Vignette: Jim Gottuso

“Making things (and living life) is essentially a series of decisions, each one contingent on the previous.” - Jim Gottuso

"Etched Porcelain Beer Glass" by Jim Gottuso, grolleg porcelain, 3.75in diameter X 6.75in tall, 2017, $70

After several years of running his own businesses, including computer graphics and animation, fatherhood prompted Jim Gottuso to commit to the studio practice of a functional potter.  Practicality and intellectualism are wedded in how he speaks about his work.

“I am very interested in the complete cycle of creating clay objects,” explains Gottuso. “Working on the wheel has provided a framework, grounded in functionality, which allows creativity to flourish. Functional demands inform aesthetics and vice versa, creating an evolution that hopefully moves forward to better work. Imperfections that occur while aspiring to perfection are exciting and learning to let them be has been a challenge. Not setting out with strict limitations always allows some wiggle room to let something become something else. This makes each object’s creation different and the immense frontier of possibilities provides exhilaration. Wondering about the unknown results in the coming years of trial and error, a period that all potters eventually get under their belts, appeals to a sense of anticipation about the promise of the future.”

“I’ve written statements about my work over the years and as I’ve matured I’ve come to look at what I do in the broader context of what all artists, craftspeople, writers, musicians, etc. do. After attempting to distill this all down to a somewhat simple explanation and thereby jettison the inevitable “artspeak jibberish”, what I’m left with is this:  Making things (and living life) is essentially a series of decisions, each one contingent on the previous. Evidence of those moments of decision (or the concealment of said moments) represents the object’s evolution from idea to its final state. Consequently, the work done on the objects themselves can be viewed as a metaphor for existence. In the microcosm (my work), the calligraphic brushwork includes obvious examples of my decisions represented by the change of direction of each brushstroke. I try to make these quickly so that the results are almost a presentation of many decisions skirting the boundaries of my subconscious.”

"Etched Porcelain Bowl" by Jim Gottuso, grolleg porcelain, 7.25in diameter X 4.5in tall, 2017

"I've come to believe that I've always just been in love with what happens when a brush, pen or pencil makes contact with another surface and using shellac as a resist on dried, unfired clay allows the surface to be etched without losing the immediacy and spontaneity of such brushwork."

Gottuso will be participating in the first Southern Crossings Pottery Festival (SXPF), which will take place March 2 & 3, 2018 at Copper & Kings in the Butchertown neighborhood of Louisville. The event will showcase potters in the Ohio River Region, including Lexington, Cincinnati, and more. The festival will also include the Empty Bowls Benefit Dinner @PLAY Louisville on March 3, 2018.

Hometown: Chadwicks, New York
Education: BFA in Drawing and Ceramics / Murray State University 1982; MFA in Sculpture / Southern Illinois University, Carbondale 1986
Website: gottuso.etsy.com
Instagram: /jimgottuso
Gallery Representation: In Tandem Gallery / Plough Gallery / Kentucky Artisan Center / Terra Incognito / Warm Springs Gallery.

Etched Porcelain Bowl" by Jim Gottuso, grolleg porcelain, 6.25in diameter X 4.75in tall, 2017

"Etched Porcelain Bowl" by Jim Gottuso, grolleg porcelain, 6.5in diameter X 4.5in tall, 2017

"Etched Porcelain Bowl" by Jim Gottuso, grolleg porcelain, 5in diameter X 4.5in tall, 2017

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2017 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved.

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Q&A With Penny Sisto

"Flamingos" by Penny Sisto

Penny Sisto learned to sew at the age of 3, growing up on the remote Orkney Islands off the northern tip of Scotland. Her unique, narrative quilts have brought her international recognition because of the estimable craft, but also for the colorful, humanist quality of the characters and stories she discovers. The social consciousness that is an important aspect of her work is brought to the fore in her latest work, to be exhibited at The Carnegie Center for Art and History in New Albany Indiana beginning February 16, 2018.

The Sixties – Turn on, Tune in, Drop Out! continues to follow many of the themes that has been at the center of Sisto’s work over the years — exploring people, politics, art, music, and spirituality — but presents them looking through the prism of the 1960s.” - Carnegie Center for Art & History website.

Keith Waits: The new exhibit reaches back to the 1960’s. Why is that period important to you now?

