlight
around the raised arms and reels of the 16mm projectors. The shadows of the
reels would play around the audience as a sort of initiation into film via a
ritualistic invocation.

There was also a performance by Sally Golding and Joel Stern, two of the
organizers of the festival who also do performances under the name Abject
Leader. Joel does live soundtracks and Sally makes films. She’s a fellow
projectionist and also a film preservationist and her work is steeped in
experimentations with film substance and film history. The performance that
they did at the festival dealt with early cinema color techniques in which
consecutive frames of film would be shot behind red, green, and blue filters
onto black and white film and then projected back through those same filters
to create a full spectrum effect. Sally set up three projectors pointed
straight into the audience, one each with a red, green, and blue filter, and
then stood in the center of the room holding up a large picture frame filled
with tracing paper. She makes the audience stare into the glare of the
projector and then rescues us by physically interrupting the glare and locking
the three projections into a single image.

BLVR: One thing I've never been entirely clear about is the job of a
projectionist. What's the whole process there?

V: The average feature film comes in two very heavy metal cases each
containing three 20-minute reels about 18 inches in diameter. Probably 95
percent of theaters run these reels on what is called a platter system. This
means that they build all of the reels onto one big platter so the projector
pulls the film off of one level of the platter and spits it back out onto
another. The whole film runs through a single projector in a single pass with
no need for a projectionist other than to build the film and push the START
button.

I’m lucky to work at a theater that doesn’t use platters. Instead we use two
projectors and do reel changeovers. Over the course of a film, the
projectionist switches back and forth between the projectors four or five
times. At the end of each reel of film there are two sets of cue marks,
approximately 8 seconds apart. When one reel is winding down, I stand at
attention next to the projector that is not running and keep a very careful
eye on the top right corner of the screen. When I see the first cue mark, I
start the second projector, which then has 8 seconds to get fully up to speed.
At eight seconds, I see the second cue mark and hit the CHANGEOVER button
which simultaneously closes the dowser on the first projector and opens the
dowser on the second. If my timing is off, or if I miss the cue marks, the
audience is treated to anything from a half second of black to a very
embarrassing six seconds of countdown leader.

II. "YOU ARE A GOOD ROBOT SENT TO SAVE THE LAST HUMAN FAMILY FROM THE EVIL
ROBOTS"

BLVR: The Vladmasters have been in a ton of film festivals, and you actually
won the title of World Champion of Experimental Film a few times, which means,
by all standards, you are clearly a filmmaker. But at the same time, you're
not a filmmaker in the same way that pretty much everyone else is a filmmaker.

V: IN terms of the audience experience, which is of a visual and audio
narrative that takes place oer a pre-determined time line, I'm closer to
making films than anything else. I certainly feel comfortable beinga part of
film festivals. However, when I'm making things I don't think of them as
films, I think of them as stories. If I had my choice I think I'd go with the
very simple description "picture story."

BLVR: So then, if you had to place yourself in a lineage of directors,
filmmakers, or picture-story makers, where would you be? On your website it
says that you enjoy "the very early films of Rene Clair."

V: Although I love film, I don't often think in terms of cinematic models when
I'm working on a project. I get more caught up in the very strict parameters
(twenty-eight photographs over four disks) of the View-Master and I
concentrate on working things into that tight little structure. One of the
great delights in working with the form is in the moment of anticipation, in
the narrative disjunction, that comes in the jump from one frame to the next.
To me this jump feels more akin to turning a page in a storybook than to
smoother flow of a film narrative.

The one time I did look to cinematic models was working on Actaeon at Home. I
knew that that would be a show with live music and no narrator, so I was
trying to create a purely visual logic for the jumps from frame to frame. I
was inspired by early animation. Looking at something like Gertie the Dinosaur
or early Fritz the Cat cartoons you get a sense of these early animators' joy
in discovering the infinite malleable possibilities of lines in motion. There
is a glorious anarchic logic and infinitely transformative quality to those
worlds that I tried to capture, in stiffer form, in Actaeon.

BLVR: Another thing I want to ask you about is Portland, which, per capita,
seems like one of the most artistically exciting cities in the world right
now. It also seems, from the outside, like there are these very close-knit
artistic communities tying together all types of musicians, artists, and
filmmakers in a free-spirited sort of way.

V: I'm probably not the best person to talk about the Portland art scene just
because I'm very, very shy and mostly opt to retreat from the world. That
said, I probably never would have become a sort-of filmmaker if I hadn’t moved
to Portland and discovered organizations like the ones I mentioned above. When
I moved to Portland, after college, I had spent four years programming a
university film series and had a good background in foreign and classic film
history but no real concept of experimental or underground film. The only
models I had of regular people making films were unnecessary imitations of
Quentin Tarantino. Coming to Portland I discovered a whole other idea of
making films, films that were small, personal, homemade, and felt completely
apart from anything I had seen before. It was not unlike discovering, at the
age of 13, that there were people who made music that was not played on Top 40
radio stations.

BLVR: So how did your awakening to experimental film unfold? What directors
helped to usher you out of the "Top 40" of filmmaking?

V: I don’t know if experimental is exactly the right word for the films that
attracted me. I think I might more use the term handmade. Some of them were
certainly experimental, but just as many were simply small or personal or
homemade. One thing that happened a week or two after I moved to Portland was
that I went to a screening by the Tiny Picture Club. This is a Portland Super
8 collective. Their logo was like the Superman logo with an 8 replacing the S.
It was a very chilly November and the screening was in a tiny, unheated
Quonset hut. There were about 50 people crammed in there, sitting on the
floor, with musicians along one side of the room. They played along to about
10 different Super8 films about dreams. The films were all very small, simple,
and joyous. Much of the footage was hand-processed and scratchy. There was
some stop action animation. There were homemade costumes and masks. There was
an introductory film set to the T-Rex song “Bang a Gong.” In it all of the
members of the club wore white jumpsuits with their logo emblazoned on the
back. They were running around a park with their cameras. There was much
pixilated action made to make them look like they were flying, levitating,
rotating in circles on the ground on their bellies. The feeling I felt sitting
in that room and watching those films was exactly like the feeling of falling
in love.

BLVR: Do you make any handmade films yourself?

The only films I've made have been super8 films with the Tiny Picture Club.
The thing that I enjoyed most with films was trying out technical experiments.
I used to work in the Equipment Room for the film school at the Northwest Film
Center, so I had access to all kinds of super8 cameras and projectors. I built
a device that could control up to three super8 cameras simultaneously and
could run them at either eighteen frames per second or off of a
intervalometer. It was pretty cool but, other than filming some friends
playing soccer in a park one afternoon, I never really figured out anything
good to point the cameras at.

BLVR: You once said that Atari is one of your favorite art forms. You said you
liked the video games where you could still see the pixels. I'm curious if
this ties in with all of these homemade ideas. Without any of the
high-fidelity bells and whistles, it seems like there is less of a separation
between the artist-creator andthe viewer.

V: I think what you said about the lack of separation between creator and
viewer is exactly right. I like to be able to get a sense of craft and
humanness behind work. When I see the little pixels rolling by in an Atari
game, I think back to BASIC programming and how hard that little computer is
thinking and how hard the programmer had to work to put all those pixels in
just the right place.

I’m very bad at actually playing Atari games. I rarely make it past the first
level. However, similar to the viewmaster, I love them as absurd little
mini-narratives. The narratives are really what give form and understanding to
the pixels. If you take a game like Space Invaders or Galaga or even Frogger,
and watch it, forgetting the narrative, you’re left with the motion of
abstract colored forms. It’s only those couple of text windows at the
beginning (which nobody pays much attention to) that provide form for the
whole structure and objective of the game. One of my favorite mini-narratives
goes along with a game whose title escapes me at the moment — it’s the one
where you are a good robot sent to save the last human family from the evil
robots.

I’ve recently encountered some interesting Flash games online that return to a
completely abstract and non-narrative form of the video game. One in
particular is called Boomshine. It’s a field of slowly moving colored balls.
The objective is to click your mouse somewhere on the screen to create an
expanding ripple. Every ball this ripple touches turns into a new ripple. You
try to turn as many balls into ripples as possible with your single click.
It’s so simple that it doesn’t require directions, yet it’s also beautiful and
incredibly addictive.

BLVR: OK, I just played Boomshine for twenty minutes and I was in some sort of
weird trance with that game. Plus, you're right about the directions. To
figure the game out, you just get to resort to simple visual assumptions
(e.g., if I do A then B happens). In the context of this conversation, it
reminds me a little of the abstract filmmaking you've been mentioning, where
you're forced to start thinking things like "That thing over there is moving
fast, and the other thing is moving slow." It engages the mind in such a
different way than narrative film.

V: I’m very untrained when it comes to watching experimental film. I don’t
think I could make an abstract film if I tried because everything inside of my
head only knows how to operate on cause and effect. But I do like to sit back
and enjoy other people’s abstractions even if I’m always very self conscious
about not appreciating them in the right way. This might be why I like
Boomshine so much. You get cause and effect alongside your abstractions. I
can’t help but trying to make sense of everything I see whether I’m supposed
to or not.

BLVR: And finally, just to clarify, Vladimir is not your birth name, right?

V: I was never enamored of my birth name and I’d always planned on changing it
when I went off to college. But one day, when I was sixteen, one of my English
classes had a class assignment in which we were supposed to pair up and write
little essays about our partners based solely on looking up their name in a
few baby books. Maybe it was just my natural impulse toward sabotage, but it
seemed like the perfect opportunity to make the change. I had a sharpie and an
index card and I made myself a name tag introducing myself by my new name.
Ever since then, I’ve been Vladimir. I have now been Vladimir for almost half of my life

T-Shirts For Scavenger Project Exhibit Now Available

2009-10-26T14:28:00.009-08:00

Wow, what a beautiful T-Shirt! Go to the link below to find out more about this tremendous exhibit, scheduled to exhibit June 2010 at Form/Space Atelier. You have until January 5th to enter. Bon Chance!

http://arthousecoop.com/projects/scavengerproject#info

Rock The Terminal Art Market November 7, 2009, 6-10PM will be judged by Paul Pauper.

2009-10-15T16:23:00.001-07:00

Rock The Terminal Art Market November 7, 2009, 6-10PM will be judged by Paul Pauper.
Location: Art Not Terminal Gallery 2045 Westlake Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121

Form/Space Atelier Opening Reception Captured On Time Lapse

2009-09-22T22:44:00.007-07:00

Very cool time-lapse of Form/Space Atelier Opening Reception October 9.

Find it here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/espressobuzz/sets/72157622439692419/

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2009

2009-09-22T10:31:00.005-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2009

Show Title: From Industry to Information

Show Duration: October 9- November 8, 2009

Show Description: Seattle Photographer Dan Hawkins exhibits photographs of the abandoned Fisher Flour Mill on Harbor Island, Seattle. This exhibit marks the fourth exhibit of Hawkins photographs curated by Paul Pauper, his second consecutive solo exhibit (his first was December 2008) at Form/Space Atelier. Hawkins also exhibited a show curated by Paul Pauper at Angle Gallery 312 South Washington, Seattle in the Spring of 2008, and participated in a group show at Form/Space Atelier in April 2008. From Industry to Information combines sound installation in a site-specific intercession installed at great expense and technical deployment.

Curator's notes compiled by Emily J. Hoch, Assistant Curator Emeritus, Form/Space Atelier:

Walking with Dan Hawkins: Exploring and Photographing an Abandoned Mill

In the early afternoon of August 22nd, our car pulled up along the cracked sidewalk of an industrial district of Seattle. Photographer Dan Hawkins, sound artist Paul, and I hop out of the car. As our eyes move across the landscape taking in the graffiti-covered train yards and deserted cracked sidewalks, Dan quickly outlines our route to the mill, “Okay, so, we’re going to go down to the beach. If we see anyone, keep walking. If anyone talks to us, let me do the talking. We have to establish ourselves as people with a legitimate purpose in the area before we go any farther.” Dan’s tone is casual but matter of fact. He’s done this before. He knows where we’re going, how to get there and how to handle the various situations which may interfere with our mission.
As our small party walks towards the beach, I can’t help but notice the alien nature of the industrial landscape. Along the sidewalk to our left looms a tall cement wall topped with curls of barbed wire, and to our right train cars stand idly on their tracks, waiting patiently for use as rust grows on their bellies. I glance behind me at the high rise buildings of downtown Seattle that decorate the landscape with their glistening windows in the afternoon sun as if to remind us that we really are still in Seattle.
According to Dan, the best way to “establish ourselves” and avoid awkward questions is to change plans depending on the immediate situation. In other words, though our ultimate plan is to get to the abandoned mill, at the moment we played the role of beach combers. To solidify this impression, we sit on a log along the shoreline and pretend to collect shells.
Across the water from us is an enormous shipping barge. We hear steel clanging against steel and the whining of machines as they echo across the water providing a soundtrack for the urban wasteland around us. “You know,” Dan pipes up, “most people think Seattle runs on big companies like Boeing, Microsoft and Amazon. Big and corporate. But it doesn’t. It runs on blue collar jobs like this.” He gestures towards the ship. “Steel cutting, logistics, shipping… industry. But people don’t know that. People don’t see the industry of raw materials that keeps our economy running. These raw materials are our nature, and I want to reintroduce people to that.”
After satisfactorily establishing ourselves on the beach, Dan deems it safe for us to continue our trek to the mill. We have to keep close to the water to remain out of sight of people who may question our purpose. We scramble over sharp rocks laden with brown and green seaweeds piled against a vacant lot of cracked concrete until we arrive under the cover of a forgotten loading dock. Beneath the dock we climb through a shadowy gloom, over more rocks and around half-rotted pillars along the blue-green water.
At the edge of the loading dock Paul, and I pause as Dan goes ahead to scout our route and entry point into the mill. As we sit and wait for Dan to return with further instruction, I can’t help but feel like a refugee sneaking past border guards. The experience is both exhilarating and unwelcoming.
Dan returns and escorts us to a small cave-like entrance in the foundation through which we can enter the mill. As we enter the foundation we see evidence of scrappers in the form of multi-colored wires littering the dirt ground. Dan shakes his head. He is unhappy about how much the scrappers have destroyed the historic mill.
We enter the mill by contorting our bodies through a small man lift that brings us up to the first floor of the building. In the dark of the interior, we are disoriented and must wait for our eyes to adjust before continuing.
Dan strides ahead into the next room as Paul and I, having never been to the mill, stumble through the darkness, relying on the light of Dan’s cell phone to guide us to him. “We have to be quiet in this part of the building,” Dan tells knowledgeably. “We don’t know who else is here.” With that he leads us deftly through the building’s maze of stairs and rooms until we emerge quite suddenly onto a sunny rooftop between the mill’s two great rows of silos.
“Basically,” Dan summarizes as we pause on the roof, “there are four types of people who come into these buildings and photographers are the least of your problems. There are graffiti artists, who I don’t really mind –I just see that as another form of decay, but there are also scrappers and arsonists. Scrappers are just as bad as arsonists, because they destroy these old buildings. They take so much that the building can’t support itself anymore and it collapses. Abandoned buildings hold a lot of history about the city, and this mill is a part of Seattle’s story as much as it is a part of its landscape. To destroy it is to destroy a little of Seattle. That should be prevented.”
Dan decides to give us the “grand tour” of the mill and stops first in a room just off the landing, which houses a large old-fashioned boiler, browned with age. Dan pulls out his camera and positions it carefully to one side of the object. The light from the windows streams in and reflects off the few still-shiny surfaces left on the great metal machine. As he adjusts his camera for each picture, Dan explains his relationship to this industrial object: “You know, I’ve photographed this object many times, and each time it changes. It’s like having a conversation. It shows me how I’ve changed. …It shows me how we’ve changed.”
Excitedly, Dan shows us a new room that he found only recently. The room is situated on top of one of the rows of silos and can only be accessed by crossing the land bridge which connects the two silo rows about forty stories off the ground. As we crossed the bridge, sounds of clanging metal, beeping trucks and whining machinery from the outside world enter through the windows and reverberate through the hall like a ghostly reminder of the mill’s former use. At the end of the bridge I am disturbed to find what would be one of many birds to fly into the mill and then die after being unable to escape. The presence of the bird’s carcass in that lonely hall stimulates unavoidable associations with the mill’s own death after abandonment and its slow decay as the world outside forgot it and moved on.
Down a flight of stairs we come to a long room filled with curved yellow pipes which point toward the building’s exterior. A vibrant mixture of yellow, blue and once white walls, the room functioned as a grain distributor by pushing grain through the over-head ducts and funneling it though the pipes into the silos below. Today the room stands bare, having been stripped of its ability to function by scrappers who have taken the pipes and electrical power as they scavenged for copper and other sellable materials. Though now deprived of industrial purpose, the room’s long narrow shape, bright, simple colors and repetition in the piping still provide an aesthetically pleasing setting, which Dan notes as he carefully photographs the space.
Leaving the room of pipes we re-cross the land bridge and enter a dusty-gray space, which had the same function as the previous room, but is positioned over the opposite row of silos and houses different machinery. Though their tasks are the same as the pipes and ducts in the previous room, the machines of this room consist of rows of low-sitting conveyer belts which stretch the length of the room, visually extending its length through their horizontality. With conveyer belt next to conveyer belt pulling my eye along the length of the room, I understand Dan’s nickname for the space as “The Long Room.” Accented by the presence of thick, wooden pillars, which break up the space’s horizontality and provide a vertical balance, the former factory space suddenly transcends its original function and becomes an art space.
Desiring a view from the peak of the mill, our party sets out on the slow climb of flight after flight of stairs to reach the highest floor. When we become tired of walking inside, Dan leads us outside where we scurry up flights of steep, narrow, metal steps which scale the side of the mill. As the rest of us bustle upwards, enthused by the sense of adventure, Dan walks casually behind us, cell phone to his ear, nonchalantly flicking his hand at us to communicate directions. Dan’s familiarity with the abandoned mill and his ease within the environment could not be more obvious.
When, finally, the steps end, we crawl through an open window into a narrow hallway. Following the hallway we enter a room where we see evidence of scrappers: the piles of discarded metal parts littering the floor. A Snickers wrapper, caught in the scrapped metal shards, gives the room, now stripped of functionality, the atmosphere of a garbage dump. Dan taps with the side of his foot a mechanical part, which has been ripped from the metal lockers along the wall. “See,” he says, “this is what they do. Scrappers come into these old buildings and take whatever they want, but destroy the space in the process.” The space really had been destroyed. Not only has its functionality been taken away, but its clean, mechanical lines and structural shapes, so aesthetically pleasing in the mill’s other rooms, have been reworked into a series of crooked angles and inconsistencies. Stepping over nuts and bolts which scatter the floor, we move through the room and continue our ascent to the top of the mill.
After one more flight of stairs and a small metal ladder, we emerge into the bright light of day on the mill’s highest roof. The view is incredible. We see every ingredient of Seattle’s character spread beneath our feet: the high-rise buildings of downtown sparkling in the afternoon sun, homes neatly spread across the hills as well as the machines and cranes of the industrial districts. Strangely, however, despite our ability to observe the city sprawl across the hills, the people of Seattle didn’t seem to be able to see us. Instead we are oddly invisible as we stand on this industrial peak of the Seattle skyline observing the day as it unfolds below us.
As we begin our long climb back down those many flights of stairs, Dan makes a brief but humorous comment about reentry being like a descent into hell. I don’t really get his comment until we’ve gone done at least eight flights of stairs. Just above the lowest floors, an inky blackness hovers over the stairwell, cloaking all things, the stairs, our hands in front of our faces, in a rich, creamy, but utterly terrifying darkness. Suddenly, I understand Dan’s comment perfectly.
We descend down two flights of stairs. Since no one thought to bring a flashlight, we rely on Dan to lead the way. We step gently, out fingers tracing the wall or gripping the handrail while our feet tap ahead of us, feeling the ground for the possibility of more stairs. At the bottom of the stairs, light oozes in from some unseen window, and our eyes, previously starved of light, take in a vast, vaulted space with concrete pillars holding up cavernous ceilings. As Dan explains, the great vaulted spaces in the room’s ceiling were originally the homes of some large machine. He points one out to us explaining that he’s not sure how whoever takes these large machines gets them out of the building nor is he certain what happens to them, but every once in a while, another one disappears.
Dan tries to find us an alternative exit route out of the mill instead of taking us through the man lift hole we entered through. We move through the first level of the mill rattling windows and pulling on doors only to learn that our only promising method of escape was indeed our entrance route. As we walk to the man lift we pass the former women’s dressing room. A light is on in the room, inspiring an eerie sensation that this room within the vacant mill is inhabited. Inside, mirrors still hang on the women’s lockers and the toilets still flush. Large tables and a stove are set up in the room making it seem inhabitable. As I look at the broken pottery and scattered debris covering the floor, I can’t help but feel as though we are standing in a ghostly time warp, or a space trapped between the back then and the right now, of daily use and of its current state of abandonment.
Our exit via our entry route into the building allows us a quick and deft escape from the building. Our plan had been to retrace our steps along the shoreline and under the loading dock, but to our dismay the tide has come in too high for us to successfully continue on this route. Changing our tactics, Dan leads us on a on a winding maze that zigzags around parked semi trucks and through bushes. Suddenly we can go no farther following this route –the brush grows too thickly against the side of the semi to allow us to pass. Quickly changing our plan again we assume the role of lost beach combers and march smartly across the workers’ lot to “ask for directions.” Though at first confused and upset by our presence in an industrial workspace, the manager of the worksite eventually leads us through the field of semis and along the rusted railroad tracks to the edge of the vast concrete field we had originally crossed to get to the water’s edge. There, waiting for us, is the car. We all pile in and drive across the cracked concrete, lined with crumbling walls and rippled chain link fences –back to the city and away from the urban decay with only our impressions, Paul’s sounds and Dan’s photos to remind us of the mill’s ghostly presence along the Seattle skyline.

