The 2026 LVA Honors is on March 20th, and two of the honorees, Robyn Gibson & Tom Pfannerstill, join us in the studio. Tune into Artists Talk with LVA on WXOX 97.1 FM at 10 AM every Thursday.

Robyn Gibson is an emerging artist, curator, and podcaster living and working in Louisville, KY. After she started boxing in 2016, Gibson began incorporating it into her art practice. Larger-than-life-sized bold, gestural charcoal figures on canvas, a lyrical writing style meant to pack a punch, and voluptuous ceramic vessels inspired by her own curves all convey the movement and force important to her work and inspired by her boxing practice. The act of taking up space and claiming ownership of it is important to her work. As a Black artist focused on self-portraiture and the exploration of her trauma, Gibson grapples with Black identity, the depiction, perception, and value of Black bodies, and what it means to be authentic. She is also the host of the podcast, WheelHouse Art’s Art by Volume, presented by the Wine Room.

For nearly four decades as a full-time studio artist, Tom Pfannerstill has transformed overlooked everyday objects—trash, food, clothing, paintbrushes, and waste—into astonishing hyper-realistic sculptures. His work challenges viewers to reconsider consumerism and the byproducts of human consumption, often requiring a second glance to distinguish art from reality. Tom has exhibited nationally since 1990 and is the recipient of a prestigious Kentucky Arts Council fellowship. His work is held in major collections including the Flint Institute of Arts, Bellarmine University, and the Evansville Museum of Arts and Sciences. Based in Louisville, his enduring practice continues to influence generations of artists.

Public Radio

Artists Talk With LVA: September 8, 2022

Keith Waits · September 8, 2022

We speak with J. Daniel Graham & Hannah Smith, 2 of the several artists included in the 2022 KMAC Triennial. Tune in to WXOX 97.1 FM/Artxfm.com each Thursday at 10 am to hear Artists Talk with LVA.

The 2022 KMAC Triennial: Divided We Fall, connects concerns relevant to our geographic region with issues that define the larger national narrative, revealing how our landscape can be a site of conflict and resistance, as well as a place of unity and mutual respect.

Featuring work by Tammy Burke, Jon Cherry, Ceirra Evans, J. Daniel Graham, Ed Hamilton, Bruce Linn, Ebony G. Patterson, José Manuel Nápoles Puerto, Hannah Smith, Norman Spencer, Vadis Turner

The exhibition is officially open to the public until November 6th, 2022.

J. Daniel Graham comes from a family of storytellers. His mother was a basket maker and calligrapher and the lessons of engineering and risk from my dad. He studied Printmaking at the University of Florida and the University of Georgia, where he earned his Masters degree. Graham also trained as a custom woodworker under woodworker Dennis Sitka in Washington, D.C. Currently, he is a Professor of Art and Chair of the Art Department at Georgetown College in Georgetown Kentucky where he teaches a variety of courses including Sculpture, Printmaking, 3D Design, Metal Casting, and Package Design.

Jdgraham.net

Hannah Smith graduated with an MFA from the School of Art and Visual Studies at the University of Kentucky. They are currently teaching graphic design, printmaking, and sculpture at the University of Kentucky and Northern Kentucky University. Smith is also a Lead Teaching Artist with ArtWorks Cincinnati. They are also an instructor with the GSA in Kentucky.

Smith was honored at the 2022 Future Art Awards: Ecosystem X from Mozaik Philanthropy in Los Angeles, CA.

hannahsmithfineart.com

Mixed Media, Painting, Sculpture

Vignette: Tom Pfannerstill

Josh Jenkins · November 11, 2016

*"Ali Center and River West" by Tom Pfannerstill, 30x45in, acrylic on canvas (2016)*

Artists are sometimes magicians, creating illusions of space and time. Tom Pfannerstill’s “From the Street” series appear to be trash, candy boxes, fast food cups, oilcans, violently pressed flat by the heavy tread of delivery trucks. The artist finds these items in the street and alleyways, but this is not what you see on the gallery wall. Pfannerstill recreates each cast-off container as carved wood sculptures painted with acrylics.

It is a highly successful trompe l’oeil effect. The notion of picking any of these up by hand in the alley might be distasteful, but the seductive desire to touch the sculptural replication is difficult to control, even if only to verify that they are indeed not the flattened and filthy ‘real thing’. Pfannerstill applies the same approach to recreating objects from around his studio “They have been altered, bent, folded and scarred,” explains the artist, “ …in a word individualized. They touch on issues of commercialism and consumerism, but are mostly intended to be subtle reminders of the temporality of all things.”

*"Spring Street Tavern" by Tom Pfannerstill, 19.25x24in, acrylic on canvas (2016)*

Pfannerstill is most renowned for the painted sculptures, but actually is identified through several different styles and medium. “The work changes often, but I find myself returning again and again to several major areas of investigation; three-dimensional still life, found object works, a series of the human head (in this case, mine), quilts and quilt patterns using un-quiltlike materials, blue paintings, and of late black paintings.”

Now, inspired by flying out of NYC at night, Pfannerstill hs been immersed in a series of paintings of cities at night; darkness punctuated by points of light. The work is not like anything people are familiar from this artist, which is why he is particularly excited about them.

Pfannerstill currently has a show in Nashville Tennessee at the Cumberland Gallery. He will also be exhibiting with Caroline Waite at Galerie Hertz in Louisville, Kentucky November 13 through December 31, 2016.

Hometown: Louisville
Age: 64
Education: BFA, Western Kentucky University, 1975; School of Hard Knocks, 1975-present
Gallery Representation: Galerie Hertz, Louisville; Cumberland Gallery, Nashville, TN; Jonathan Novak Contemporary, Los Angeles, CA; Ellis-Walker Gallery, Bowling Green, KY; Sager-Braudis Gallery, Columbia, MO
Website: http://www.tpfannerstill.com