Penny Sisto: The Sixties were the years in which I escaped - leaving the Islands for the Highlands of Scotland.

I worked some really low level jobs: a chambermaid in a seedy hotel - I was fired for being late! We were expected to be there at 4:00 am and I had no funds for the bus and in snowy weather I would roll in an hour later. Then I was a seamstress in a factory setting. I was fired for bad, inaccurate sewing. I got an even lower paying job as an alteration sewer in a big store. I was fired again, this time for leading a walkout in protest after a fellow seamstress got electrocuted by old wiring on her steam iron. I sewed hats as a piece worker and was fired for bad and sloppy sewing.

Then my pregnancy began to show, which was a bad situation back then! It was December, and Anna was born at home in January. Life could go nowhere but up.

"Imagine" by Penny Sisto, 

I began to become aware of music - the Beatles of course, then came the Art. I started making art and clothing, and selling them successfully.

I continued practicing my midwifery skills, and it was hard to keep up with the demand - I did more and more babies, went to Africa, and helped women safely deliver more babies. It was there I met my first American friends. They were all Peace Corps members. I got pregnant with Tulsi, AKA baby  #4, married her Dad, came to the USA and after 6 months of working as Janitor for the Armenian Church just off Harvard Square we saved enough to buy an old VW bus and drive across the country to a commune in the Sierra Foothills in Northern California. When I got there the first person to greet us was Richard Sisto! I guess it was Kismet!

Having grown up in an area where everything was circular, including the old underground houses that in those days were still left wide open for us to play in and explore, growing up in an area and an era when Freedom was yours unless there were chores to be done on the farm and school was in one room and was discontinued at harvest time or times of big storms. My life was lived with few boundaries. If I milked and did my farm chores I was unsupervised, wild. I wore feathers in my hair, went to school only if forced, could edge so close to the seals and puffins that they learned to ignore me, stayed out all the light-filled nights of midsummer - that far north you can read a book at midnight outside.

KW: When did you first begin to reference Native American culture in your work?

PS: The myths of Northern Scotland and my islands are so akin to Native American as to become one quilt. Even the hats worn by Scottish soldiers are called Bonnets - War Bonnets. Our villages are called Clans. All Clans become one in my heart and mind.

The eagle and hawks are sacred magical creatures of our myths, and the salmon is known as the oldest Teacher on this earth, so when I came to America the only society that resonated within me and felt safe was the easy cross-over to Native American ways of looking at this Earth, our Great Mother. I worship in a raggedy old tipi, or the yurt if the tipi is too cold.

KW: You seem to exhibit in two-year cycles. How soon do you know what will be the focus of the next body of work?

PS: As for showing quilts in 2 year cycles, I would show more if I had more galleries available or willing to take me.

I am a Drone, a mindless worker. The quilts arrive even if I don't pay attention; they literally pour into my mind and my clumsy fingers butcher them into being. They are never what I want nor what I envision, they are pale shadows, and as I age they become even less like my initial vision. Such is the way when one’s fingertips are 76!

KW: The narratives are always built around characters. Do you know who the characters are before you start a piece?

PS: The characters on them arrive fully formed. Sometimes I portray living people, but usually they come like cloud people, unknown cloud beings who insist on being seen.

KW: You have been known to incorporate some unexpected things in your work - you once told me a story about pubic hair; did you use any unorthodox materials in these quilts?

PS: Nothing like that here. In this series there are less unorthodox findings and fabrics just because my pantry of bones, beads, and baubles is a wee bit bare.

"Yippie" by Penny Sisto

THE SIXTIES – TURN ON, TUNE IN, DROP OUT! NEW WORK BY PENNY SISTO

February 16 – April 21, 2018
Opening Reception February 16, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

In addition to Sisto’s art quilts, the Carnegie Center will also be displaying a series of whimsical and joyful wooden benches created by Pierce Whites.

Carnegie Center for Art & History
201 E. Spring Street
New Albany, In.
http://www.carnegiecenter.org/
812-944-7336.

Tuesday - Saturday, 10:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Admission is always free.

"Nesting" by Penny Sisto

"Solstice Moon" by Penny Sisto

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2018 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved.