Walking with Dan:
A Chronological Description of an Afternoon with Dan Hawkins

At 1:40 P.M. on August 22nd, 2009, Dan, Paul and I begin walking towards the mill from the North. Our intent is to move towards the beach and pretend to be beach combers in order to establish ourselves.
1:55 P.M.: We pause on the beach in order to establish our presence before moving on.
2:15 P.M.: To avoid being seen as we continue toward the mill, we creep along the shore towards the cover of an abandoned loading dock.
2:25 P.M.: We reach the end of the loading dock that stands closest to the mill. Paul and I pause while Dan moves ahead to scout the best point of entry into the mill.
2:30 P.M.: We enter the mill on its Northeast side through a small hole in its foundation. To enter the mill’s interior we climb up through a man lift.
2:40 P.M.: We move through the dusty silence of the mill. We walk through the old manufacturing rooms and climb a flight of stairs along the far wall.
2:45 P.M.: On the landing, we step through a door and emerge into the bright sunlight of one of the lower rooftops.
2:50 P.M.: We reenter the building and move into another room, which houses a large old-fashioned boiler. Dan pauses to photograph the boiler, and comments that it is one of his favorite objects in the mill to photograph.
2:55 P.M.: To access the next room of our tour, we cross the land bridge which connects the two rows of silos.
3:00 P.M.: Along the top of the silo at the end of the land bridge, lies a long, narrow room, which once functioned as a grain distributor for the silos.
3:15 P.M.: After taking a few photos, Dan leads us back across the land bridge to the room which holds the same function as the previous one though along the opposite set of silos.
3:25 P.M.: Desiring a view from the mill’s highest point, our party sets out on the slow climb up flight after flight of stairs to reach the highest floor.
3:35 P.M.: On the mill’s highest landing, we scurry up a small metal ladder, which leads us to the highest rooftop. Standing on the mill’s peak we can see all parts which make up Seattle: the industrial stock yards, the business-focused sky-scrapers of downtown, and the residential areas.
3:40 P.M.: We reenter the mill and begin the long descent down to its base. Towards the bottom we encounter an inky blackness and Paul and I must rely on the light of Dan’s cell phone to guide us through the darkness.
3:45 P.M.: At the base of the stairs lies a gloomy, concrete space with tall cavernous ceilings, which, according to Dan, originally housed huge, oval machines.
3:55 P.M.: As we search for an alternative exit route out of the mill, we stumble into the old women’s locker room. The light in the room was on, casting an eerie glow through the rest of the dark interior.
4:05 P.M.: We exit the same way we entered, though the man lift. We retrace our steps under the loading dock and along the shoreline only to find that the tide had come in and the water is too high to allow us to pass.
4:10 P.M.: Adjusting our purpose and our route, we march into the workers’ yard pretending to be lost beach combers asking for directions.
4:15 P.M.: The manager of the worksite leads us back to our car, which we climb into to drive back to the city.

Form/Space Atelier Exhibit for September 2009

2009-08-26T19:14:00.004-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Exhibit for September 2009

Show Title: Program

Show Duration: September 11- October 4, 2009

Opening Reception September 11, 6PM, as part
of Belltown Second Friday Artwalk www.belltownartwalk.com

“Program” is a collection of Lynn Schirmer’s autobiographical large-scale figurative paintings, drawings, and other products. These recent works explore in more detail methods of external control, identity, and how experiences impact our sense of physicality. At the (opening) reception, audiences will have the opportunity to program Schirmer, or alter her mental state, by interacting with the elements in one particular piece.

Lynn Schirmer received her BFA from University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana and studied at the Atelier of Seattle Academy of Fine Art (now Gage Academy).

Artist’s website: http://www.lynnschirmer.com

Attached image:
Schirmerprogram.jpg

Detail of: “The 4 Corners, (Corrupted Over Time)”
Pastel on drafting film and colored paper
7’ x 7’
2009

Curator's notes:

I had known of Lynn Schirmer's artwork for some years previous to becoming associated with her professionally in 2007. Our professional association came about as a result of an exhibit in February of 2006 I curated at 1907 2nd Avenue, Seattle, the first geographic location of Form/Space Atelier. In the course of planning the exhibit in late 2005, I met artist Julia Gfrorer ( www.thorazos.net ) a member of Cult of Youth art group. Julia Gfrorer soon after taking part in the Cult of Youth group exhibit at 1907 2nd Avenue in February 2006, recommended me to Lynn Schirmer for a curator's position at Angle Gallery, where Schirmer was director.
I contacted Lynn Schirmer and forwarded my credentials and curriculum vitae. I was instantly and poignantly impressed with Lynn's striking combination of astute professionalism and courtesy in her person, with the well-wrought and absolutely original expression of her artwork. Lynn hired me to curate Angle Gallery, I filled out the necessary paperwork as required by Artspace Projects, Inc., and I was given the keys to Angle Gallery.
During my tenure as curator of Angle Gallery, there were several outstanding exhibits; paintings by Sam Birchman come to mind, as does an exhibit of collagraphs by a collaboration of a White-Eyed Conure parrot called Carlos and a human named Steven Schrock.
There were also trying times at Angle Gallery. The familiar curator's landscape of artists failing to meet press deadlines, delivery obligations and failing to honor contracts; the usual problems with artists "acting famous". Lynn was a stalwart redoubt of leadership during these tribulations, a bulwark of managerial acumen executed with spectacular diplomacy.
I curated Lynn Schirmer's first show at Form/Space Atelier in March 2008; comprised of sculpture, painting and drawing by Lynn Schirmer with an opening reception dais by independent art critics Jim Demetre, Jae Carlsson and Steven Vroom. Lynn Schirmer presented a collection of mixed-media sculpture, as well as paintings and drawings on the theme of attachment. Some pieces referred directly to the late 1950‘’s-era experiments of psychologist Harry Harlow on rhesus monkeys. Others were the result of self reflection on her attachments, negative and positive, and how these have affected her sense of security and identity. The show utilized an ingenious variety of site-specific sculpture in a multitude of materials. Plaster limbs floated in a re-purposed construction netting. Two six-foot-long carved closed-cell insulation foam clitorises nearly touched over the gallery's dramatic stairwell space. Small paintings on one wall.
I contacted Lynn Schirmer a little while after Harlow Monkey asking if she would exhibit again at Form/Space Atelier in the near future, she declined at that time because she was to busy dealing with the aftermath of the the death of her friend Su Job. She suggested postponing Program for the Fall of 2009. Program will be her second consecutive solo show at Form/Space Atelier, and undoubtedly another magnificent critical triumph.

Form/Space Atelier Exhibit August 14- Sep 6, 2009 Show Title: Outskirts Show Duration: August 14- September 6, 2009

2009-07-30T16:19:00.005-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Exhibit August 14- Sep 6, 2009

Show Title: Outskirts

Show Duration: August 14- September 6, 2009

Opening Reception August 14, 6PM as part of the Belltown 2nd Friday ArtWalk; www.belltownartwalk.com

Outskirts is a site-specific infiltration using photographs and a kiosk to narrate a previous site-specific exhibit by Paula Rebsom developed during a residency at the Ucross Foundation in a Wyoming prairie dog metropolis. Outskirts is Rebsom's first solo show at Form/Space Atelier and her second show at Form/Space Atelier overall. Portland-based Rebsom is the recipient of the Jan Zach Award for excellence in sculpture and the AAA Dean's Fellowship Award from the University of Oregon, where she received her MFA.

Eric Kellogg II comments on Paula Rebsom:

My favorite show in Portland this year (2006) was Paula Rebsom at the Tilt Gallery. Her work is amazing. She brings a whole new flair to photography. Her photographs were of massive wood structures, cut out in the shape of wolves. Honestly, you have to see the work. It reminds me of Bev Doolittle—when I was younger, I would spend hours gazing at my mother's Doolittle collection. When I saw Rebsom's work I had to keep coming back, sometimes twice a day. In my opinion, Paula Rebsom is the Bev Doolittle of the contemporary photography world.

Jeff Jahn comments on Paula Rebsom:

Probably the best local show up is "When I can't be here, I go there" at Tilt gallery (run by PORT's own Jenene Nagy, I just can't ignore this gem, which comes on the heels of several other decent to good shows). In addition, "WICBTIGT" is the auspicious debut of recent University of Oregon MFA grad Paula Rebsom who seems to have become ten times the artist she was 6 months ago. With just two large format images Rebsom constructs impressive somewhat pensive scenes of moody artifice but it's the little touches that win the day here, including the conceptual installation.

What I like here is that unlike Gregory Crewdson and to a lesser extent Thomas Demand, Rebsom's scenes are studies in revealed staging and rather spoiled artifice.

It is a nice installation as the two photos (one is a front yard, the other is of the back yard) seem to long for one another's phoniness… its like Breakfast at Tiffanies only with Joan Crawford as Holly and Mickey Rooney cast as Paul "Fred" Varjak not the intolerable landlord. That effect would be icky but you would have to watch that trainwreck.

Back to the photos, the house itself seems to be a non-entity, a prop for the props which sets up some nice rythms for the rest of the show. Also, like Ad Reinhardt paintings they need to be seen in person as tiny internet images can't possibly provide enough detail or contrast to represent them well. It is a nice touch of phoniness that demands there be no subsitutes.

The front yard photo, "North Dakota Badlands," sports a tiny dandelion in the extreme foreground, which highlights the simple and artificial cutout steppes in front of the ranch house and in "Howling Coyote" we can practically hear the yelping of a film foley that will never be added to this acknowledged contrivance. It's all chicanery and there is something refreshingly honest about the gloom here. Apparently all of it was accomplished with existing lighting, yet it hardly feels like an indie filmmaker's work and more like a darker and still cousin to Terry Gilliam's strange film, The Adventures of Baron Von Munchausen.

In the crowded genre of cinematic and staged large format photography Rebsom has come right out of school with something to say of her own. It isnt behind the scenes but its rather refreshing that she doesnt try to delight her audience so much as not make any promises that her work can't keep. For me it delivered more. By Jeff Jahn, October 11, 2006.

Paula Rebsom comments on her work:

Outskirts

I could hear the prairie dogs barking miles before I arrived in their desolate town 5 miles down a dirt road from Ucross, Wyoming, population 25. As I got out of my vehicle to survey the location for a new suburban development, a family of pronghorn circled me curiously and marked their territory along the way. The road I walked along was littered with bullet casings. The prairie dogs continued to bark as they scattered to their burrows for safety. As they disappeared into their extensive network of underground tunnels a ghostly stillness settled over the town. All that remained were a few bleached prairie dog skulls and scat that I found lying next to their burrows.

All this was very familiar to me having grown up in western North Dakota. As a young girl I thought prairie dogs were cute animals you fed crackers to, as a teenager I shot them for sport (an act I am not proud of), and as a young adult I educated people on the importance of prairie dogs in the ecosystem as a ranger for Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Although prairie dogs are small and seemingly harmless animals they are quite controversial. Farmers and ranchers see them as competition for acreage and their burrows as a danger to livestock. Ecologists consider them a keystone species playing a central role in the survival of many endangered species that prey on them or use their burrows for nesting.

This new suburban development I scouted on the 22,000-acre ranch that houses the Ucross Foundation was not for humans, but rather for the prairie dogs themselves. I constructed 85 small house facades, each with its own set of pleated curtains, to be placed in a very active portion of a prairie dog town. Over the course of three days, I staked one house behind each existing burrow, creating a visual map of the prairie dog town. For the remainder of my stay I spent the mornings and early afternoons (when prairie dogs are most active) observing their interactions with this new development. Instead of embracing this new suburban utopia, the prairie dogs abandoned the heart of the town. Only the young, naive ones remained in the homes on the outskirts.

The installation in the prairie dog town on the Ucross ranch combined elements of urban sprawl, homesteads, and ghost towns. My role fluctuates between that of a rancher, a deputy, and a park ranger, leaving room for an ambiguous narrative to form within the sequence of images. In the Outskirts project I explored my own personal relationship with these animals and also created a domestic paradox of human and animal relationships that balances on the edge of absurdity. The images act as historical documents, offering a different perspective in the complex relationships that we have developed with animals and nature.

Form/Space Atelier Opening Reception Party July 10, 2009 Show Title: Joe Reno House of Orange

2009-07-12T13:14:00.006-07:00

Form/Space Atelier Program for July 2009

2009-06-27T13:49:00.008-07:00

Joe Reno, American b. 1943, "The House of Orange", oil on panel, 16x48 inches, 2009.

Form/Space Atelier Program for July 2009

Show Title: The House of Orange

Show Duration: July 10- August 9, 2009

Opening Reception July 10, 6PM, as part
of Belltown Second Friday Artwalk www.belltownartwalk.com

Joe Reno studied at the Art Students League of New York and has exhibited paintings and sculpture in Seattle since the 1970's. Matthew Kangas wrote criticism of Joe Reno's work in Kangas' recently published book "Relocations".

Sample image:

http://www.seattleweekly.com/photoGallery/?gallery=302371

I met Joe Reno at the Ballard Goodwill. I was looking over Reno's shoulder at a 12-string guitar that had seen better days. The little kiosk was peopled with a Goodwill employee talking with Joe about the finer points of a print he had in his hand, and in the course of the conversation Joe mentioned his name to the employee, and I took notice of him, having been familiar with Joe Reno's name for some 30 years. I entered the discussion, introducing myself to Joe as a friend of Edd Cox, the owner of Gold Shoe Studios in 619 Western. Within a few minutes, we had agreed to the larger ideas of an exhibit proposal at Form/Space Atelier the following year.
As the months passed, Joe and I periodically talked on the phone, and I suggested he begin a new series of paintings on nine mahogany panels I had constructed. This became the organizing principle behind the exhibit proposed for July 2009 at Form/Space Atelier.
In February 2009, Joe and Ree Brown (see below * ) came to Form/Space Atelier during regular business hours and familiarized themselves with the space and I gave Joe six of the nine panels. He began working on the panels immediately and I received progress reports from Joe throughout the Spring of 2009.
I agreed in April 2009 to meet Joe at his house to view the paintings he had been working on. I found the old pickup in front of his house and ducked through the Alice-In-Wonderland cubbyhole in a gargantuan, towering laurel hedge, into a plein-air studio which is Reno's front yard. This mass of shapes and colors is the antecedent to the interior of the Reno residence, Joe's home since 1950. The nearly six decades have been diligently spent by Joe accumulating the peculiar wealth of artwork, art supplies, domestic effluvium, homespun ephemera and antique bric-a-brac which rivals Francis Bacon, though with a distinctly Northwest melody humming through Reno's home studio.
Joe offered me a glass of orange juice and I declined. We ascended the narrow staircase to the second storey of his home and entered the nerve center of Reno's creative expression command headquarters. The title painting "The House of Orange" sat finished in an easel facing the door as I walked in. To the left, backlit from the window providing Reno with the necessarily academic north light, was his palette. The painting and the palette looked like mother and child, both bestrewn with common hues, and the palette was caked with a residual impasto almost a half inch thick. About the room were several other paintings in the series. I photographed them, Joe and I talked more about the exhibit at Form/Space Atelier, and also about many Northwest artists Joe has known over time.
Joe and I transported the paintings and some small sculptures Joe had added to the exhibit to Form/Space Atelier in June 2009 in the huge male vehicle which is Joe's old Ford. Joe drove with deft skill, having learned as a driver in the Army. He was fast but precise. The paintings arrived safely. I may have added a grey hair to my dwindling supply of swarthy locks in the process.
Joe Reno is a unique Northwest painter and sculptor. I hope he is collected soon by SAM and other institutions.

