Recent BFA grad Alex Mandrila’s work “Family Setting” was recently featured in “Love Issue” published by Oitzarisme. This body of work, utilizing pictures of his own domestic setting to examine issues of fractured identity, was developed during Alex’s junior and senior years at Eastern. See the full publication.
Alex also took all the photographs used for backgrounds on this site.
The exhibit theme focuses on the body as location, a personal investigation of form and physicality in art. “nude” takes a closer look at the tactile, sensual and sometimes repulsive nature of skin and the body. The works included in “nude” all maintain a predominately flesh colored palette, heightening the organic quality that simultaneously seduces and repels.
Participating artists include Marcelyn Bennett-Carpenter, Kris Ebeling, Iris Eichenberg, Jason Ferguson, Petrova Giberson, Kylie Lockwood, Mark Newport, Corina Reynolds, Jane Ritchie, Claudia Florence Savage and Sarah Wagner.
814 West Eleven Mile Road, Royal Oak, Michigan April 15-May 14. Opening Reception: Friday April 15th from 7pm-10pm
http://openbookworkshop.com/
Faculty: Denise Gonzales Crisp and Christopher Baker
Dates: July 29-August 6, 2011
Cost: $700
Over the last two decades, there have been a number of essays—and, ironically, books—that predict the demise of traditional books in the wake of digital media. Defining the term “book” loosely, as a vehicle for visual or verbal content that is organized into “sections,” this intensive nine-day workshop will challenge overly simplistic ideas about the demise of physical books by stressing instead the ways novel renditions of physical and digital and hybrid “books” carry meaning. The objective is to encourage participants to explore unconventional forms that books may take and to create an artwork/designed object that challenges ideas of what books can be.
The nine-day intensive workshop is organized by Eastern Michigan University faculty Leslie Atzmon and Ryan Molloy. It will be led by Denise Gonzales Crisp and Christopher Baker. While the instructors will guide the direction of and lead discussions at the workshop, participants will be asked to contribute their particular knowledge and skill sets and contribute to the topic through presentations of their ideas and their creative work or research. The workshop is open to students, educators, and professionals from all disciplines.
Participants will be supplied basic art materials as part of the workshop. Other materials can be purchased at art supply stores in nearby Traverse City.
This Open Book workshop is an offshoot of the Open Book experimental book exhibition that was held in Eastern Michigan University’s University Gallery from April 3 to June 15, 2010. http://openbookexhibit.com.
Denise Gonzales Crisp is Professor of Graphic Design in the College of Design at North Carolina State University where she served as Department Chair from 2002 to 2006. Prior to arriving at the College in Fall 2002, Gonzales Crisp was senior designer for Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, and principal of the studio SuperStove!, designing such projects as Artextmagazine, Southern California Institute of Architecture lecture series, and books for independent presses. Her design and writing have been published internationally, and she has lectured widely at institutions such as the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), GraficEurope (Berlin), RMIT (Melbourne), and ArtCity (Calgary). Juried and commissioned essays are included in Design and Culture, Items Magazine, and Design Observer, and several anthology volumes. Her research areas include defining the “DecoRational,” writing alternative-design discourse, and most recently, speculative “tools that make type.” She is the author of the forthcoming book Relational Typography: Systems, Context, Form, Message (Thames & Hudson 2011). Gonzales Crisp serves as contributing editorial board member for the journal Design and Culture, and is a member of the Contemporary Art Museum advisory board in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Christopher Baker is an artist whose work engages the rich collection of social, technological and ideological networks present in the urban landscape. He creates artifacts and situations that reveal and generate relationships within and between these networks. Baker recently completed his Master of Fine Arts in Experimental and Media Arts at the University of Minnesota. He is now the senior artist-in-residence at the Kitchen Budapest, an experimental media arts lab in Hungary. In his previous life as a scientist, Baker worked to develop brain-computer interfaces at the University of Minnesota and UCLA.
Book: Leslie Atzmon’s collection Visual Rhetoric and the Eloquence of Design is out in print.