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Vignette: Waller Austin

"Waller Austin works with childhood's preeminent medium, the crayon, but the uses to which he puts this pigment are anything but childlike. Waller melts, mixes, pours and burnishes his paintings. His aptitude for representational techniques is expansive, as is his gift for mimicry, so the devices of schoolbook illustration are often uncannily attached to compositions and subjects referencing contemporary art; Pop Parody, if you will." – Buzz Spector

"Prosaic (dis) appearance" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, poplar, mylar, stainless steel, 48,648 paper wrappers, 2016-17 (contact for pricing)

Interdisciplinary is, arguably, the most crucial term on contemporary visual art, although even that claim underscores the essence of the word, as it points to the persistent breakdown of definitions of cultural disciplines. Today’s art lexicon now includes the designation “creatives” in places of artist, poet, musician, etc., a further reflection of the fluidity that confronts working artists.

Waller Austin uses the phrase to delineate his own artistic identity, connecting to a strain of installation artists that dates back to the early 20th century.

"snowed in" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, wood, 12x12in, 2017, $900

“All of my art can be summed up as post-conceptual self-portraiture, though it may be difficult for untrained eyes to recognize and/or acknowledge. With a Postmodern attitude, I address challenges of post-colonial times by actively engaging structures of mimicry and hybridity via the appropriation of common themes in contemporary art. I stress that the identity I deliver through art is to be recognized as apocryphal - simultaneously indulgent and self-abasing. Through an interrogation of originality and authenticity, I challenge the viewer to examine their own systems for consideration and interpretation of any prescribed visual language or learned norm.”

“My works incorporate processes of decision making that revolve around play and leisure with a conflation between art history, humor, and mythology. I address an open range of content stemming from an interest in identity, mimicry, and hybridity. As an artist, my goal is to muddy and force a complication of information, and to incite intuitive and inventive thinking within my audience.  Elevating the ‘riff,’ I work almost exclusively with ‘readymades’ in terms of image, esthetic, idea, and process. Exploring notions of ownership, I commandeer screenshots of intellectual property and transform defining information into new tangible objects that bare my unique signature.”

“Paint is simply pigment and binder. Artists have the privilege to choose how to further define these two elements. Over the past three years, I have dedicated much of my studio practice to utilizing Crayola crayon as a both paint and sculpture material. The resulting works occupy a place in the art historical cannons of encaustic painting and wax sculpture. They catalyze a nostalgic phenomenon for older audiences and flatten high and low art, providing understandable access to a younger audience.”

 "eleven (hybrids)" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen,poplar, 120x72in, 2016, $4600

There will be a Closing Reception for Waller Austin's current installation at The Tim Faulkner Gallery
Friday, January 26, from 6:00-7:00 pm.

Hometown: Louisville, Kentucky
Education: MFA in interdisciplinary studio arts, Washington University, St. Louis, MO; BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Website: www.walleraustin.com
Instagram: @walleraustin

Scroll down for more images

"mouth of a gift horse" (installation detail) by Waller Austin,  mixed media. variable dimensions, 2016 (contact for pricing)

 "Superman Ice Cream Paintings" (installation detail) by Waller Austin, mixed media. variable dimensions, 2015-17, $200-$900

"lil homies" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, wood 12x12in, 2017, $900

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Vignette: Karen Boone

“My painting reflects my minimalist, natural lifestyle.” - Karen Boone

"Red's Meadow" by Karen Boone, Watercolor on canvas, 24x18in, 2017, $450

Painter Karen Boone calls herself a “Natural Explorer,” creating environmentally friendly paintings inspired by nature and backcountry hiking adventures. Often she will hike in the wilderness for over a week, carrying only essentials in a backpack - she keeps the weight under 28 lbs, executing paintings of great immediacy; a painter’s snapshot of the environment.

"Helen Lake" by Karen Boone, pastel on paper, 4x6in, 2017, NFS

“In 2016 I backpacked in Costa Rica, below the rim of the Grand Canyon, and thru-hiked the John Muir Trail from Yosemite to Mt. Whitney. In 2017 I spent a week hiking the backcountry of Glacier National Park and a week in the Cascades. I do tiny sketches while in the field, then create larger pieces back in the studio. My paintings focus on nature’s powerful colors and energy, often with a figurative quality.”