Following Essay Reprint Courtesy Suzanne Beal.

The house is easy to find. It has an immense hedge, hot-pink trim, and a dilapidated 1969 Ford truck parked out front. It's a standout even by Ballard standards. And it suits Joe Reno to a T. He's lived in it since his family moved here from Everett in 1950, when he was 5 years old. Reno says he doesn't need to go anywhere: "I travel with my mind."The house is full of art. No, make that overflowing with art. Prints and paintings cover the walls, but just as many are set directly on the floor. There are piles of etchings and block prints spilling off the tables, which, in turn, are surrounded by various vintage printing presses that take up the better part of what may have formerly been a living room. Reno tells me he recently got rid of his stove to make room for more storage. It doesn't sound like he used it much anyway, preferring the gourmet meals of curator and critic Matthew Kangas, with whom he's enjoyed hundreds of dinners in a friendship that dates to 1980. "Twenty-six years of gobbly gobbly gobbly, yum yum yum," Reno says. He's shown his appreciation to Kangas—whom he describes as a phenomenal cook—with a number of drawn pieces. Kangas isn't alone in accepting Reno's work. A number of collectors have known Reno since his Ballard High days.
"You barter much?" I ask. "You bet," he replies. "Food, medical, dental bills...." He flashes me a winning smile.
Reno's talk is casually peppered with the names of legendary Northwest arts figures, such as Morris Graves, who praised the young artist's efforts when they showed together in 1967, and Guy Anderson, who owned a Northwest Coast Native American mask that served as the model for Reno's drawing Guy's Dog. (Anderson introduced Reno to the joys of Pernod as well.) Too young to be part of the Mystic School himself, Reno nevertheless has strong mystical leanings. He believes, for example, that American artists—and Northwest artists in particular—benefit from a psychic power emanating from our natural surroundings. His conversation is interspersed with two prominent phrases: "To make a long story short" and "What I'm driving at is this." We rarely get there, but it matters not at all. His work, like his conversation, is a joyride. At one point, he spontaneously breaks into song. Complimented on his voice, he replies, "Oh, well, I was using that high one, but I have two better ones."His art reveals multiple voices as well. "Joe Reno: Works on Paper Retrospective," now entering its final week at the Kirkland Arts Center, displays about 50 prints and paintings from three decades of work, all of them owned by Kangas (the exhibit's curator). They cover an impressive amount of stylistic ground. Figure Study (1996), for example, shows an almost calligraphic reclining female figure in egg tempera and ink that recalls Edwin Dickinson's penchant for rapidly executed portraits done in a single sitting. (And no wonder: Reno studied with Dickinson in New York.) But more impressive are Reno's abstract works, some of which playfully reproduce Mark Tobey's "white writing" in color. (Wall Painting of '48, done in 2000, is at left.) Other works, including a number of landscapes, exhibit an intense expressionism. Made up of shimmying lines in electric colors, Olympic Mountains, February, and Self-Portrait 12/30/96 reveal passion, frenzy, and unrest.Reno embodies the creative pluralism of the Northwest while remaining a native son. Though his work is in a number of Northwest institutions, including the Henry and Tacoma Art Museum, it also shows up in less-established venues, such as his old high school, where he created a 16-foot mural of Golden Gardens Park for the hallway west of the library. The Kirkland show exhibits an astounding range of styles that reference the Northwest's best-known artists, but ultimately reveals Reno's particular vision: His writhing marks suggest half-submerged animal and human forms, and the people and places of the Puget Sound radiate with intensity and pulsing color. Reprint courtesy Suzanne Beal/Seattle Weekly.

* Ree Brown
Born in Utah, Ree worked for a petroleum company in Seattle and San Mateo, California, until the late 1960's when he decided to return to Seattle and retire. Along with his partner, Ree scoured western Washington for antiques and then "peddled what we could, but there really wasn't much money in it." In the mid 1970's Ree began to draw, and then paint, pictures of "no one in particular", scenes containing birds, cats, and people. Ree paints his delicate paintings onto scraps of paper, cardboard, bits of matting, brown paper bags, and just about anything else that will hold paint. "I was always interested in art," says Ree. In the late 1980’s, Ree's paintings caught the attention of MIA Gallery who began to show his work.

Currently, Ree is represented by Seattle-based Garde Rail Gallery, and in several galleries across the U.S. Ree is also included in 20th Century American Folk, Self-Taught, and Outsider Art by Betty-Carol Sellen.

Shannon Barry at Form/Space Atelier June 12- July 5, 2009

2009-06-03T17:04:00.006-07:00

Shannon Barry at Form/Space Atelier. Amazing talent. Contact gallery for details.

Form/Space Atelier Photographer Dan Hawkins and my Friend Eva Isaksen--TOGETHER!!

2009-05-23T15:46:00.002-07:00

Wow! What a blockbuster this is! Form/Space Atelier represented photographer Dan Hawkins and Eva Isaksen, both friends of mine at SAM gallery. You must see this show!

Form/Space Atelier Assistant Curator Emily Hoch, Curator and Impresario Paul Pauper and unidentified art collector at "Beautiful Simple" party 5/8/09.

2009-05-23T14:42:00.004-07:00

A great party, a great exhibit.

2009-05-20T14:00:00.002-07:00

Buy or barter Raleigh Briggs book "Make Your Place; Affordable, Sustainable Nesting Skills", written and illustrated by Raleigh: letsgiveuptheghost@gmail.com

Shannon Barry...................................................at Form/Space Atelier June 12- July 5

2009-05-15T16:49:00.027-07:00

Shannon Barry exhibits at Form/Space Atelier June 12- July 5. Opening reception June 12, 6pm.

Form/Space Atelier Program for June 2009

Show Title: The Quiet Society

Show Duration: June 12- July 5, 2009

Opening Reception June 12, 6PM, as part
of Belltown Second Friday Artwalk www.belltownartwalk.com

Shannon Barry studied in the atelier of Mark Kang-O'Higgins at the Gage Academy of Art, Seattle. The Quiet Society is her second consecutive solo exhibition at Form/Space Atelier, and her third, and possibly final, exhibit overall at the gallery.

Artist's Statement:

This series is called The Quiet Society because the central characters, despite their different surroundings, all share a common relaxed state.-Shannon Barry

Curator's Notes:

Shannon Barry eschews obfuscation at every chance she can, and her art is no exception. Ms. Barry has a great degree of skill as an artist, and has distinguished herself as an academic through her study at the atelier of Mark Kang O'Higgins, and since passing from Gage, formidable and sustained self-study of art literature, New York museum visits and consistent studio practice. Anyone familiar with the curriculum at the Gage Academy of Art is aware of the rigorous battery of daily life study, unquestionably the time-honored truth of an artist's training. Draftsmanship cannot be faked, where it is required for freehand expression. Ms. Barry is an outstanding draftsperson, along the lines of Lucien Freud, Alice Neel and Wayne Thiebaud. Ms. Barry paid homage to Thiebaud's hand in a years-long series of donuts and coffee cups in oil on canvas, her primary medium. She was living across the street from Top Pot Donuts at the time, and this series was a visual report, almost anthropological, of her environment at the time. This series was also Ms. Barry's first commercial success, her first collector purchasing a work from her which has fixed her current rate of value. A curated showing of this series was exhibited as part of a group show at Form/Space Atelier in April 2008.
Ms. Barry next began a series of large-scale abstract landscapes of clouds in bright, cartoon-like renderings. As a curator, I find this series to be a bold expression, and as art objects, these paintings are extremely original, eye-catching and elicit happy emotions in virtually every observer. The case for a therapeutic work of art could definitely be made with Ms. Barry's Clouds series. The "wow" factor was recorded by this curator, who sat with these paintings in an exhibit at Form/Space Atelier in August of 2008, "wow" being the consistent ejaculation of those visiting the exhibit during the duration of the show.
With the advent of the Quiet Society in June 2009, Ms. Barry returns to production of large-scale figures in oil on canvas. The characters in these paintings, with the exception of a work after John Singer Sargent, are the product of Ms. Barry's imagination. She is sure of her expression with this series. Her drafting, color-mixing and compositional skills are synergized in masterstrokes.

Form/Space Atelier Integrative Intervention; "Beautiful Simple" drawings by Dipika Kohli

2009-04-14T18:21:00.004-07:00

Design Kompany will be exhibiting some new artwork at Form/Space Atelier.

Save the date for the opening reception on Friday, May 8.

Beautiful Simple
Drawings by DK
Form/Space Atelier
2407 First Avenue
Belltown, Seattle

Form/Space Atelier Program for April 2009

2009-04-02T13:31:00.002-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program for April 2009

Show Title: Postcards From Footsteps: Explorations of Unique and Universal

Show Duration: April 10- May 3

Opening Reception April 10, 6PM as part of the Belltown Art Walk www.belltownartwalk.com

Kristen Elsbeth Dallum graduated from the University of Washington School of Art with a BFA in Interdisciplinary Visual Arts. She has worked with youth artists at Arts Corp, Seattle, finding creative solutions to individual and group efforts, and at Camp Sealth, Vashon Island, where Form/Space Atelier Curator Paul Pauper lived from 10 years old until he was 25, and Pauper still has many family members living there. Postcards From Footsteps: Explorations of Unique and Universal is Kristen Elsbeth Dallum's first solo photography exhibit at Form/Space Atelier. The photographs are editions of one, and are 8x10 inches. Prices are $200 each. Exhibit is free.

Exhibit Description:

This collection of images was created from that which I have photographed
digitally over the past few years; presented for your consideration in black and white as a commentary on contrast, these are the only existing prints of these images, each singularly available as an experiment in detachment. Each image has been gathered from my personal encounters with charming coincidence. Contrast speaks of borders and boundaries, which serve multitudes of functions. They foster controversy, cooperation, and conversation. Where we place them or determine them to fall creates consequences of our choosing, conscious or otherwise. They offer to amplify our stark differences along with our stunning similarities. The paths we tread speak of our intentions as well as our innately wondrous nature, our
knowledge and our imagination. What we choose to uphold and herald, what we choose to abolish and ignore: it is all there in the borders. Beginnings, endings, pivotal circumstances, conclusions, changes and continuity are available, abundant. Thank you for looking!

Attached JPEG: Untitled, copyright 2008, Kristen Dallum.

Form/Space Atelier Upcoming Exhibits

2009-03-18T13:13:00.017-08:00

April 2009 Kristen Elsbeth Dallum- B&W Photography
May 2009 Dipika Kohli- Drawings and Installation "Beautiful Simple" http://www.design-kompany.com/
June 2009 Shannon Marie Barry- Paintings: Figural "The Quiet Society"
July 2009 Joe Reno Paintings "The House of Orange"
August 2009 Paul Rebsom, First solo exhibit at Form/Space Atelier, 2nd exhibit overall, photography and sculpture, www.paularebsom.com, http://oregonartsblog.typepad.com/photos/rebsom/outskirts_2007_working_print2.html
September 2009 Lynn Schirmer http://www.lynnschirmer.com/
October 2009 Dan Hawkins-Photography http://danhawkinsphotography.net/
November 2009 TBA
December 2009 Sam Birchman- Paintings
January 2010 John Monson- Paintings: Abstract
February 2010 Matthew Kandegas-Paintings: Postminimalist http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Kandegas
March 2010- Juliette Fretté - Paintings
April 2010- Kristen Dallum - Photographs/New Media "54th Statehood Exposition"
May 2010- Elara Tanguy - Paintings
June 2010- Michael Lane - Paintings
July 2010- Vladmaster - New Media
August 2010- Mick Lorusso - Multiple Media
October 2010- Dan Hawkins- Photos, Bethlehem, PA
November 2010- Megan Hosch-Schmidt- Interdisciplinary
December 2010- Samuel Birchman - Paintings
January 2011- John Monson - Paintings
February 2011- Beili Liu- Site-Specific Installation

Paul Pauper Testifies In Washington Legislature, January 31, 2008

2009-03-11T09:40:00.008-08:00

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Form/Space Atelier Program for March 2009

2009-02-22T18:29:00.005-08:00

Form/Space Atelier program for March 2009

Show Title: The Return Of the Amazing Daredevil Bears

Show Duration: March 13- April 5

Opening Reception March 13 as part of the Belltown Art Walk www.belltownartwalk.com

Aaron Murray exhibits his recent character series, the Daredevil Bears at Form/Space Atelier. Timing isn't everything, as the sage once quipped, it's the ONLY thing; the stock market has been overrun recently with the carefree, devil-may-care, Daredevil Bears. Aren't they lovable? For sure.

Aaron Murray is a visual artist, educator, and shop keeper in Seattle, WA. Murray owns a shop called Nancy with his wife Kate, www.nancynancynancy.com Murray teaches art at several Seattle community centers, is an active member of the Capitol Hill Watercolor Society, and has been making and selling art since 1990.

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2009

2009-01-29T17:50:00.013-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For February 2009

Show Title: Trombones Jaunes

Show Duration: February 13- March 8

Opening Reception: February 13, 6PM as part of Belltown Art Dealers Assn.
Second Friday Artwalk www.belltownartwalk.com

Postminimalist painter Matthew Kandegas exhibits his yearly crop of paperclip
paintings, this time they are yellow paperclips on pink grounds. The images
are becoming more vague and ambiguous. As the world goes paperless, the
paperclip rides the vagaries of necessity. The scale of the paintings come
in two sizes; 18x36 and 48x96 inches. All are oil on panel save one which is
oil on fabric mounted to panel. Show curated by Paul Pauper, exhibit is
free. As a sociological intervention, wherein commerce is deliberately and creatively altered, Form/Space Atelier will pay collectors one american dollar for the rights to adopt one 18x36 inch Matthew Kandegas painting. Contact gallery for details.

Postminimalist Artist Matthew Kingston Kandegas was born December 29, 1960 in a poor section of south Seattle called White Center. He formally trained with Seattle art instructors Norman Lundin and Sharon Munger. Kandegas' work reflects the Postminimalist echo of simpler times when the hand was used to create things, such as works on paper, and how the obsolescence of paper (and the paper-clip by extension) fulfills the ultimate Postminimalist destiny of complete separation of artist and artwork. He had his first exhibit of his work in November 2007 at Form/Space Atelier at the advanced age of 45 and is represented by Form/Space Atelier, Seattle. He has become known for his paintings of paperclips and association with Kyle MacDonald, a performative artist and author of One Red Paper Clip... a book detailing MacDonalds art performance wherein he traded 14 times from a paperclip to a house. Kandegas is in the private collections of MacDonald and Lindsay Daniel, and the public collections of The Low Income Housing Institute, Cascade People's Center and other charitable organizations. His next scheduled exhibit is February 2010 at Form/Space Atelier, Seattle.

Postminimalist painter Matthew Kingston Kandegas grew up feeling the harshness and anger of White Center, a ghetto of Seattle, caused by the pall of stadium rock of the 1970s. He was born into a family of three children and a father who was a simple factory worker of Danish descent. It is sufficient to say that Kandegas’s early life has very little to do at all with his eventual career as an artist. Kandegas did not have access to any artistic materials, coming from a poor family, although he thoroughly enjoyed when his grandfather allowed the children to experiment with his paintball gun. As a child, his torment was soothed somewhat by reveries of living someday in a travel trailer on the campus of the University of Washington with his younger brother Odd, where his mother, Kristin Kuniholm had been a sorority girl at Sigma Kappa sorority and graduated Summa Cum Laude in Visual Communication. Since marrying Kandegas's father, her life was one of penury and privation, though she made sure her son Matthew understood the subtle but distinct difference between matters of the heart, as an inexplicable attraction to a bad person, and art; the creation of the sublime and sacred. Kristin Kuniholm was descended from the Finnish indigenous people Sami, and her family was known as a tribe of shaman in Vasa, Finland prior to emigrating to Seattle in 1850. Her grandfather Kuniholm was a famous Seattle area wicker-worker at Five Corners on Queen Anne hill.

His real beginnings as an artist began when Kandegas left home at 14 to financially aid his family and earn a living for himself. Like thousands of others, Kandegas changed from one dismal job to the next, extremely discouraged by the misery and hopelessness around him. As a sensitive and intuitive person, Kandegas was compelled to respond and decided to look into art as a hobby. He could not afford art school, so he attended simple life drawing classes three times a week, and in his free time studied reproductions in the Seattle Public Library. He enjoyed the works of post-impressionists, such as Modigliani, Van Gogh and Cézanne, especially the expressionist works of George Grosz, Otto Dix and Max Beckmann. These expressionist works demonstrated a means of expressing the anger Kandegas felt during the popularity of stadium rock. Kandegas considered himself a post-minimalist, and is generally considered the "forgotten" post-minimalist because his work
has been exhibited only twice during his lifetime, though he has donated many of his paintings to charity, including Lihi, Cascade People's Center. He was a shipyard worker and sketched maritime scenes while working as a firewatch under a shower of white hot slag and deafening roar of pneumatic guns and compressed air.

Throughout the 1970s, Kandegas continued to hone and refine his skills, whilst experimenting with his homemade paints, unable to afford others. He was ultimately a very self-taught artist, but this leaves him free from artistic conventions that would have been learned in art school, though he was academically trained at the University of Washington, taking studio classes with Norman Lundin, and elsewhere at the atelier of Sharon Munger.

In the late 1970s, two important social realists arrived in Seattle – Art Munny and Lotta Loven. Their images were realistic representations of harsh truths seen in society that characterised stadium rock. This had a great effect on Kandegas’s work, as he too, begins to explore confronting truths of stadium rock. However, Kandegas’s work began to take more shape in the next decade, the “Angry Decade” of the 1980s, as the artists respond the horror of marijuana abuse, incensed by the abolishment of hope, just after stadium rock appeared to be clearing up.

From Kandegas’s perceptive response to the world around him, he was recognised by two people - Art Munny and Lotta Loven. These two saw connections between Kandegas’s work and other artists, angry too at the social situation. Art Munny and Lotta Loven were members of the Nowadays Arts Society, set up to promote these emerging artists, known as the Recentists. The Society was set up in 1978 by Mark Hofer, in opposition to the Hoquiam Academy of Art, which was believed to promote conservative art and not the Recentists.

