Friday, September 28, 2012

Seen: Reduceds @ Tempus Projects

In 2005, Kurt Piazza created a fundraiser for the Gulf Coast Museum of Art, coupling emerging artists in a museum setting with a maximum $500 price to encourage young professionals to become emerging collectors. Tempus partnered with the [5]art artists to continue this tradition, and this was their fifth REDUCED show.

This makes for a very eclectic show, save for a black-and-white theme. Here are a few highlights...

Eli Neuboren, "3 Window Shuttle"

Eli Neuboren's "3 Window Shuttle" is a giclee print depicting what appears to be an airplane window in a sequence of three, with the views  changing in each one. Surrounding the windows is what appears to be a geographical map. The effect is that of seeing through and looking at each aspect simultaneously.








Leslie Elsasser, "Manifest Destiny Series"

This gouache, glitter, metallic pigment work on watercolor paper by Leslie Elsasser, titled "Manifest Destiny" is particularly difficult to reproduce in a photo, but this gives some idea of what it looks like. A rising sun-like orb stretches out to the lateral edges of the frame, with organic forms rising and falling in layers. A very calming, meditative piece.












Becky Flanders, "Silphium Stalk 2"


 The work on the left is fairly small, but exquisite. Perhaps 5x7 inches, "Silphium Stalk 2" seems like an abstraction at first glance. It is not. Silphium was a highly valued plant that grew in a limited environment in the N. coast of Africa. Animals grown where they could graze on it were highly valued for what the plant's resin did to the meat. Becky told me at the opening that for her, the plant's value as birth control was very important. So much so that it image was put on coins, and supposedly it was worth its weight in silver. Perhaps due to the high demand by the Romans, this strain appears to have gone extinct.










Silphium stalk on Cyrenean coin from North Africa when it was part of the Roman Empire.

Congratulations to all the artists and Tracy Midulla Reller, Director of Tempus, for a good show.

--- Luis

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