The essays in Visual Rhetoric and the Eloquence of Design foreground the rhetorical functions of design artifacts. Rhetoric, normally understood as verbal or visual messages that have a tactical persuasive objective—a speech that wants to convince us to vote for someone, or an ad that tries to persuade us to buy a particular product—becomes in Visual Rhetoric and the Eloquence of Design the persuasive use of a broad set of meta-beliefs. Designed objects are particularly effective at this second level of persuasion because they offer audiences communicative data that reflect, and also orchestrate, an array of cultural concerns. Visual Rhetoric and the Eloquence of Design features ten scholarly essays, as well as two visual essays on the topic of ornamental typography with accompanying verbal texts. The essays in this collection span a number of design disciplines, including manufacturing design, graphic design, architectural design, and monument design. Contributors include Leslie Atzmon, Gerry Beegan, Guillemette Bolens, Kate Catterall , Barry Curtis, Michael Golec, Vladimir Kulik, Ryan Molloy, Teal Triggs, Jane Webb, Jack Williamson, and Lori Young.
http://www.parlorpress.com/atzmon
http://www.amazon.com/Visual-Rhetoric-Eloquence-Design-Leslie/dp/1602351910/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302449492&sr=8-1
Currents is a juried student exhibition featuring work by SDA student members. This is a part of the International Surface Design Conference June 9-12, 2011.
Paul Whitney Larson Gallery, St. Paul, MN. April 21-August 12. Opening Reception: Opening reception will be Thursday April 21st from 7-9pm.
Solo exhibition, POISE, will have works from the Spoon-fed Lies series. This body of work plays with the precarious position of women in Generation X and finding their way through life.
Spencer Loft Gallery, Chelsea, MA. May 06-May 31. Opening Reception: Opening reception will be May 6, 2011 6-9pmThis is an opportunity to see how science and art (jewelry and small metals) are interdisciplinary. The following students will be showing their work from the Metalsmithing:
Metalsmiting I
Aaron Allen,
Elize Jekabson,
Todd Malnar,
Tyler Palsrok,
Kristin Rheinheimer,
Darin Smith
Metalsmithing II, III, IV
Ryan Bogan,
Katharine Foster,
Jessica Tenbusch,
Julie Williker,
Graduate Metalsmithing
Charlotte Allen
A special thanks to Ryan Bogan, Katharine Foster and Jessica Tenbusch for set up.
Atrium of the new Mark Jefferson Science Building. Opening Reception: 12:30-5:30PMPresented by Jason DeMarte. This time on a Wednesday- April 13 3:00-3:30 in the Media Center, Ford 212.
In order to make your artwork look good digitally, Jason will cover the basics on how to properly document and photograph your artwork, including lighting, and color balancing once you download.
Works in this show include a variety of hand sewn dolls and soft toys; a selection of toys made from old books; ceramic dolls and robots; a set of bottle cap figures; a beautifully crafted hand-cranked flip book toy; the King Kong Panic Playset; a refrigerator magnet set complete with refrigerator door; a collection of marble games and puzzles; wooden animal pull toys; paper doll sets; an elaborate marble game construction that may be played alone or with multiple players; masks and a headdress made from found objects and small toys; a visual game based on fictional Tall Tales about the origins of Detroit landmarks; a Grey Gardens board game; a pair of simple but challenging flash video games; surrealist games made up of objects and small parts that hold their own absurd logic; and the lovely Chime Cat Visits Cloud City, a musical pull toy featuring an oversized cat on a wheeled cart. Participating artists range from veteran artists familiar to many in the Detroit area, to newcomers exhibiting their work for the first time.
For more information visit the PCCA website.
Paint Creek Center for the Arts, 407 Pine Street, Rochester, MI April 15-May 14. Opening Reception: Friday, April 15 - 6pm - 9pmThe Crossing Lines Design Expo is a showcase of outstanding design work by students and faculty across the University. Arts and entertainment, video, animation, textile, art, film, interior design, construction management, astronomy, geography, geology, gaming, graphic design, jewelry and more will be on display.
Atrium of the new Science Complex April 08-April 08. Opening Reception: Friday April 8, 12:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.