The Recentists included Albert Kandegas, Joy F. Sexton, Siddhartta Sunshine, John Longfellow, Arthur Drawbridge and Jean-Noel Vandaele. These artists met to discuss material on a regular basis. Kandegas enjoyed being part of what he saw as a like-minded group of artists, all focused on producing works along similar themes, in response to marijuana abuse, stadium rock and moral denigration. The artists also brought influences from European movements such as Surrealism, Cubism, Expressionism, Dadaism and Constructivism.

From this “Fidelis” group of Recentists, formed a group known as the Canis Fidelis which also included many social realists. The Recentists and social realists in this group shared the same concerns, and their work became focused on stadium rock and its horrors, along with moral decay and the emergence of Americanism. The Canis Fidelis was also a publication that these artists wrote for, published by Harris Shapiro. Kandegas’s original influences, Angonka Toulouse and Cyrus Vance, were part of this group. The Canis Fidelis was the major outlet for the expression of avant-garde ideas.

Kandegas’s main inspirations can be divided into periods, although he was originally influenced by the depression, post-impressionists, expressionists and social realists, also keeping in mind his involvement with the Canis Fidelis, and his responses to stadium rock. Ultimately he is always best known for paintings of paper clips, or trombones as the French call them.

Kandegas’s first significant works were produced during his involvement in the Boy Scouts. In 1980, Kandegas was called up for service and spent most of his time working in Western State Hospital drawing patients suffering from horrific wounds and mental illnesses as a result of stadium rock. He produced three important works at this stage, Seated Man, a pen and ink illustration of a man whose nose had been sliced off by a Braun blender, The Waste Treatment Plant at Fort Lawton, an image of death sitting on a stool watching and waiting, and Floating Logs, of two figures floating down a hall, a third with a demented smile. All of these images illustrated the horror and madness of stadium rock. At this time, Kandegas was influenced by raw images of death and horror, wishing to present a blunt, direct, succinct image of stadium rock’s consequences. This is similar to the way social realists wish to present their messages, although Kandegas’s actual
delivery was surrealistic and expressionistic in appearance.

In 1982, Kandegas ignored stadium rock and returned to a Seattle he did not like. He was particularly disgusted, but inspired by scenes of Seattle’s nightlife, of a city he felt demonstrated a collapse of simple morality. He was shocked and outraged by images of brutish laborers, pig-like, grinning and clutching the meager frames of young women in bawdy red lipstick, as if possessions or prizes of stadium rock, representing a clear confusion as to what stadium rock actually reaps. This painting was the catalyst for his series of works known as the Urinating on Car Door Handles, all depicting similar nightlife and exploitation of women figures, or comodification of sex, symbolized in recurring motifs; sticks or skin-toned blobs with red smiles and single, elaborately styled eyes with curly lashes. As Kandegas continues creating these images, the subjects become less and less human and occupy space in more and more disconnected ways; floating or melting,
being abducted from above, slumped on the side of the road, lying in the shadows of movie theaters. His source is clear, after seeing immoral scenes of sex, abduction, confusion and clear gender stereotyping, and maintains the same surreal, expressionistic delivery with socially realistic content.

The post-stadium rock period did not bring peace to visions at first he had hoped for, explaining humanity's status after stadium rock as “irreparably damaged”, viewing the world with great anxiety and a loss of hope. In early 1987, Kandegas traveled to Japan with a local newspaper as an art correspondent, required to interpret the devastation he saw there. He produced a monochrome pen drawing called Fishmobile; it contains no figures, just the aftermath of complete devastation, with somber tents and shelters littering the landscape. During this time, Kandegas was influenced by his sense of hopelessness after seeing the stadium rock, depression, and the fact that society had never improved. Hiroshima does indeed appear hopeless and empty.

Upon returning, he broke up with Candace Carson, who had already had a son, Swiney, in 1975. Out of bitterness, Kandegas left for Europe later in 1987 for the next 13 years. In England and Europe until 1998, Kandegas painted many prostitutes, highly influenced by the fact that no city seemed to be free of this “disease” of prostitution, and so painted them in abundance. He then moved to New York in 1998 and his subjects switched from the city to Hoquiam, feeling rather homesick. Where some works of Bronco Nagurski and Elijah Pitt had reached international level, Kandegas rejected them as being sports-themed. He depicted the landscape as being a harsh, barren and sterile wasteland. He distorted stereotypes and icons of the White Center, including early professional football stars George Blanda and Walt Suggs. He was influenced by the sheer barrenness and hopelessness that White Center conveyed, and added these icons as pawns to White Center's deadly game.

Throughout the 2000s, Kandegas began to face many personal traumas. He had begun to form a good relationship with Swiney, who had been adopted by Angonka and Napoleon Toulouse, but unfortunately he committed suicide in 1999. A few years later, the Toulouses both died within a week of each other from being run over by a motorcar. Kandegas's father found them lying in the street, and served them with rice to his sister who was visiting. He began to feel that many of the people he had influenced in his life were quickly slipping away from him, looking back at Candace Carson, who had also died in 1990. As a tribute, and to immortalize his contemporaries, he produced the "Paperclips Series". The series saw Kandegas move away from his most celebrated themes, and to variations of the paperclip, a representation of an explorer’s conflict with the environment that eventually fuses the two together to become of the same element, as both the landscape and the
heads were created using the same medium, texture and color. His other major subjects were the “intruders” or “fauns” that became mindless metallic beings that patrolled dead environments with guns and weaponry. This added to his recurring themes of hopelessness and loss.

Kandegas’s style, subjects and attitude stay the same throughout his life as an artist. They are implied but never visible. Only his resolute image- the paper clip- is allowed to speak for all the figural ideas, theoretical landscapes, virtual still lifes. His attitude always comes across as perceptive, pessimistic, disgusted and generally critical of the environment around him. Whenever he portrays males or females together, they seem to be sexually confused – the females maintain an extreme prostitute image and the males appear lustful and greedy. He often depicts scenes of madness, destruction and horror especially in response to the stadium rock. He portrays many scenes of hopelessness in his post-stadium rock stage, of the desert, the total eclipse of 1979 and of his personal losses. And paperclips.

His style retains a surreal, expressionistic quality. He often places subjects on barren, dream like and hostile plains, with confused or distorted bodies, appearing surrealistic. He wonders in text printed on the back of several of his works on paper if Klimt had been frought with minimalism if his strokes would resemble his own, paper clips suggested in later embodiments, strokes which held the threshold of making marks ambiguous, vague, but present. He enjoys disfiguring his subjects’ forms to emphasize an issue or point, while being very expressive in his appliance of mediums, linking to expressionism. His messages however are ultimately of social realist quality, apart from his surreal explorations into his losses in his final artistic stage. He always wants to bluntly and confrontingly display social issues that are harsh, but real and very much a part of society. But mostly paperclips.

Kandegas’s subjects often recur. He starts with many psychologically disturbed subjects in his stadium rock period, and also wounded subjects. He then moves to a subject of modern evil, with the recurring motif of the fake smile, single eye and pole and/or blob-like masses for bodies, with pig-like males. His subjects then move to hopelessness and loss in the post-stadium rock period, including the desert, football icons, Antipodean Heads, “Fauns” and Puget Sound. The theme linking all of these is often moral confusion.'' But mostly he paints paper clips.

Jean-Noel Vandaele Exhibit At Form/Space Atelier

2009-01-09T13:43:00.004-08:00

The exhibit has the clean, austere curatorial style Paul Pauper is known for. The drawings by Jean-Noel Vandaele are inexpensively but tastefully framed. Thanks to Josh Okrent for being in the right place at the right time. Opening reception tonight; 6PM. Show runs until February 8th.

Jean-Noel Vandaele At Form/Space Atelier

2008-12-31T14:26:00.003-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For January 2009

Show Title: Enroute With Yellowhead

Show Duration: January 9- February 8

Opening Reception: January 9, 6PM as part of Belltown Art Dealers Assn. Second Friday Artwalk www.belltownartwalk.com

Enroute With Yellowhead, paintings by Belgian artist Jean-Noel Vandaele. Japanese woodcut-inspired figurative paintings.

The following corollary was translated from French.

It was at Dunkirk in 1976 Jean-Noel Vandaele painted his first canvases before exile in the United States in 2002. "It changed my life. There, the success was immediate. The painter does not forget his years of misery, though today he has many exhibitions. Some of his paintings will be at Le Touquet in spring 2009.

The sources of inspiration for Jean-Noel Vandaele, particularly the traditional Kabuki theater and Japanese prints, may have enabled the painter from Dunkirk, 56, born in Ghyvelde Belgium, to stimulate the curiosity of Japanese galleries. He recently exhibited his work in Tokyo until the end of December. "There are few artists in Japan, is a real chance," he notes.

In 2009, some of his paintings will also stop in New York and Seattle, USA. The country of adoption of Jean-Noel Vandaele, who has chosen to settle here in 2002. "My career is in the USA. The U.S. does not ask where you come from, it checks your work, that's all. A way of saying that on the Old Continent, the reception was not always so warm.

"Dunkirk, it was a dog"

In Dunkirk, where he began painting in 1976 while working as an accountant in college Guynemer Saint-Pol-sur-Mer, the beginnings are difficult. Few doors open when trying to explain his painting. "Dunkirk it was the gallery. I contacted the institutional for so many years, I've had the negative, he says, bitter. In France, the painting was rejected because it was considered obsolete. The artistic policy is oriented around the concept, facilities plastics. His former professor at the Beaux-Arts de Dunkerque, Gérard Hennebert, agrees: "Today, the painting seems paltry next to the new media, photography, video. "However, Jean-Noel Vandaele is not abandoning his art. "The painting and drawing, this is my expertise. It allows me to go take a walk in the imagination and bring back images. In 1995, he opened an art gallery in Dunkirk. "It did not work hard, but it allowed me to develop contacts with many European artists. "Four years later, he moved the first time in Spain. Before assuming the leadership of the United States in 2002.

Since then, a small group of supporters in Dunkirk continue to monitor its work. "I'm still a guy from the North," says the painter.

From March to May 2009, his work around the American painter Winslow Homer will be presented to the museum of Le Touquet. And why not a day at Dunkirk? "I'm not obsessed not like it ... Maybe. "

Vandaele also is influenced by Winslow Homer. Living in the small harbor town of Dieppe along the Normandy coast in France, artist Jean Noel Vandaele has always been fascinated by the sea as well as those people whose lives depend upon it. His decision to base his works in The Maritime Adventure series on the work of an American artist was determined not only by his attraction towards that country with its extraordinary maritime history, it was moreover his desire to counteract the prevailing conviction of the French that influence in the world of art travels only westwards between Europe and the Americas.

Being introduced to the work of Winslow Homer as one of the foremost American artists who have grappled with the subject of the sea, Vandaele decided to focus on this quintessentially American artist. Homer was extremely modern for his time - painting in a style similar to an image that a camera captures he heralded the arrival of photography as a medium of art. Vandaele embraced the challenge posed by basing his work on that of such an iconic artist and decided to introduce his imaginary character to Homer's work. This 'yellow head' that he was familiar with from previous work, was placed on specific carrying bodies from the original paintings and prints by Homer. This changed not only the appearance of the composition but also the relationship of the characters within it.
Since the work of Homer encompasses issues from the lives of sailors to gender and class roles, Vandaele had to tread carefully so as not to distort these ideas. Furthermore, it is by virtue of this 'yellow head' that he is able to comment not only on the work of Homer but more so on our own lives and time. The world of his work thus becomes constantly analogous to our own, critiquing it, yet smiling at it. At once a positive yet cynical comment on our society, it makes us question, and beyond that, it makes us look more closely.

Form/Space Atelier Is Stranger Recommended

2008-12-27T12:27:00.003-08:00

Detroit: The Arsenal Of Democracy is recommended by The Stranger, come see what the press is cheering about! A star next to our listing in this week's Visual Arts Calendar. Free lumps of coal for the first 100 visitors, limited time only.

Also, it is my birthday monday. You may kiss my ring.

Seattle Weekly Honors Form/Space Atelier AGAIN! This time, Dan Hawkins

2008-12-19T13:09:00.005-08:00

The review follows below, written by Joshua Lynch:

Dan Hawkins: Detroit: Arsenal of Democracy

When Dan Hawkins goes to Motown, he’s all about business. “No one goes to Detroit for vacation,” he says. Hawkins’ latest exhibit, “Detroit: Arsenal of Democracy” (through Jan. 4), gives some picture-perfect reasons why the city doesn’t have Disneyland tourist appeal. The Seattle-based photographer shoots abandoned buildings—mental hospitals, jails, hotels, chemical factories, and nuclear facilities—in their various states of decay. Detroit, dubbed the abandoned building capital of the world for its 36,000 forgotten structures, provided Hawkins with plenty of material—around 4,000 shots. (In a way, Detroit is his Disneyland.) Twenty of those dark, looming, and eerie compositions form Hawkins’ exhibit, which is utterly capitvating and surprisingly beautiful. That’s a good thing for Hawkins, who says he would be thrilled if any of the buildings is preserved because of his work. In the meantime, he’ll settle for this: “I want people to see how something like this could occur in the richest country in the world.” Form/Space Atelier, 2407 First Ave., 349-2509, www.formspaceatelier.com. Free. Noon to 4 p.m. JOSHUA LYNCH

Form/Space Atelier presents Dan Hawkins "Detroit: The Aresenal Of Democracy" Opening Reception Friday, December 12, 2008

2008-12-14T11:57:00.001-08:00

Form/Space Atelier For December 2008

2008-11-27T20:28:00.000-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program for December 2008

Show Title: Detroit: Arsenal of Democracy

Show Duration: December 12- January 4

Opening Reception December 12, 6PM

Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus
"We Hope For Better Things; It Shall Rise From the Ashes" (Detroit Motto)

This is the motto of the city of Detroit. I chose this place as a vantage point to observe what I felt to be the fulcrum of the vast transitions that have occurred in our country over the last half-century. The city of Detroit was at one time the fourth largest city in the US. With a peak population of over two million people in 1960 and one of the most powerful economies in the nation no one could have foreseen the forces that would lead to the flight of its inhabitants or the architectural legacy they would leave behind. One of the most striking things one observes upon viewing the city is the sheer ambition of the early architects and designers. Everywhere there are grand boulevards and granite archways. This was truly one of the great cities not just of our nation but of the world.
Now at the turn of a new century Detroit stands as a forgotten city. A place with just under half of its original populace. There are a number of staggering statistics that describe the Detroit of today:
The current population is 960,000 (down from 2,000,000)
Only twelve percent of this population is white.
There are more than a dozen abandoned skyscrapers in the downtown Detroit area.
Detroit has over 36,000 abandoned structures.
But these numbers cannot begin to describe the sense of desolation this city sometimes demonstrates. There were many occasions when I would stand still and realize that I was the lone person on a main street in the downtown core. I would look to my left and see a majestic building lying in rot. On my right would be another ruin and down the way I could make out more towering abandonments as I looked out over the skyline. I often felt that I was seeing the first crack in the walls of a crumbling empire. It is my attempt with this work to illuminate the story of this great city and invite us as a nation to reflect on the fate of its populace.

Dan Hawkins is a Seattle based photographer who is currently studying at the Photographic Center NW. He spends much of his time covering local events and is one of the photographers for the Seattle International Film Festival. His work has appeared in Real Change, On Screen Magazine and Film.com His personal work often deals with the dual themes of memory and decay.
About his focus on photographing abandonments he has this to say, "One day I was asked what used to be on a vacant lot on my street. It was then that I realized that I could not remember. I realized that my vision was being occluded and I wanted to see what was behind the curtain. I was asleep. This work began as my attempt to wake up. I tend to think there is more to learn from what people leave behind than from what they keep. Because of this I attempt to use these abandonments as a lens through which to view the human spirit.
Beginning with empty houses and discarded water towers he has gone on to document deserted nuclear facilities, chemical factories, decaying ballrooms, crumbling hotels, and a number of derelict mental hospitals and jails. Primarily using photography as a means to bring the isolation of these places to the viewer he has traveled the country in search of abandoned spaces. Working with a small network of associates he has managed to see many of the nations lost treasures of industry and tour its forgotten mental health legacy. He is currently working on a body of photographs from a recent trip to New England. An ongoing catalog of this work can be seen at http://www.flickr.com/photos/dghawkins90/

Seattle Weekly Honors Form/Space Atelier

2008-11-26T12:18:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the late posting but yes we were Weekly Wire in October. Erika Hobart apparently lived in Japan near where Yuriko Miyamoto grew up, and Erika's parents are still there. I cut and pasted the review below.

Yuriko Miyamoto: Crossing Boundaries
Published on October 22, 2008 at 6:36am

Japanese artist Yuriko Miyamoto (now based in Seattle) grew up accosted by images of Hello Kitty and Godzilla, so it’s no surprise her acrylic paintings convey that kawaii aesthetic so prevalent in J-pop culture. Miyamoto’s newest series, “Crossing Boundaries” (through November 9), features sassy cats riding in UFOs and friendly fish viewing sunsets. (How they manage to survive out of water is beyond me.) The artist employs simple geometric shapes to impart a playful, childlike innocence to her paintings. Her nonsensically cute scenarios—“Catworm”?—will sometimes have you scratching your head. But consider Miyamoto’s inspirations: Hello Kitty doesn’t even have a mouth. Form/Space Atelier, 2407 First Ave., 349-2509, www.formspaceatelier.com. Free. Noon–4 p.m. ERIKA HOBART
Wednesdays-Sundays. Starts: Oct. 23. Continues through Nov. 9, 2008

Belltown History

2008-11-21T15:14:00.001-08:00

Belltown-Denny Regrade -- Thumbnail History

The area of Seattle stretching north of the central business district from Stewart Street to Mercer Street is usually dubbed the Denny Regrade, acknowledging the area's forcible flattening by city engineers early in the twentieth century. It incorporates the older Belltown district, originally west of 2nd Avenue but today more broadly defined by its various denizens.

The area today combines artist lofts and hangouts with new high-rises where condos and apartments are providing close-in housing. Following the new, mostly affluent residents, a number of upscale restaurants and clubs have established a brisk trade in the area. The result, at least for the time being, is a yeasty combination of the bohemian and the trendy, with a significant nightlife.

A City Engineer and His Nemesis

The generally flat terrain of today's Regrade was originally a steep hill named Denny Hill, but that was changed by a mammoth construction project in the first decades of the twentieth century. A motivating force was Reginald Heber Thomson (1856-1949), who became Seattle's city engineer in 1892. He designed the town's first modern sewers and established a water system that a century later remains the region's largest. But roads and boulevards were Thomson's first love, especially straight and level roads and boulevards. Thus, Seattle's topography presented the Scots-Irish engineer with a daunting challenge, and no irregularity of nature affronted him more than Denny Hill.