“I try to make my art supplies as environmentally friendly as possible. I hand-mix archival natural pigments (free of fillers, additives, synthetic preservatives, toxins, petroleum-based pigments and heavy metals) with walnut oil for oil paint, or gum arabic, honey and clove oil for watercolors. I stretch my own canvases using organic cotton and plant-based gesso, (free of horse hooves or rabbit skin). I often use sticks or rocks to move paint on the canvas, a style I call ‘Wild Brushes.’ I have been painting sustainably for over 10 years when I started experimenting with Amish milk paint. My painting reflects my minimalist, natural lifestyle.”

There is admirable consistency in Boone’s sense of mission, which is both socially aware and politically astute, and, even though she speaks in such practical terms, at least of hint of spirituality in her communion with nature.

Boone currently has a show at Rainbow Blossom in the Highlands through the end of February. “It’s a symbiotic relationship because I use their essential clove oil in making my watercolors.”  All of the paintings shown here are included in that exhibit. An award-winning painter and graphic designer, Boone has been chosen three times as the Kentucky Derby Festival poster artist, most recently in 2015.

Hometown: Louisville, Kentucky
Education: BA, University of Louisville , MA, Basel School of Design Switzerland.
Website: www.karenboone.com
Instagram: karenboonedesign                    

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"Muir Pass" by Karen Boone, Oil on canvas, 30x20in, 2017, $1950

"Mt. Whitney" by Karen Boone, Oil on canvas, 48x24in, 2017, $2400

"Pinchot Pass" by Karen Boone, Oil on canvas, 30x20in, $750

"Wildflowers Boulder Pass" by Karen Boone, Watercolor on paper, 8x6in, 2018, NFS

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2018 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved

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Student Showcase: Emily Meredith

"Red Scarf" by Emily Meredith, Oil on canvas, 16x20in, 2016, $250

To be a college student is to be exposed to the larger world through academia; to say it is a formative experience is, of course, a gross understatement. For some, the particular details of their upbringing might provide an even more pronounced contrast in the experience, as they are suddenly exposed to elements that that dramatically expand their frame of reference.

“Growing up in a religious family,” explains Emily Meredith, “I wasn’t exposed to many worldly things. My parents were very protective and conservative so the idea of the naked body was not something discussed around the house. When I came to college, I took figure-drawing classes to study the human body and how it sat in space. I grew to love the curves and angles of the figure.”

Meredith is certainly not the first art student to fall in love with the human form, but her work still expresses that inevitable sense of wonder and discovery that comes from exploring what is essentially the truth of our own existence. One’s own body is taken for granted; the last thing we see when we look in the mirror is beauty and mystery, being mired in the daily trappings of hygiene and fashion.  Meredith’s work here is grounded in the expected but nevertheless compelling life drawing studies, but she has begun to investigate the humanity contained within the body through abstracted imagery of body parts and character illustrations.

“I am inspired by the colors and techniques of figure painters like Lucian Freud and how he captures the details and vitality of the human tones. I also try to use simplistic color shapes like that of Lena Rivo and Gideon Rubin to find form. The movement of Duchamp’s futurist paintings influences some of my other works. My artwork is focused around the experiences of my life and the emotions that I feel, and my pieces are an expression of how I perceive the world around me.”

"Beauty marks" by Emily Meredith, Mixed media, 5.5x9in each, 2016, $60 each or $350 for the series

“The Beauty Marks series is based on the idea that our body flaws make us who we are. They have stories behind them and they show us how time has passed. I wanted viewers to see their insecurities as strengths and beautiful parts of themselves.”

Meredith will be a part of the May 2018 Senior Thesis show at the 849 Gallery at Kentucky College of Art + Design at Spalding University.

Age: 21
Hometown: Crestwood, Kentucky
Education: BA candidate in Painting and Drawing with a concentration in Illustration at Kentucky College of Art + Design at Spalding University (Spring 2018).
Instagram: @emmeredith14

"Pounding" by Emily Meredith, Oil on masonite, 16x20in, 2017, NFS

Back in a Blue Chair" by Emily Meredith, Oil on canvas, 20x24in, 2016, $350

"Paper bag" by Emily Meredith, Oil on masonite, 30x40in, 2015, NFS

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2017 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved.

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