The hill rose steeply north of Pine Street between 2nd and 5th avenues and then descended gradually to the north across the land claim of William Bell (1817-1887). It was defined on the west with a precipitous bluff that dropped from 2nd Avenue to the edge of Elliott Bay. This confined "Belltown" to 1st and Western avenues and largely isolated it from the downtown precincts to the south. (Bell left Seattle in 1855 and actually had little to do with his namesake land claim.)

Denny Hill stuck in R. H. Thomson's craw because he believed it blocked the city's manifest destiny of northward expansion. Having seen the power of hydraulic mining in California, he knew that the hill could easily be sluiced into the bay, but he was frustrated by the stubborn ambition of Arthur Denny (1822-1899) to lure the territorial legislature to his own "Capitol Hill" (not to be confused with the present-day hill northeast of downtown).

Finally persuaded in 1889 that the seat of the new state government was firmly planted in Olympia, Denny began to erect an enormous hotel, which he named for himself. The Panic of 1893 halted work before the interior had been completed, leaving the turreted Victorian shell of the Denny Hotel to hover over Seattle's landscape for a decade, abandoned at the altar of Denny's great expectations.

James A. Moore, a flamboyant developer in his own right, bought and completed the 100-room pile as the Washington Hotel. He personally handed the first guest keys to President Teddy Roosevelt (1858-1919) and his entourage on May 23, 1903. Moore built his own tram to transport guests to the top of Denny Hill and started building his own namesake theater and hotel on its western slope.

Regrading Moore's High Expectations

Thomson started nibbling at Denny Hill's flanks while working on the perhaps more difficult project of wearing down Moore's resolve. Economics finally convinced Moore to abandon the high ground in 1906. He erected a modern New Washington Hotel (now the Josephinium) at 2nd Avenue and Stewart Street.

Thomson wasted no time tearing into Denny Hill, but it took five years to vanquish his topographical foe west of 5th Avenue. (The rest of the eastern slope was regraded in 1929 and 1930.) When property owners balked at selling, engineers carved around their lots, sometimes leaving houses stranded a hundred feet in air atop "spite mounds." These man-made buttes fell by 1911, giving Seattle a vast new tabula rasa upon which to sketch its urban visions.

The first and most famous vision was drawn by Virgil Bogue (1846-1916), a protégé of the Olmsted brothers (whom Seattle had retained in 1903 to plan its park system). The Municipal Plans Commission hired Bogue in 1910, and he delivered a comprehensive plan the following year. Reading like a manifesto of the City Beautiful movement, the Bogue plan proposed to remake Seattle in the image of the "Civic Idea ... a consciousness demanding the recognition of organic unity and intelligent system."

These words were given flesh in his design for a new Civic Center, an ensemble of Beaux-Arts government buildings, not unlike San Francisco's City Hall complex, radiating outward from the intersection of 4th Avenue and Blanchard Street. The plan basically relocated downtown Seattle to the new Regrade, which horrified property owners south of Pine Street and precipitated a bitter battle between reformers, led by Thomson, and the "landlord trust."

Voters Nix Bogue Plan

Divided, confused, and wary of the potential bill for Bogue's dream -- which included a rapid transit tunnel from downtown to Kirkland on the far shore of Lake Washington and the purchase of Mercer Island as a city park -- voters rejected the plan in 1912 by nearly two to one.

Thomson's blank slate remained mostly blank for the next half century, thanks to two key factors. First, the automobile, barely mentioned in Bogue's plan, facilitated the city's rapid expansion into outlying areas and obviated the Regrade's original raison d'etre to serve horse-drawn vehicles stalled by Seattle's steep hills. Second, skyscrapers such as the new Smith Tower, which City Beautiful planners despised, allowed owners to concentrate business development (and raise property values) within the existing downtown.

Serviceable But Seedy

Hotels, apartments, warehouses, and car dealerships slowly filled the Regrade's vacant lots with functional but largely undistinguished structures. The cheap land attracted marginal businesses to service the downtown. Labor unions raised meeting halls and a Central Labor Temple at 1st Avenue and Broad Street. Film distributors dotted the area with ornate "jewel box" auditoriums in which to preview new releases for theater owners from throughout the Northwest. The older strip of Belltown west of 2nd Avenue fell into disrepair and disrepute as an upland adjunct to the harbor and a berth for visiting sailors.

Seattle's Soho

The Regrade's modest success as a working-class neighborhood fell far short of Thomson's and Bogue's lofty ambitions, but this did not dissuade succeeding generations of planners and developers from fantasizing "better" futures for the area. The next major step was taken in the mid-1970s when the City approved new zoning to encourage construction of a high-rise residential district. Reality again disappointed the planners, and young artists, musicians, and entrepreneurs took advantage of the area's low rents to establish a thriving mini-Soho colony of studios, galleries, cafes, and clubs.

In the early 1980s, developer Martin Selig launched a one-man boom of new office construction in the area. The condo craze and superheated real estate market of the Reagan years promoted more construction -- and nearly bankrupted a few developers when the tax reform of 1986 popped their financial bubbles. A new round of high-rise construction and rising property values threaten to drive out the Regrade and Belltown's surviving bohemian element. But, as of the late 1990s at least, the artistic feel continues to mingle with the upscale restaurants and clubs that are serving the many new residents.

Sources:
Walt Crowley, National Trust Guide Seattle (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998).

By Walt Crowley, May 10, 1999

Kellie Patricia Lynch: Dinner For One at Form/Space Atelier

2008-11-20T19:13:00.000-08:00

Photos were taken minutes ago while Kellie said the rosary for two hours on her knees in an asphalt parking lot outside Form/Space Atelier. Somewhat mystical and sad, but undeniably riveting. Check out Kellie's upcoming performances; www.dinnerforoneinfo.com and Forrest Baum has video of the event possibly coming soon at www.doitforthegirls.com

http://www.dinnerforoneinfo.com DINNER FOR ONE: Performance Art By Kellie Lynch

2008-11-20T13:35:00.000-08:00

My friend Kellie Lynch is performing her new work "Dinner For One" at the gallery tonight. There is a lot of imagery in the piece, eggshells and candles and things.

Kellie sent me the following two paragraphs; brief statement about her/work.

Seattle based performance artist Kellie Patricia Lynch places experiments into the flow of the everyday. She uses her role as a storyteller and trickster to better understand her audience and self. Her recent work plays with human sculpture as an image and the expectation of her audience. She prefers publically exposing her artistic process to let there be reactions to her actions.

Dinner for One is the most recent work of Kellie Patricia Lynch. It is a exploration of Love and its associations with people, ideas and images. The twilight performances at The Anne Bonny and Form/Space Atelier before the event set the narrative for the performance

Last time I saw Kellie's work was at Cornish, she blew my mind with her art; sitting on a pedestal covered with a thousand veils for THREE HOURS, try that sometime if you dare. Very powerful work. Based on that show I think you should come see her work tonight at my gallery: www.formspaceatelier.com

Sales Are Brisk Of Greg Boudreau's Spire Series

2008-11-20T11:52:00.000-08:00

I am being pleasantly astonished at how well Greg Boudreau's Spire series paintings are selling ( www.alwaysbebuilding.blogspot.com ). Jon B. of Seattle walked out with FIVE of them yesterday, two large, one medium and two small paintings. Thanks Jon! If anyone is interested in buying, there are still over a hundred paintings in the gallery, but they are selling fast so STOP BY TODAY 12-4PM, or during business hours 12-4PM wed-sun.

Also, Dan Hawkins show is coming in December ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/dghawkins90/ ). Two sizes of photographic prints; poster- and demi-sized. Subject is Detroit, as a crumbling echo, the rusty part of the Rust Belt. Dan is a very bright artist and his work reflects his intelligence and passion.

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2008, And Form/Space Atelier Archives Dating From Gallery Inception March 20th, 2006

2008-11-11T09:38:00.008-08:00

Form/Space Atelier Program For November 2008

Show Title: Spire

Show Duration: November 14- December 7, 2008

Opening Reception: Friday November 14, 6PM (Belltown Art Dealers Assn.
Second Friday Art Walk)

Location: Form/Space Atelier 2407 1st Avenue Seattle, WA 98121-1311

Stencil artist Greg Boudreau creates an exhibit emphasizing the unique
vertical qualities of Form/Space Atelier, combining nearly two hundred
stenciled panels and a towering spire installation of salvaged wood.

Greg Boudreau prepared this proposal statement prior to the execution of November 2009's exhibit: "The project for Form/Space will be called "SPIRE." It will essentially consist of a central spire constructed of salvaged wood on the '2nd landing' (of the gallery) with possibly one or two separate partial spires. The spires will be loosely modeled on the structure of construction crane frames. The walls will be filled with a "massive" quantity of single layer hand drawn bird stencils printed on frames of salvaged wood. The intent to create a project/installation that emphasizes the vertical quality of the gallery of Form/Space Atelier. Spire also combines our original ideas (Boudreau and Form/Space Atelier Curator Paul Pauper) of having outside studio work mixed with an atelier project. Because of the 'freer' nature of the execution of the project I've been changing my ideas and approach more than usual."

The build for Spire can be witnessed here: http://alwaysbebuilding.blogspot.com/

GREG BOUDREAU

SOLO_
- “A FUTURE OF CONCRETE AND STEEL.” Canvas Art. Seattle, WA. August 2008. Solo Exhibition.
- “Auburn: People and Places” or “Greg Boudreau’s More Than You Imagined” Auburn Parks and Recreation Department. June, July 2008. Auburn, WA. Solo Exhibition.
- Twilight Artist Collective. Seattle, WA. May 2008.
- “You Were Always My Favorite.” Canvas Art Gallery. Seattle, WA. March 2008.
- “Publicis Commission.” 152 panels created and installed for company collection, August and November 2007.
- “I’m Only Friends with Attractive People.” 619 Western Artist Studios. Seattle, WA. August 2007.
- “Big Game Hunters.” Calamity Jane’s. Seattle, WA. April 2007.
- Solstice Café. Seattle, WA. April 2006.

GROUP_
- “Spray It, Don’t Say It.” Bherd Studios. Seattle, WA. August 2008. Group Exhibition.
- “American Dream.” DDADX Studios. Portland, OR. June 2008. Group Exhibition.
- “Papercuts.” 108 Occidental Gallery. Seattle, WA. June 2008. Group Exhibition.
- ArtReach. Sea Sound Lounge. Seattle, WA. May 2008.
- Forgotten Works’ 30-30 Challenge. OK Hotel. Seattle, WA. December 2007.
- “SS Marie Antoinette Group Art Exhibit.” 619 Western Artist Studios. Seattle, WA. September 2006.
- “The Anti-Terrorism Handbook.” OK Hotel. Seattle, WA. April 2006.

EDUCATION_
- Bachelor of Arts, Business Administration, Marketing, Seattle University, Seattle, WA, June 2005
- 2008 EDGE professional development program through Artist Trust.

Form/Space Atelier Program For October 2008
Show Title: Crossing Boundaries
Show Duration: October 10- November 9, 2008
Opening Reception: Friday October 10, 6PM (Belltown Art Dealers Assn. Second
Friday Art Walk)
Second Chance Opening Reception Tuesday October 14, 6PM
Crossing Boundaries is an exhibit of Yuriko Miyamoto’s acrylic paintings on canvas, each canvas 18x24 inches. The scale of the paintings was chosen creatively and intentionally by curator Paul Pauper, who, with his own hand grounded each canvas with a gesso tinted a pale yellow.
Yuriko Miyamoto creates paintings, illustrations and graphic design, characterized by a child-like playfulness and strong use of characters. Yuriko is an employee of the Frye Art Museum.
More info: www.ysquare.net

Using simple life forms such as cat, dog, fish, bird and insect often helps to reflect and symbolize ourselves, our emotions and the quiet space of our thoughts. In each of my paintings, a character and scene has a special moment and each element is challenged to cross boundaries—gender, species, dimension, and relationships to universal laws. The scene inspired by nature, from the microcosmic world to outer space with a sense of our existence being the part of the cosmic universe.
Challenging the world by crossing boundaries, I find a good dose of humor, great surprises and enjoy a playful skew to the familiar world.
Yuriko Miyamoto, a.k.a ysquare is a Japanese-born artist residing in Seattle, Washington. She works in a variety of mediums including painting and digital illustration. Her works have been shown in Seattles Blue Bottle Gallery, DV8 Cafe and Dr. Vigari Gallery in Vancouver, BC, and a number of places in Los Angeles.
Miyamotos experience ranges from analog to digital and her artwork gives an organic and natural sense whether its a painting or a digital illustration. Whichever the medium, her sensibility is for expressing beauty through simplicity, harmony and an awareness of ourselves as simple creatures.
Her strong belief that use of simple geometric shapes (such as circle, triangle, and square) are essential to grasping the beauty of space, whether 2-or 3 dimensional, shows throughout her work. Miyamoto shows simple life forms and moments of familiar life circumstances in the hopes that it will help connect us and free our concepts of gender, species, and dimension.
Her influences include nature, music, architecture (Gaudi), fashion (Issey Miyake) and artists such as Hundertwasser and Paul Klee.

Form/Space Atelier Program For September 2008
Show Title: Play: Intuitively Altered Spaces
Show Duration: September 12- October 5
Opening Reception: September 12, 6PM
Exhibit is free.
Julie Alpert exhibits at Form/Space Atelier September 2008, addressing illusionism in collage,
painting, and installation as a metaphor for the way we suspend belief as a form of escapism. Her
process holds as much importance as her finished pieces. It begins with an intuitive response to the
architectural space the work will inhabit using found objects and building materials to distort the
space and create a loose narrative. She then manipulates photographs of the installation in collages,drawings, and paintings, distorting the already altered space. The work is an homage to German Expressionist film, contemporaries such as Jessica Stockholder and Lisa Sigal, and the tromp l‘’oeil artists of the 1600‘’s ‘– early 20th century.
Julie Alpert is a recent MFA graduate of the Painting and Drawing program at UW School of Art. She particiapted this year in Oliver Herring‘’s Task at Seattle Public Library, and also co-exhibited at Ouch My Eye gallery with Whiting Tennis.
Image Description: Julie Alpert, ‘“Questioning the Fabric of of Reality Using Formal Considerations of Painting and Drawing,‘” detail, 2008 (Exhibited At The Henry Art Gallery).
The Septmeber 2008 installation at Form/Space Atelier will be new site-specific work from Julie Alpert and “Baltimore” may or may not be exhibited.
Julie Alpert:
jlynnalpert@yahoo.com - www.juliealpert.com
Education
2008 MFA University of Washington, Seattle, WA
2002 BA University of Maryland, College Park, MD
Teaching
2008 Intern, Advanced Painting The Landscape and Figure
2007 Instructor, Issues in Contemporary Art
2007 Instructor, Introduction to Drawing
2007 Intern, Introduction to Drawing

Solo Exhibitions
2008 ‘– Play: Intuitively Altered Spaces Form/Space Atelier, Seattle, WA
2008 - MFA Exhibition Sandpoint Gallery, Seattle, WA
Group Exhibitions
2008 - Oliver Herring‘’s Task presented by the Frye Art Gallery Seattle Central Library, Seattle, WA
2008 - MFA Thesis Exhibition Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, WA
2008 - Coupling VI: Flashforward Collaboration with Whiting Tennis, Ouch My Eye, Seattle, WA
2008 - School of Art Open House Juried by Billy Howard of Howard House, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle, WA
2008 - Sandpoint Open Studios Sandpoint Gallery, Seattle, WA
2008 - Flashback Strange Coupling Benefit Auction, Sandpoint Gallery, Seattle, WA
2007 - Small + Flat Juried by Greg Bell of Gallery 4 Culture, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle, WA
2007 - Over the Line ‘– Second Year MFA Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle, WA
2007 - Sandpoint Open Studios Sandpoint Gallery, Seattle, WA
2007 - Works in Progress ‘– First Year MFA Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle, WA
Bibliography
Thomas May, “Fall Arts Preview.” Seattle City Arts Magazine. September 2008
Jen Graves, “The Art of Doing What You‘’re Told: Torture, Rape, and Making Noise at the Library.” The Stranger. July 8, 2008
Regina Hackett, “Henry Hosts MFA.” Seattle P.I. Blog. May 23, 2008
Regina Hackett, “Henry Gallery exhibit is a strong showing from 2008 UW master’s degree class.” Seattle P.I. May 22, 2008
Peter Kelley, “Making Meaning: Master of Fine Arts Students Show Their Work at the Henry.” University Week. May 22, 2008
Sheila Farr, “The Week Ahead.” The Seattle Times. March 23, 2008
Jesse Barracoso, “Over the Line: Artists Change Mediums and Explore Boundaries.” The University of Washington Daily. October 4, 2007

More info:
Paul Pauper, Curator
Form/Space Atelier
2407 1st Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121-1311
206-208-9843

Where:
Form/Space Atelier
2407 1st Avenue
Seattle, WA 98121-1311

More Info:
206-349-2509

As an atelier, a working gallery space, Form/Space Atelier is committed to Three E’s for the art community. Providing beautiful and thought provoking Exhibits, Entertainment at our monthly opening receptions, and Education in the form of figure drawing sessions, lectures, multimedia presentations and other academic programs.

Form/Space Atelier Program For August 2008
Curated By Paul Pauper
Show Title: Clouds
Show Duration: August 8- September 7, 2008
Opening Reception: August 8, 2008 6PM
Clouds is an exhibit of large-scale abstract oil paintings by Shannon Barry. The exhibit is inspired by children‘’s drawings, brightly colored and with cartoon-like elements.
Shannon Barry studied at Gage Academy of Art, in the drawing and painting atelier of Mark Kang-O‘’Higgins.

Form/Space Atelier Program For July 2008
Curated by: Paul Pauper
Show title: Findings
Show duration: July 11- August 3
Opening reception: July 11, 6PM
Findings, Britta Johnson‘’s first site-specific video installation, is composed of several video elements installed throughout Form/Space Atelier‘’s dramatic architectural spaces. Johnson‘’s imagery is mysterious and beautiful, a thought-provoking spectacle of sensuous frivloity. One element, titled S`©ance for Descartes*, employs sculptural means to creatively alter the exhibit space. Johnson‘’s newest work, 2008‘’s 21 Landings, gift-wraps beautifully the futlity of repetition. The exhibit is free, a limited number of copies of the video elements are for sale.
Britta Johnson received a BA from Carleton College in Northfield,
Minnesota in 1997. She has been doing stop motion animation in
Seattle for more than 10 years; she directs shorts and music videos,
and her film collaborations with musicians have shown in places
including Seattle‘’s On the Boards, the PICA‘’s Time Based Art festival
in Portland, OR, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, MN, MassMoCA
in North Adams, MA, the Boston MFA, and Dance Theater Workshop in NY, NY. This is her first show of installations. Britta Johnson website
www.thekmpi.net.

*Cartesian coordinate system
Fig. 1 - Cartesian coordinate system. Four points are marked: (2,3) in green, (-3,1) in red, (-1.5,-2.5) in blue and (0,0), the origin, in yellow.
Fig. 2 - Cartesian coordinate system with the circle of radius 2 centered at the origin marked in red. The equation of the circle is x2 + y2 = 4.
In mathematics, the Cartesian coordinate system (also called rectangular coordinate system) is used to determine each point uniquely in a plane through two numbers, usually called the x-coordinate or abscissa and the y-coordinate or ordinate of the point. To define the coordinates, two perpendicular directed lines (the x-axis, and the y-axis), are specified, as well as the unit length, which is marked off on the two axes (see Figure 1). Cartesian coordinate systems are also used in space (where three coordinates are used) and in higher dimensions.
Using the Cartesian coordinate system, geometric shapes (such as curves) can be described by algebraic equations, namely equations satisfied by the coordinates of the points lying on the shape. For example, the circle of radius 2 may be described by the equation x2 + y2 = 4 (see Figure 2).
Contents
1 History
2 Two-dimensional coordinate system
3 Three-dimensional coordinate system
4 Orientation and handedness
4.1 In two dimensions
4.2 In three dimensions
5 Representing a vector in the standard basis
6 Applications
7 Further notes
8 See also
9 References
10 Bibliography
11 External links

History
Cartesian means relating to the French mathematician and philosopher Ren`© Descartes (Latin: Cartesius), who, among other things, worked to merge algebra and Euclidean geometry. This work was influential in the development of analytic geometry, calculus, and cartography.
The idea of this system was developed in 1637 in two writings by Descartes and independently by Pierre de Fermat, although Fermat did not publish the discovery.[1] In part two of his Discourse on Method, Descartes introduces the new idea of specifying the position of a point or object on a surface, using two intersecting axes as measuring guides. In La G`©om`©trie, he further explores the above-mentioned concepts.[2]

Two-dimensional coordinate system

Fig. 3 - The four quadrants of a Cartesian coordinate system. The arrows on the axes indicate that they extend forever in their respective directions (i.e. infinitely).
A Cartesian coordinate system in two dimensions is commonly defined by two axes, at right angles to each other, forming a plane (an xy-plane). The horizontal axis is normally labeled x, and the vertical axis is normally labeled y. In a three dimensional coordinate system, another axis, normally labeled z, is added, providing a third dimension of space measurement. The axes are commonly defined as mutually orthogonal to each other (each at a right angle to the other). (Early systems allowed “oblique” axes, that is, axes that did not meet at right angles, and such systems are occasionally used today, although mostly as theoretical exercises.) All the points in a Cartesian coordinate system taken together form a so-called Cartesian plane. Equations that use the Cartesian coordinate system are called Cartesian equations.
The point of intersection, where the axes meet, is called the origin normally labeled O. The x and y axes define a plane that is referred to as the xy plane. Given each axis, choose a unit length, and mark off each unit along the axis, forming a grid. To specify a particular point on a two dimensional coordinate system, indicate the x unit first (abscissa), followed by the y unit (ordinate) in the form (x,y), an ordered pair.
The choice of letters comes from a convention, to use the latter part of the alphabet to indicate unknown values. In contrast, the first part of the alphabet was used to designate known values.
An example of a point P on the system is indicated in Figure 3, using the coordinate (3,5).
The intersection of the two axes creates four regions, called quadrants, indicated by the Roman numerals I (+,+), II (?,+), III (?,?), and IV (+,?). Conventionally, the quadrants are labeled counter-clockwise starting from the upper right (“northeast”) quadrant. In the first quadrant, both coordinates are positive, in the second quadrant x-coordinates are negative and y-coordinates positive, in the third quadrant both coordinates are negative and in the fourth quadrant, x-coordinates are positive and y-coordinates negative (see table below.)

Three-dimensional coordinate system

Fig. 4 - Three dimensional Cartesian coordinate system with y-axis pointing away from the observer.
Fig. 5 - Three dimensional Cartesian coordinate system with the x-axis pointing towards the observer.
The coordinate surfaces of the Cartesian coordinates (x, y, z). The z-axis is vertical and the x-axis is highlighted in green. Thus, the red plane shows the points with x=1, the blue plane shows the points with z=1, and the yellow plane shows the points with y=-1. The three surfaces intersect at the point P (shown as a black sphere) with the Cartesian coordinates (1.0, -1.0, 1.0).
The three dimensional Cartesian coordinate system provides the three physical dimensions of space ‘— length, width, and height. Figures 4 and 5 show two common ways of representing it.
The three Cartesian axes defining the system are perpendicular to each other. The relevant coordinates are of the form (x,y,z). As an example, figure 4 shows two points plotted in a three-dimensional Cartesian coordinate system: P(3,0,5) and Q(?5,?5,7). The axes are depicted in a “world-coordinates” orientation with the z-axis pointing up.
The x-, y-, and z-coordinates of a point can also be taken as the distances from the yz-plane, xz-plane, and xy-plane respectively. Figure 5 shows the distances of point P from the planes.
The xy-, yz-, and xz-planes divide the three-dimensional space into eight subdivisions known as octants, similar to the quadrants of 2D space. While conventions have been established for the labelling of the four quadrants of the x-y plane, only the first octant of three dimensional space is labelled. It contains all of the points whose x, y, and z coordinates are positive.
The z-coordinate is also called applicate.

Orientation and handedness
see also: right-hand rule
In two dimensions
The right hand rule.
Fixing or choosing the x-axis determines the y-axis up to direction. Namely, the y-axis is necessarily the perpendicular to the x-axis through the point marked 0 on the x-axis. But there is a choice of which of the two half lines on the perpendicular to designate as positive and which as negative. Each of these two choices determines a different orientation (also called handedness) of the Cartesian plane.
The usual way of orienting the axes, with the positive x-axis pointing right and the positive y-axis pointing up (and the x-axis being the “first” and the y-axis the “second” axis) is considered the positive or standard orientation, also called the right-handed orientation.
A commonly used mnemonic for defining the positive orientation is the right hand rule. Placing a somewhat closed right hand on the plane with the thumb pointing up, the fingers point from the x-axis to the y-axis, in a positively oriented coordinate system.
The other way of orienting the axes is following the left hand rule, placing the left hand on the plane with the thumb pointing up.
Regardless of the rule used to orient the axes, rotating the coordinate system will preserve the orientation. Switching the role of x and y will reverse the orientation.

In three dimensions
Fig. 7 - The left-handed orientation is shown on the left, and the right-handed on the right.
Fig. 8 - The right-handed Cartesian coordinate system indicating the coordinate planes.
Once the x- and y-axes are specified, they determine the line along which the z-axis should lie, but there are two possible directions on this line. The two possible coordinate systems which result are called ‘right-handed’ and ‘left-handed’. The standard orientation, where the xy-plane is horizontal and the z-axis points up (and the x- and the y-axis form a positively oriented two-dimensional coordinate system in the xy-plane if observed from above the xy-plane) is called right-handed or positive.
The name derives from the right-hand rule. If the index finger of the right hand is pointed forward, the middle finger bent inward at a right angle to it, and the thumb placed at a right angle to both, the three fingers indicate the relative directions of the x-, y-, and z-axes in a right-handed system. The thumb indicates the x-axis, the index finger the y-axis and the middle finger the z-axis. Conversely, if the same is done with the left hand, a left-handed system results.
Figure 7 is an attempt at depicting a left- and a right-handed coordinate system. Because a three-dimensional object is represented on the two-dimensional screen, distortion and ambiguity result. The axis pointing downward (and to the right) is also meant to point towards the observer, whereas the “middle” axis is meant to point away from the observer. The red circle is parallel to the horizontal xy-plane and indicates rotation from the x-axis to the y-axis (in both cases). Hence the red arrow passes in front of the z-axis.
Figure 8 is another attempt at depicting a right-handed coordinate system. Again, there is an ambiguity caused by projecting the three-dimensional coordinate system into the plane. Many observers see Figure 8 as “flipping in and out” between a convex cube and a concave “corner”. This corresponds to the two possible orientations of the coordinate system. Seeing the figure as convex gives a left-handed coordinate system. Thus the “correct” way to view Figure 8 is to imagine the x-axis as pointing towards the observer and thus seeing a concave corner.

Representing a vector in the standard basis
A point in space in a Cartesian coordinate system may also be represented by a vector, which can be thought of as an arrow pointing from the origin of the coordinate system to the point. If the coordinates represent spatial positions (displacements) it is common to represent the vector from the origin to the point of interest as . In three dimensions, the vector from the origin to the point with Cartesian coordinates (x,y,z) is sometimes written as[3]:

where , , and are unit vectors that point the same direction as the x, y, and z axes, respectively. This is the quaternion representation of the vector, and was introduced by Sir William Rowan Hamilton. The unit vectors , , and are called the versors of the coordinate system, and are the vectors of the standard basis in three-dimensions.

Applications
Cartesian coordinates are often used to represent two or three dimensions of space, but they can also be used to represent many other quantities (such as mass, time, force, etc.). In such cases the coordinate axes will typically be labelled with other letters (such as m, t, F, etc.) in place of x, y, and z. Each axis may also have different units of measurement associated with it (such as kilograms, seconds, pounds, etc.). It is also possible to define coordinate systems with more than three dimensions to represent relationships between more than three quantities. Although four- and higher-dimensional spaces are difficult to visualize, the algebra of Cartesian coordinates can be extended relatively easily to four or more variables, so that certain calculations involving many variables can be done. (This sort of algebraic extension is what is used to define the geometry of higher-dimensional spaces, which can become rather complicated.) Conversely, it is often helpful to use the geometry of Cartesian coordinates in two or three dimensions to visualize algebraic relationships between two or three (perhaps two or three of many) non-spatial variables.

Further notes
In computational geometry the Cartesian coordinate system is the foundation for the algebraic manipulation of geometrical shapes. Many other coordinate systems have been developed since Descartes. One common set of systems use polar coordinates; astronomers and physicists often use spherical coordinates, a type of three-dimensional polar coordinate system.
It may be interesting to note that some have indicated that the master artists of the Renaissance used a grid, in the form of a wire mesh, as a tool for breaking up the component parts of their subjects they painted. That this may have influenced Descartes is merely speculative. (See perspective, projective geometry.)

See also
List of canonical coordinate transformations
Graph of a function
Point plotting
Orientation (mathematics)
Right-hand rule
Regular grid
Taxicab geometry
Euclidean space
Curvilinear coordinates
Stereographic projection
Point (geometry)
Line (mathematics)
Plane (mathematics)
Integer point
Complex plane
Coordinates (mathematics)
Coordinate systems
Geocentric coordinates
Parallel coordinates
Other coordinate systems
Orthogonal coordinates
Two dimensional orthogonal coordinate systems
Cartesian coordinate system
Polar coordinate system
Parabolic coordinate system
Bipolar coordinates
Biangular coordinates
Two-center bipolar coordinates
Hyperbolic coordinates
Elliptic coordinates
Three dimensional orthogonal coordinate systems
Cartesian coordinate system
Cylindrical coordinate system
Spherical coordinate system
Parabolic coordinate system
Parabolic cylindrical coordinates
Paraboloidal coordinates
Oblate spheroidal coordinates
Prolate spheroidal coordinates
Ellipsoidal coordinates
Elliptic cylindrical coordinates
Toroidal coordinates
Bispherical coordinates
Bipolar cylindrical coordinates
Conical coordinates
Flat-Ring cyclide coordinates
Flat-Disk cyclide coordinates
Bi-cyclide coordinates
Cap-cyclide coordinates

History
Ren`© Descartes
Discourse on Method
La G`©om`©trie
Related topics
Ordered pair
Analytic geometry
Abstraction (mathematics)
Notation system
ISO 31-1
Graph paper

References
Descartes, Ren`©. Oscamp, Paul J. (trans). Discourse on Method, Optics, Geometry, and Meteorology. 2001.
^ “analytic geometry”. EncyclopÃ`dia Britannica ¨mes qu’on peut construire sans y employer que des cercles et des lignes droites (Book one: Problems whose construction requires only circles and straight lines). (French)
^ David J. Griffith (1999). Introduction to Electromagnetics. Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-13-805326-X.
Bibliography
Morse PM, Feshbach H (1953). Methods of Theoretical Physics, Part I. New York: McGraw-Hill, p. 656. ISBN 0-07-043316-X, LCCN 52-11515.
Margenau H, Murphy GM (1956). The Mathematics of Physics and Chemistry. New York: D. van Nostrand, p. 177. LCCN 55-10911.
Korn GA, Korn TM (1961). Mathematical Handbook for Scientists and Engineers. New York: McGraw-Hill, pp. 55‘–79. LCCN 59-14456, ASIN B0000CKZX7.
Sauer R, Szab I (1967). Mathematische Hilfsmittel des Ingenieurs. New York: Springer Verlag, p. 94. LCCN 67-25285.
Moon P, Spencer DE (1988). “Rectangular Coordinates (x, y, z)”, Field Theory Handbook, Including Coordinate Systems, Differential Equations, and Their Solutions, corrected 2nd ed., 3rd print ed., New York: Springer-Verlag, pp. 9‘–11 (Table 1.01). ISBN 978-0387184302.
External links
Cartesian Coordinate System
Printable Cartesian Coordinates
Cartesian coordinates on PlanetMath
MathWorld description of Cartesian coordinates

Form/Space Atelier June 2008
Show Title: Resurfacing
Show Duration: June 13-July 6
Opening Reception: June 13, 6PM
Carolyn Polk‘’s exhibit ‘‘Resurfacing‘’ is the first showing of the new body of work she has been developing. The pieces in the show illustrate her continued exploration into scarab imagery and realizing her previous encaustic paintings in new ways. These new works illustrate a melding of not only an assortment of mediums, but also a connectivity of intent that permeates through all her artwork. The various media used in creating Polk‘’s artworks in this show include: acrylic paint and mediums, paper, recovered barn wood, recovered washers, resin, metallic pigment, coasters, image transfer, and print. The common thread throughout her work is color and texture and their dominating and subtle presence. She is intrigued by their influences and how she manipulates their relationships.
For several reasons Polk is drawn to painting scarabs: the intoxicating quality of color they possess; and how she is be able to represent them in a wax medium, with the undulating layers and transparencies of colors. She appreciates the symbolism attached to scarabs. They are an ancient symbol and possess a variety of meanings from many different cultures. Historically, scarabs were first identified as an important icon in ancient Egypt. Polk‘’s focus of scarab imagery is also rooted in her ardent appeal of the symbolic meaning that the image holds, that of renewal, good luck, and protection.
The scarab imagery used in these works was all original encaustic painting by Polk that she discovered a new vehicle for. Her encaustic paintings are created using a small travel iron to apply pigmented wax to paper. The original paintings are kept at very intimate size, no bigger than 8x10 inches. The artwork in ‘‘Resurfacing‘’ pushes the images further, to be experienced in sizes ranging from 4x6 inches to 3x4 feet.
Born in 1979, Polk lives and works in Seattle, WA. She received her BFA in 2001 from Endicott College in Beverly, Massachusetts. Exhibitions of her work have been shown in galleries in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Virginia, Georgia, and Washington. Polk‘’s broad audience includes private collectors from across the globe as well as corporate entities that have purchased and commissioned artwork from her.

May 2008

Form/Space Atelier Program for May 2008
Show Title: Mentor: The Unknown Work of Nancy Lee
Show Duration: May 9-June 8
Opening Reception: May 9, 6-10PM
Zhi LIN, Associate Professor, Co-Chair, Painting + Drawing Program
Co-Chair, Art Division University of Washington School of Art, Art History + Design lectures this
Saturday May 10th at 7PM, Form/Space Atelier 2407 1st Avenue, Seattle, WA 98121-1311.
The lecture’s title is:
FromTiananmen Square to Promontory Summit - a Painter’s Journey
Across Culture and History.
Link to Zhi Lin sample jpg and detailed description:
http://people.tribe.net/8d061aed-0311-4f18-bbd8-ce3b7389111d/photos/e93b757c-64c8-42d1-8fac-34914497c2f3
Title: Names of the Unremembered: Transcontinental
Medium: painting and video projection on canvas
Dimensions: 76 x 135 inches
Date of Completion: 2008
Attribution: Zhi Lin (concept, composition and painting)
Dan Boord and Luis Valdovino (video)

Seattle artist and much-loved middle-school art teacher Nancy Lee died in 1990, leaving behind a fascinating but virtually unknown body of work. Following the death of her widower, Dr. Robert C. Lee, in 2006, a large number of pieces by the artist were discovered while the Lees‘’ home of many years was being cleared of their belongings. Mentor: The Unknown Work of Nancy Lee represents a journey by a living artist, Paul D. Natkin, into the work of a deceased artist, Lee, who was his long-time family friend and early mentor. The several works by Lee presented in this show exemplify her passion for a wide variety of materials, from the durable to the ephemeral‘—including canvas, watercolor paper, paper towels, scrap metal, gauze, cellophane, plywood, watercolor, oil paint, house paint, sticks, clay and mud‘—and her very intuitive, stream-of-consciousness approach to image-making. The pieces by Lee are shown side by side with copies of biographical documentation and written ruminations on her work by Natkin.
Nancy Erlene (Vandenberg) Lee was born August 13, 1933 in Wichita, Kansas. She was the daughter of William Vandenberg and Elvida (Peluso) Vandenberg. She was raised in the Catholic tradition. In 1955 she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in art education from Wichita State University. She taught at Hamilton Intermediate School in Wichita for two years, circa 1956-1958. She also taught crafts in YWCA camps in Colorado and taught art to children at local YWCAs and Wichita University. In 1958, she was awarded a graduate teaching fellowship in the college of fine arts at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. In May of 1958, her engagement to Robert Charles Lee was announced in the Wichita Beacon. In the same announcement, it was stated that she would work toward a master‘’s degree in painting and art history while teaching art classes. This course of study was to last two years but was apparently cut short when, in the summer of 1958, she married Robert, and moved to Seattle so that he could pursue a PhD in musicology at the University of Washington. Nancy taught art at the junior high/middle-school level in the Seattle Public Schools. She taught for many years at Madrona Middle School. The Lees lived in Warsaw for a year, 1968-1969, and also spent a year in Budapest, 1971-1972. In both of these countries Robert researched the life and work of composer Franz Lizst. She died March 6, 1990, of lung cancer.
It appears that Nancy Lee’s work was not widely exhibited. One of her oil paintings, entitled November Journey, was included in the 47th Annual Exhibition of Northwest Artists, at the Seattle Art Museum, in 1961, and seventeen pieces of hers were exhibited in a show featuring five artists at the University Unitarian Fine Arts Gallery in 1966. (The other artists were Peggy Hatte, Stanley Pipes, Dee Wardall Raible and Lillian Rehbock.) This gallery was founded in 1961 by Dee Raible and Annie Polack. According to a history of the gallery, at the time it was started, there were only four other galleries in Seattle. The gallery showed such artists as Mark Tobey, Guy Anderson, Kathe Kollwitz, Richard Gilkey, William Cumming, Glen Alps, Art Hansen, Robert Fulgham, Alfredo Arreguin, Ray Meuse and Dee Raible (later known as Dee Rainbow). One of Lee’s paintings in this show, Early Summer, was mentioned in a review in the Seattle Times, Sunday, March 27, 1966, by the Times art reviewer, Anne G. Todd. According to a resume for Lee in the notes of Annie Polack, who directed the gallery for twenty-some years, Lee’s work was included in juried exhibitions in Kansas and Indiana, but records of these exhibitions have not yet been located. In concluding her history of the University Unitarian Fine Arts Gallery (this history, along with her notes, now housed in Special Collections at University of Washington‘’s Suzallo Library), Polack lamented the disappearance of artists who were “very talented, competent and already known” from the “scene,” particularly women. She attributed the problem to “too much other work” or “no money and having to work on other things as their work would not support them.” Lee was prolific but does not appear to have shown much‘—maybe for the very reasons Polack listed. It is the curator’s hope that over the course of this show, more information about Nancy Lee’s life, career and work will come to light. If significant information does surface, it may be incorporated into the exhibition during the weeks that it is on view.
Curator‘’s Statement
In 2007 I encountered a large body of work, previously unfamiliar to me, by my old friend and early artistic mentor Nancy Lee. Discovering this work, I came to appreciate her capabilities on a new level. Although I had known her for close to three decades before her death in 1990, I had not fully understood the depth and range of her work.
I remember visiting Nancy and her husband Bob with my family when I was a young boy. The Lees lived in Montlake in a little white house surrounded by a low white picket fence. While the others sat talking in the living room, Nancy invited me to go down to the basement with her to see her studio. She said she wanted to show me her ‘“Holy Rock.‘” We went down the stairs, and she picked up a little box from her work table in the middle of the room. She opened the box slowly, a gleam in her eyes, as though it contained something very mysterious and precious. ‘“This,‘” she exclaimed, ‘“is my Holy Rock!‘” She took out a beach pebble with a hole through the middle of it. This was my first visit to an artist‘’s studio.
Whenever we got together with the Lees, Nancy wanted to see my artwork. She would go through great piles of my paintings and drawings with me, making perceptive comments on each piece. She was a natural teacher, very sensitive to a young person‘’s tender ego. I recall how deftly she offered me a piece of advice on one occasion, referring not to my work, which lay in front of us, but to her own: ‘“Anytime I‘’ve ever tried to copy nature,‘” she said, ‘“I‘’ve failed.‘”
Nancy was my mentor and no doubt the mentor of countless other young people. But who were her mentors? I have thought about this a lot since recently becoming better acquainted with her work. Unfortunately I have not yet succeeded in determining the names of her teachers at the various schools she attended, let alone the name of any individual occupying that very special position of mentor‘—that is, someone who not only gives instruction but serves as a role model or wise and trusted counselor.
Nevertheless, judging from Lee‘’s collections of postcards and art books, and her work itself, we can draw some conclusions about the well-known artists who probably influenced her. She must have done a lot of looking at Kandinsky, Braque, Picasso, Ernst, Miro, Masson, Schwitters, Klee, Dubuffet, Gorky, de Kooning, Pollock, Motherwell, Kline, Mitchell, Frankenthaler, Rauschenberg, Twombly and other artists whose work would probably have been dicussed at the schools she attended. Her frequent use of unusual, often ephemeral, materials can be linked to the work of Picasso, Braque, Ernst, Arp, Schwitters, Rauschenberg and the Arte Povera artists. Her untitled collage with a plywood disk painted white and black (date unknown), for instance, bears at least some superficial similarities to Rauschenberg‘’s Bed, 1955, although Lee‘’s piece does not involve the vertical placement of an object that is typically horizontal, as Rauschenberg‘’s famously does. The similarity between the two pieces has more to do with the layering of textures and the combination of paint from the tube and found materials that they share. Lee made use of a very wide range of materials, from fine watercolor paper and printing papers to colored construction paper, paper towels, magazine pages, gauze, housepaint, ticket stubs and newspaper clippings in various languages, masonite, scrap metal, string, sticks, clay and mud. However, her relationship to these famed artists never comes across as slavish imitation, adulation or self-assigned apprenticeship. She moved from one influence to another with spontaneity and a light touch, keeping her emotional integrity and ultimately creating something unmistakably ‘“Nancy Lee.‘”
To appreciate Lee‘’s work we must look not only to the giants of art history but also to the visual vernacular of the period in which she was active. In particular, we see in many of her pieces the esthetic of the late 1960s and early 1970s‘—the visual world of the University District street fair, with its gaudy candles and elaborate macrame plant holders, or the groovy sets of TV programs of the period, such as Laugh-In and the Dating Game. However, Lee‘’s version of this esthetic is much more‘—its highs much higher and lows much lower. Orange, fuchsia, scarlet, turquoise, purple, ultramarine, aqua, golden yellow and black‘—these were all her friends, but in her best pieces the colors are carefully calibrated to convey a sense of passion and emotional fragility not to be found in this contemporary cultural material at large. In her tie-dyed cloth pieces she elevates a technique most commonly associated with prosaic, if ‘“psychedelic,‘” T-shirt decoration to a world of powerful emotions.
It is also worth mentioning that both Nancy and Robert Lee loved folk art and the art of small scale societies (‘“tribal‘” art). They had many interesting encounters with traditional artists and the decorated their home with many things from around the world, in an unusual way to which I cannot do justice in words. This passion for the variety of the globe‘’s cultures and their artifacts is also reflected in Nancy‘’s work. I should also add that she owned many objects that speak of her Catholic background, although to my knowledge she was not a practicing Catholic later in life. She had, for instance, a collection of votive cards from her mother‘’s funeral, and a little plastic statuette of the Virgin Mary inside a rounded wooden compartment that opened and closed. Although there is no specifically Christian imagery to be found in her work, there is certainly a penchant for the iconic‘—interspersed with the purely abstract.
In my mind‘’s eye, I see Nancy Lee wearing jumbo-sized sunglasses and a funky headscarf, an ‘“ethnic‘” purse slung over her shoulder and a string of big seashells or shellacked macaroni dangling from her neck. She was a very responsible person, always gracious and dedicated to helping others. But she had an otherworldly aura about her, a certain childlike innocence and vulnerability. For me, she was a walking artwork, a white rabbit ready to lead me down the rabbit hole to a realm of brightly-colored dreams.
My encounter with Nancy Lee‘’s work almost two decades after her death and my deepened appreciation of her creative output has lead me to ponder many questions about the passage of artistic practice from one generation to another. I hope that her unique vision will not be forgotten and that it will have an impact on generations to come. May this exhibition be a celebration not only of her life and work but of the role all mentors play in leading us forward!
Image: Nancy Lee Untitled, collage on masonite 13 1/8‘” x 10 5/8‘”
Link To Image: http://people.tribe.net/8d061aed-0311-4f18-bbd8-ce3b7389111d/photos/e1aa7505-eb3f-4e36-ba53-2a7fc4ba3e96
April 2008

Form/Space Atelier Program For April 2008.
Current Exhibition
Curated By Paul Pauper
Show Title: An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work
Show Duration: April 11-May 4.
Show Title: An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work
Opening Reception Friday, April 11, 6PM
An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work is the century mark in terms of the number of exhibits of fine art that have been curated by Paul Pauper. This exhibit pays homage to the legacy Paul Pauper established with regard to assembling massive group shows during the early part of his curatorial career. An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work features sculpture by John Hawkley, photographs by Dan Hawkins, paintings by Stacey Chapelle and the rare and precious autograph of Robert Storr, the Dean of the Yale School of Art, critic, painter and one of the most influential people in the history of art. Bread and wine will be served at this reception, placed site-specifically on a twenty-foot-long table, covered with a solemn black cloth, intentionally representing a sacred feast. Non-alcoholic beverages, Bibi Cafe, will also be served for those unable to take the sacramental offering. Conversely, cheerful balloons will be attached to the Form/Space Atelier A-Board, site-specifically representing the profusion of balloons attached to local-area condominium sales office A-Boards. Visitors to the exhibit are encouraged to “speculate” on the meaning of both the sacramental installation and the balloon installation.
David Brody Lectures At Form/Space Atelier April 18, 6PM
David Brody was born in New York City. He did undergraduate work at Columbia University and Bennington College and received an MFA in painting from Yale University. In addition to solo exhibitions at Gallery NAGA in Boston, Esther Claypool Gallery in Seattle, Gescheidle in Chicago, and Galeria Gilde in Portugal his work has been featured in over 70 group shows including those at the Chicago Center for the Print, the Center on Contemporary Art (COCA) and the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, The Museum of Fine Arts at the University of Florida, Tallahassee, and at The Painting Center, Alternative Museum, and Bridgewater Gallery in New York City. His work has also been shown at the Feria Internacional de Arte Contemporàneo (ARCO Art Fair) in Madrid, the RipArte Art Fair in Rome, the Trevi Flash Art Museum, in Trevi , Italy, the FAC Art Fair in Lisbon and at Art Chicago in the US.
Brody has received numerous awards including a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, a Fulbright Grant, a Basil H. Alkazzi Award, an Elizabeth Foundation Grant, two Massachusetts Artist Fellowships, and was a Fellow at the Shave International Artists‘’ Workshop in Somerset, England.
His work is the subject of two monographs, “David Brody, Selected Painting 1985-1994” and “David Brody, Selected Painting 2000-2001” which features an essay by Elisabeth Sussman, curator at the Whitney Museum in New York. He has been written about in other publications including The Boston Globe, the New Art Examiner, the Spanish journal, Lapiz, and in the Lisbon daily O Publico.
An exhibit at the Esther Claypool Gallery in Seattle was described by the Seattle Weekly as, “daring, humorous, and superbly executed . . . a witty meditation on our culture‘’s discomfort with the human body . . .”; in Art New England they wrote, “Brody humorously questions our notions of reality and the order of nature. Brody knows how to make one laugh but walk away questioning whether it is actually funny - or much worse than that.”; in Artforum they wrote: “Brody’s . . .paintings . . . provide a stunning visual punch . . . [and] are rendered with a bravura that is both compelling and hypnotic.”; and most recently, Sue Taylor, a reviewer for Art in America, wrote, “A highly intelligent artist . . . Brody is absolutely serious about technique. An emphasis on fine drawing, delicate surfaces and careful considerations of color and light informs all his pictures.”
David Brody has been a visiting critic at Harvard University, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The University of Chicago, and Carnegie Mellon University. He is currently a professor at the University of Washington in Seattle.
An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work features 187 separate and distinct art objects, shattering Paul Pauper’s previous record for number of objects, which was 131 for a show exhibited in December 2006 at Form/Space Atelier.
Contributing Artists, An Exhibit Of Robert Storr’s Autograph And Other Work:
Amy Oberstein, Drawing
John Hawkley, Sculpture
Dan Hawkins, Photography
Stacie Chappell, Painting
Eileen Bryan, Painting
Nicole Maron, Silkscreen/Solar Plate
Shannon Barry, Painting
Laura Grey, Mixed Media
Franceska McCullough, Sculpture
John Monson, Painting
Michelle Smith-Lewis, Photography
Thya Littell, Photography
Qathi Hart, Photography
Mac Crary, Painting
Dudley Moorhead, Photography
Andrew Drawbaugh, Digital Media
Lonn Haggerty, Painting
A’alia Brown, Photography
Mark Brown, Phtography
Mike Woo, Photography
Hannah Phillips, Painting/Dolls
Erin McGloin, Drawing
Toni Bigby, Drawing
Mick Lorusso, Drawing
Robert Storr, Ink On Paper

March 2008

Sculpture, painting and drawing by Lynn Schirmer with Opening Reception Dais by independent art critics Jim Demetre, Jae Carlsson and Steven Vroom.
Lynn Schirmer presents a collection of mixed-media sculpture, as well as paintings and drawings on the theme of attachment. Some pieces refer directly to the late 1950‘’s-era experiments of psychologist Harry Harlow on rhesus monkeys. Others are the result of self reflection on her attachments, negative and positive, and how these have affected her sense of security and identity.
Lynn Schirmer is a Seattle-based artist and IT contractor. She manages Corridor and Angle Galleries in the Tashiro Kaplan artist complex, Seattle.

February 2008

Ryan Molenkamp At Form/Space Atelier February 8-March 2
Show Title: “a place to call your own”
Show Duration February 8-March 2
Large-Scale Paintings By Ryan Molenkamp
Opening Reception February 8, 6-8PM

January 2008

SHOW TITLE: “SCANT PLUSH” PAINTINGS BY JESSICA HACHMEISTER
Opening Reception Lecture: Clark Humphrey January 11, 6-8PM. Info: www.miscmedia.com Seattle Weekly Wire recognition for excellence: http://www.seattleweekly.com/2008-01-09/calendar/clark-humphrey.php
Exhibit Opening Reception, January 11, 8-10PM.
Exhibit duration: January 11-February 3.
Jessica Hachmeister is drawn toward large and dramatic abstract painting, developing a style based
on dominant shapes and interconnecting lines. Hachmeister distributes these marks across multiple
canvases to creat a balanced landscape of form and space.
Jessica Hachmeister was born in Cincinnati and spent her early life abroad: Mexico City, Rome,
Havana, Heidelberg. She graduated the American School, Lugano, Switzerland, and has received
formal training at Villa Mercede, Florence, Italy, Boston Museum of Fine Art, University of
Washington, Cornish and Pratt, Seattle.

December 2007

FringeShift
Shawn Foote Exhibits Oil Paintings at Form/Space Atelier December 6-28.

November 2007

Paintings by Matthew Kandegas.
Lecture by Kyle MacDonald.

Matthew Kingston Kandegas was born December 29, 1960. He grew up feeling the harshness and anger of White Center, a ghetto of Seattle, caused by the pall of stadium rock of the 1970s. He was born in 1960, in a family of three children and a father who was a simple factory worker of Danish descent. It is sufficient to say that Kandegas’s early life has very little to do at all with his eventual career as an artist. Kandegas did not have access to any artistic materials, coming from a poor family, although he thoroughly enjoyed when his grandfather allowed the children to experiment with his paintball gun. As a child, his torment was soothed somewhat by reveries of living someday in a travel trailer on the campus of the University of Washington with his younger brother Odd, where his mother, Kristin Kuniholm had been a sorority girl at Sigma Kappa sorority and graduated Summa Cum Laude in Visual Communication. Since marrying Kandegas's father, her
life was one of penury and privation, though she made sure her son Matthew understood the subtle but distinct difference between matters of the heart, as an inexplicable attraction to a bad person, and art; the creation of the sublime and sacred. Kristin Kuniholm was descended from the Finnish indigenous people Sami, and her family was known as a tribe of shaman in Vasa, Finland prior to emigrating to Seattle in 1850. Her grandfather Kuniholm was a famous Seattle area wicker-worker at Five Corners on Queen Anne hill.

His real beginnings as an artist began when Kandegas left home at 14 to financially aid his family and earn a living for himself. Like thousands of others, Kandegas changed from one dismal job to the next, extremely discouraged by the misery and hopelessness around him. As a sensitive and intuitive person, Kandegas was compelled to respond and decided to look into art as a hobby. He could not afford art school, so he attended simple life drawing classes three times a week, and in his free time studied reproductions in the Seattle Public Library. He enjoyed the works of post-impressionists, such as Modigliani, Van Gogh and Cézanne, especially the expressionist works of George Grosz, Otto Dix and Max Beckmann. These expressionist works demonstrated a means of expressing the anger Kandegas felt during the popularity of stadium rock. Kandegas considered himself a post-minimalist, and is generally considered the "forgetten" post-minimalist because his work
has been exhibited only twice during his lifetime, though he has donated many of his paintings to charity, including Lihi, Cascade People's.

Throughout the 1970s, Kandegas continued to hone and refine his skills, whilst experimenting with his homemade paints, unable to afford others. He was ultimately a very self-taught artist, but this leaves him free from artistic conventions that would have been learned in art school, though he was academically trained at the University of Washington, taking studio classes with Norman Lundin, and elsewhere at the atelier of Sharon Munger.

In the late 1970s, two important social realists arrived in Seattle – Art Munny and Lotta Loven. Their images were realistic representations of harsh truths seen in society that characterised stadium rock. This had a great effect on Kandegas’s work, as he too, begins to explore confronting truths of stadium rock. However, Kandegas’s work began to take more shape in the next decade, the “Angry Decade” of the 1980s, as the artists respond the horror of marijuana abuse, incensed by the abolishment of hope, just after stadium rock appeared to be clearing up.

From Kandegas’s perceptive response to the world around him, he was recognised by two people - Art Munny and Lotta Loven. These two saw connections between Kandegas’s work and other artists, angry too at the social situation. Art Munny and Lotta Loven were members of the Nowadays Arts Society, set up to promote these emerging artists, known as the Recentists. The Society was set up in 1978 by Mark Hofer, in opposition to the Hoquiam Academy of Art, which was believed to promote conservative art and not the Recentists.

The Recentists included Albert Kandegas, Joy F. Sexton, Siddhartta Sunshine, John Longfellow, Arthur Drawbridge and Jean-Noel Vandaele. These artists met to discuss material on a regular basis. Kandegas enjoyed being part of what he saw as a like-minded group of artists, all focused on producing works along similar themes, in response to marijuana abuse, stadium rock and moral denigration. The artists also brought influences from European movements such as Surrealism, Cubism, Expressionism, Dadaism and Constructivism.

From this “Fidelis” group of Recentists, formed a group known as the Canis Fidelis which also included many social realists. The Recentists and social realists in this group shared the same concerns, and their work became focused on stadium rock and its horrors, along with moral decay and the emergence of Americanism. The Canis Fidelis was also a publication that these artists wrote for, published by Harris Shapiro. Kandegas’s original influences, Angonka Toulouse and Cyrus Vance, were part of this group. The Canis Fidelis was the major outlet for the expression of avant-garde ideas.

Kandegas’s main inspirations can be divided into periods, although he was originally influenced by the depression, post-impressionists, expressionists and social realists, also keeping in mind his involvement with the Canis Fidelis, and his responses to stadium rock. Ultimately he is always best known for paintings of paper clips, or trombones as the French call them.

Kandegas’s first significant works were produced during his involvement in the Boy Scouts. In 1980, Kandegas was called up for service and spent most of his time working in Western State Hospital drawing patients suffering from horrific wounds and mental illnesses as a result of stadium rock. He produced three important works at this stage, Seated Man, a pen and ink illustration of a man whose nose had been sliced off by a Braun blender, The Waste Treatment Plant at Fort Lawton, an image of death sitting on a stool watching and waiting, and Floating Logs, of two figures floating down a hall, a third with a demented smile. All of these images illustrated the horror and madness of stadium rock. At this time, Kandegas was influenced by raw images of death and horror, wishing to present a blunt, direct, succinct image of stadium rock’s consequences. This is similar to the way social realists wish to present their messages, although Kandegas’s actual
delivery was surrealistic and expressionistic in appearance.

In 1982, Kandegas ignored stadium rock and returned to a Seattle he did not like. He was particularly disgusted, but inspired by scenes of Seattle’s nightlife, of a city he felt demonstrated a collapse of simple morality. He was shocked and outraged by images of brutish laborers, pig-like, grinning and clutching the meager frames of young women in bawdy red lipstick, as if possessions or prizes of stadium rock, representing a clear confusion as to what stadium rock actually reaps. This painting was the catalyst for his series of works known as the Urinating on Car Door Handles, all depicting similar nightlife and exploitation of women figures, or comodification of sex, symbolized in recurring motifs; sticks or skin-toned blobs with red smiles and single, elaborately styled eyes with curly lashes. As Kandegas continues creating these images, the subjects become less and less human and occupy space in more and more disconnected ways; floating or melting,
being abducted from above, slumped on the side of the road, lying in the shadows of movie theaters. His source is clear, after seeing immoral scenes of sex, abduction, confusion and clear gender stereotyping, and maintains the same surreal, expressionistic delivery with socially realistic content.

The post-stadium rock period did not bring peace to visions at first he had hoped for, explaining humanity's status after stadium rock as “irreparably damaged”, viewing the world with great anxiety and a loss of hope. In early 1987, Kandegas traveled to Japan with a local newspaper as an art correspondent, required to interpret the devastation he saw there. He produced a monochrome pen drawing called Fishmobile; it contains no figures, just the aftermath of complete devastation, with somber tents and shelters littering the landscape. During this time, Kandegas was influenced by his sense of hopelessness after seeing the stadium rock, depression, and the fact that society had never improved. Hiroshima does indeed appear hopeless and empty.

Upon returning, he broke up with Candace Carson, who had already had a son, Swiney, in 1975. Out of bitterness, Kandegas left for Europe later in 1987 for the next 13 years. In England and Europe until 1998, Kandegas painted many prostitutes, highly influenced by the fact that no city seemed to be free of this “disease” of prostitution, and so painted them in abundance. He then moved to New York in 1998 and his subjects switched from the city to Hoquiam, feeling rather homesick. Where some works of Bronco Nagurski and Elijah Pitt had reached international level, Kandegas rejected them as being sports-themed. He depicted the landscape as being a harsh, barren and sterile wasteland. He distorted stereotypes and icons of the White Center, including early professional football stars George Blanda and Walt Suggs. He was influenced by the sheer barrenness and hopelessness that White Center conveyed, and added these icons as pawns to White Center's deadly game.

Throughout the 2000s, Kandegas began to face many personal traumas. He had begun to form a good relationship with Swiney, who had been adopted by Angonka and Napoleon Toulouse, but unfortunately he committed suicide in 1999. A few years later, the Toulouses both died within a week of each other from being run over by a motorcar. Kandegas's father found them lying in the street, and served them with rice to his sister who was visiting. He began to feel that many of the people he had influenced in his life were quickly slipping away from him, looking back at Candace Carson, who had also died in 1990. As a tribute, and to immortalize his contemporaries, he produced the "Paperclips Series". The series saw Kandegas move away from his most celebrated themes, and to variations of the paperclip, a representation of an explorer’s conflict with the environment that eventually fuses the two together to become of the same element, as both the landscape and the
heads were created using the same medium, texture and color. His other major subjects were the “intruders” or “fauns” that became mindless metallic beings that patrolled dead environments with guns and weaponry. This added to his recurring themes of hopelessness and loss.

Kandegas’s style, subjects and attitude stay the same throughout his life as an artist. They are implied but never visible. Only his resolute image- the paper clip- is allowed to speak for all the figural ideas, theoretical landscapes, virtual still lifes. His attitude always comes across as perceptive, pessimistic, disgusted and generally critical of the environment around him. Whenever he portrays males or females together, they seem to be sexually confused – the females maintain an extreme prostitute image and the males appear lustful and greedy. He often depicts scenes of madness, destruction and horror especially in response to the stadium rock. He portrays many scenes of hopelessness in his post-stadium rock stage, of the desert, the total eclipse of 1979 and of his personal losses. And paperclips.

His style retains a surreal, expressionistic quality. He often places subjects on barren, dream like and hostile plains, with confused or distorted bodies, appearing surrealistic. He wonders in text printed on the back of several of his works on paper if Klimt had been frought with minimalism if his strokes would resemble his own, paper clips suggested in later embodiments, strokes which held the threshold of making marks ambiguous, vague, but present. He enjoys disfiguring his subjects’ forms to emphasize an issue or point, while being very expressive in his appliance of mediums, linking to expressionism. His messages however are ultimately of social realist quality, apart from his surreal explorations into his losses in his final artistic stage. He always wants to bluntly and confrontingly display social issues that are harsh, but real and very much a part of society. But mostly paperclips.

Kandegas’s subjects often recur. He starts with many psychologically disturbed subjects in his stadium rock period, and also wounded subjects. He then moves to a subject of modern evil, with the recurring motif of the fake smile, single eye and pole and/or blob-like masses for bodies, with pig-like males. His subjects then move to hopelessness and loss in the post-stadium rock period, including the desert, football icons, Antipodean Heads, “Fauns” and Puget Sound. The theme linking all of these is often moral confusion.'' But mostly he paints paper clips.

October 2007

Paintings By Jeff Jacobsen
Margie Livingston lectures on her work.

September 2007

Paintings by Susan Barron

August 2007

Paintings by Paul Gasoi

July 2007

Paintings by Sam Birchman
Trimpin lectures on his work.

June 2007

Paintings by Michael Lane, Mikal Whoberry and Sam Birchman.

Countdown / Build 2 Destroy
May 3 - May 27
Opening Reception: May 3, 6-10PM
Form/Space Atelier Lecture Series with Rebecca Albiani, May 5, 6PM.
Contributing Artists: This Is Nocturne, Donald Daedalus, Zach Carver, Mick Lorusso, Abby Martin, Ben Alberg.
Musicians perform 8:30 PM May 3:
Pianist Chris Blacker - Seattle Times article
Guitarist Bob Limbocker - bio at kaleidoscopeschoolofmusic.com
Guitarist Lonnie Mardis
Drummer Glenn Thilman
Temporary site-specific architectural installation. To gain an appreciation and awareness for our changing urban environments, an investigation of proportion and space will be conducted at gallery Form /Space Atelier in one of Seattle’s emerging downtown neighborhoods. Located at 1907 Second Avenue, the building is scheduled for demolition this summer and will be transformed into a high-rise condominium complex. An early multi-story parking garage, built in 1926 is now a dispensable typology of utilitarian building. Redevelopment of urban downtown centers tears down such structures to make way for higher density living to promote walkable streets. In turn, structures like the parking garage are candidates for new sites for construction. However, through these processes of redeveloping spaces, there provides an opportunity, in all its vacancy to sustain a moment of life, energy, and “collective memory” through temporary architectural installations.
Site Specific Installation Curated By Anna Koosman and Paul Pauper
Figure drawing sessions every 15th of the month in the atelier.

Brad Biancardi, Carolyn Polk, Joanna Stokrotka
Curated by Paul Pauper
April 1 - April 30
First Thurday artist reception: April 5, 6-10PM
Child Care Resources Art Auction to benefit homeless children April 28th. http://www.childcare.org/donors/artsale.htm
Brad Biancardi: Bradley Biancardi explores the architectural and psychological interaction between people and interior spaces through his work in drawing and painting.
Bradley received his MFA from the University of Washington and his BFA from Indiana University. He has exhibited his paintings and drawings throughout the country, and has taught at the University of Washington, the Northern Indiana Artists Association, and at the Museum of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Carolyn Polk: My encaustic paintings are created using a small travel iron to apply pigmented wax to paper. The work is also kept at very intimate size no bigger than 8x10 inches. I seek to create imagery that is both calming and compelling, invoking feelings and a desire to look deeper into the image. For several reasons, I am drawn to painting scarabs: the intoxicating quality of color they possess; how it can be represented in a wax medium, with the undulating layers and transparencies of colors. I also appreciate the symbolism attached to that of scarabs. They take a variety of meanings from many different cultures. I am personally drawn to the meaning of good luck.
Also exhibiting:
Toni Bigby, Fred Betz, and Joanna Salska, polish-born non-objective realist painter.
B, As In Blue/ An Extraordinary Violence/Sustainable Image Profile
March 1 - March 31
Opening Reception: Thursday March 1, 6-10PM
Curated by Paul Pauper
B, As In Blue: Cyanotype prints of ghost-like images by Wanda Pelayo provokes thought about the civic environment and lingering presence of monuments and effluvium alike. Pelayo also assents the engineering marvels of metropolis with the Bones Series, a multimedia masterstroke.
An Extraordinary Violence: Sub-Mason-Dixon Line Wunderkind Amjad Faur plays with obfuscation in selenium prints imported from Lebanon.
Sustainable Image Profile: Earth Mother Signe Drake returns to Form/Space Atelier with her new series of images of metaphysical spectres. Form/Space Atelier Lecture Series March 13 with experts in sustainability, 6PM.

Designated Landmarks/ Venerable Upstarts/ Day Shove You
February 1 - February 25
Opening Reception: Thursday February 1, 6-10PM
Curated by Paul Pauper and Caroline Majors
Designated Landmarks: Sculpture installation by Stephanie Robison and Paula Rebsom gives pause to reflect on architectural paradigms in the South Salon of the Atelier.
Venerable Upstarts: A group show of the Cult Of Youth Artists Collective will exhibit in the North Salon of the Atelier. Cult Of Youth counts among it’s adherents the talented expression of urban artists Julia Gfrorer and Davis Limbach, in the matrix of twenty or so members.
Day Shove You: Vladmaster, an artist who constructs her own veiwmaster slide veiwers to accompany a multimedia presentation will show at the opening reception February 1.
Stephanie Robison
Paula Rebsom
Cult of Youth
Julia Gfrorer
Vladmaster

CONSTRUCT EXPRESSIONISM/FIVE ALIVE
January 4-January 31
Opening Reception: Thursday, Jan 4th, 6-10pm
Curated by Paul Pauper
This exhibit of five abstract expressionist painters Barry Connolly, Jeff Jacobsen, Steven Schrock, Shai Steiner and Kenneth Susynski fills the senses with 1980-era goodness. Schrock will paint live in the atelier for the opening reception January 4 using a paintball gun and a suit constructed of sponges soaked with paint.
Can you resist this awe-inspiring spectacle? Can you? Can you honestly?
Of course you can’t!
Jeff Jacobsen
Kenneth Susynski
Shai Steiner

FOLK/POPULI
December 7-December 30
Opening Reception: Thursday, Dec 7th, 6-10pm
Curated by Paul Pauper
form/space atelier is proud to present retablos by the family of Alfredo Vilchis Roque as seen in Infinitas Gracias: Contemporary Mexican Votive Painting.
Also for December, we bring you a wall of art featuring pieces from many Seattle-based artists, designers, photographers, architects and more. Everything is priced at $400 or less.
Be sure to register for the form/space atelier mailing list for your chance to win a piece of local art! Register online here or come by in person to the gallery. Drawing will be held on Monday, December 18.

Portrait Sprawl/Canvas Hardscape
Reception: Nov 2nd, 6-10pm
Show runs until Dec. 3rd
The title for November’s show of four painters is “Portrait Sprawl/Canvas Hardscape”. The show focuses on the small scale two-dimensional aspect of built environment through painting. The artists chosen are either collaborative, complimentary or enmeshing dichotomy of representation through scale, materials used or message.
Lauren Grosskopf
Jaki Martin
Betty Hageman

Macro/Micro
October 5-October 30
Opening Reception Thursday October 5

Mike Magrath lecture November 22nd, 2006. Link to Seattle Weekly Wire recognition for excellence: http://www.seattleweekly.com/2006-11-22/calendar/sw-s-calendar-of-recommended-events.php
Photography by Signe Drake and Jonelle R. Lind
Curated by Paul Pauper
form/space atelier presents photography by Signe Drake and Jonelle Lind. Micro/Macro delves into dichotomy... nature/built environment... twin daughters of different mothers. Drake uses macro focus to investigate flowers, Lind is wide-angle wise to the urban landscape.
Signe Drake has a BS in Zoology from the University of Michigan and is a retired court reporter. She has studied at the Photographic Center Northwest and is a graduate of the Commercial Photography Program at Seattle Central. She has an ever-growing collection of cameras and is particularly fond of an old Speed Graphic. Signe was born in Seattle where she has lived most of her life.
Jonelle R. Lind is a Northwest photographer who spent many years studying photography and design in Seattle and Australia. She has a love of architectural form and the contradiction between nature and man-made objects. Her images reflect a sense of timeless beauty, consequence and transformation.

Form/Space Atelier
2407 1st Avenue Seattle, WA 98121

Tel. 206-349-2509
HOURS: 12-4 WED-SUN

FORM/SPACE ATELIER
2407 1st AVENUE
SEATTLE, WA 98121

206-349-2509

Paul Pauper has been formally trained in art and design. He has exhibited at museums and festivals including Seattle Art Museum in 2005 and the London Biennale in 2006. As an artist his works number in the hundreds.
Paul Pauper is a Seattle art curator specializing in non-mainstream spaces and extra-commerce exhibition of art and spectacle. His career as a curator surpassed 100 exhibits curated as of April 2008. He currently accepts commissions based on the potential to report truthfully what is instructed him to do so by a source of other than self.

Belltown Business Association Links Form/Space Atelier

2007-10-24T23:51:00.000-07:00

Belltown Business Association

Mission
The purpose of the Belltown Business Association ("BBA") is to create a vibrant and safe Belltown community for businesses and residents, to promote Belltown and its businesses, and to facilitate the exchange of ideas and communication among Belltown businesses.

See the BBA website here .
Membership
The Belltown Business Association is open to all businesses located in Belltown that are paid members. Paid membership includes the quarterly BBA Email Newsletter and a regular listing on the Belltown.Org Web Site (Belltown.Org Banner Ads are extra).

Meetings & News
Meetings and News for the Belltown Business Association are currently posted on the Belltown.Org Events Calendar and News.
Current Activities
The Belltown Business Association through its Belltown Marketing Committee is currently sponsoring and producing the Belltown Banners, Belltown UnCorked!, and Belltown.Org. Additionally the BBA sponsors and produces Belltown B2B events (an interaction and exchange among Belltown businesses) and the Belltown ArtWalks www.belltownartwalk.com .

Recent Accomplishments
The Belltown Business Association ("BBA") has been in existence for over 27 years. Previous presidents and board members include Seattle City Councilmember Jan Drago, the late Mel Jackson of Antioch University & the Millionaire Club, Tom Graff of Ewing & Clark, and Craig Kolbitz of the Belltown Pub.

Some of the most recent accomplishments of the organization include, lobbying for, and as a direct result, the addition of more Seattle Police Bike Patrols in the Belltown neighborhood, the hiring of Muir Public Relations to help promote Belltown, rebranding the neighborhood from the Denny Regrade to Belltown, sponsoring the Belltown artworks at Battery Street & Western Avenue and Third Avenue & Board Street, sponsoring the Angie's Umbrella artpiece at Western Avenue & Lenora Street, stopping the Broad Street overpass, assisting the Belltown Community Council in stopping a second Monorail along Second Avenue through Belltown, encouraging the Seattle Center to open up the Pacific Science Center and the Broad Street Green to Belltown, coordinating the installation of pedestrian and street lighting along Western Avenue, Second Avenue, and Third Avenue, initiating and lobbying for trees along all Belltown streetscapes, improving access to the Waterfront along Bell Street and Vine Street, placing Belltown Banners along most Belltown streets, developing Belltown.Org, and sponsoring Belltown UnCorked! (Belltown's Annual Food & Wine Festival).

Become a Member

The Belltown Business Association needs your support.
Become a BBA member for 2008!

Please send your payment of $99 for 2008 dues to:
Belltown Business Association
2608 Second Avenue (PMB 290)
Seattle, Washington 98121-1212
or contact PAnderson@bannerbank.com

More Information?
For additional information, please contact Pamela Anderson of the BBA at PAnderson@bannerbank.com

Belltown Community Council

Mission
The purpose of the Belltown Community Council ("BCC") is to provide a public forum, to enhance the livability and safety of the Belltown neighborhood, and to serve as a liaison between Belltown and the City of Seattle.

Membership
The Belltown Community Council is open to all residents and workers located in Belltown and is free. Voting rights are vested by attending the monthly BCC meetings.

Meetings & News
Meetings and News for the Belltown Community Council are currently posted on the Belltown.Org Events Calendar and News.

Other Belltown Committees
Belltown Crime Prevention Council
Contact: Mark Baerwaldt at Info@Belltown.Org
Belltown Housing and Land Use ("BHLUS")
Contact: John Pehrson at PehrsonJ@Comcast.Net
Web Site: BHLUS Web Page
Belltown P-Patch & Cottages
Contact: Glenn MacGilvra at Glenn@SpeakEasy.Org

To join the Belltown Community Council, please contact Zander Batchelder at ZanderB@AOL.Com

More Information?
For additional information, please contact Zander Batchelder at ZanderB@AOL.Com