Art Talk - Gaylen Hansen's Students in Conversation

Join us this Friday during Gallery Stroll for an Art Talk with three of Gaylen Hansen's former students:

Nancy Kiefer, Artist
Linda Okasaki, Artist, free-lance Art Consultant and Researcher
Ric Collier, Artist, Former Director of the SLAC

The panel discussion begins at 6:30 pm and will be moderated by Monika Del Bosque, Director of the Mary Elizabeth Dee Shaw Gallery, Weber State University.

Art Talks are free to the public.

For more information, call 328-4201 or email saras@slartcenter.org.

Visitors React to Gaylen Hansen

These comments were left by visitors to the Gaylen Hansen retrospective currently on display at the Salt Lake Art Center through May 31, 2008.

We invite you to come and leave thoughts of your own!

Colorful, I love color.
-DOJ, 2/15/2008

Loved the portrayal of the notion of being menaced by, yet unaware of the world around the Kernal.
Rebecca & Art, Pittsburgh, PA

The paintings are so many different things: intriguing, inspiring, haunting, disturbing, funny ... Thank you.
-Johanna

Fascinating. Whimsical, funny, disturbing. Thanks.
-Christopher, 3/07/08

The dog and man that were standing, looking through their legs at each other is amazing! Not many paintings have the capacity to brighten my day the way that did. Thanks!
-Erin Potter

Making the invisible visible & the visible more visible

The following is a missive by Salt Lake Art Center Curator of Exhibitions, Jay Heuman.

Humanity is physical, psychological and spiritual. Yet the post-modern is a dystopic marriage of convenience between evolving technologies and savvy marketing that meddles with the senses.

There is distraction by both the scale and volume of visual culture – colliding with the cacophony of sounds and smells – that serves only to disenchant. There is enhancement of the senses that demystifies sensation: microscopes and telescopes, amplifiers and mufflers, artificial flavors and artificial emotions. There is a betrayal of the senses: from the common to the personal and from “civil society” to “private logic” – instead of “I and Thou” or “All for One and One for All.”

The visual arts serve as object of the gaze imbued with content relevant to viewers. Perhaps this is more obvious in some artworks, less so in others inviting a meditative approach as these are subtle compared to billboards for consumer goods made with the dual motives of cost-effectiveness and quick turn-around.

For mass production inspires a quickening. The Mod style of the 1960s lasted a decade. Now, shoes are in and out of fashion in a season. In 25 years, computer data storage evolved from magnetic tapes to 5¼” floppy disks to 3½” floppy disks to ZIP disks to CD-Rs to jump drives. But now, a one-year-old cell phone is passé as it likely lacks video capability, internet access and/or mp3 storage.

But in the visual arts, there is no “mass” production, and its quickening is different. Take for example the Italian Renaissance and Pop Art. The former lasted 200 years and was entirely handmade; the latter lasted 20 years and was screen-printed and air brushed. But Pop artists understood popular culture was a subject … not an objective.

In pre-Modern times, manual craftsmanship was the only method to create an artwork, striving to represent the visible world as it existed and the spiritual world as it was thought to exist. In Modern times, with machines and assembly-lines spitting out Fords and Frigidaires, artists continued to value manual craftsmanship; but, disenchanted by the external, they turned inward to explore what machines could not define for us – the indomitable human spirit. And what we call “contemporary,” a society valuing:

• the binary, without room for all the shades of gray between extremes of 0 and 1;
• the digital, not the digits of manual craftsmanship;
• the finite colors of computers, to simplify the infinite palette the human eye can see; and,
• the indiscriminant compositions of digital cameras (lacking emphasis), not personal choice.

The realm of ideas and ideals, the worlds of spirit and ether, cannot be mass produced and mass marketed, and is neither a fad nor feeble.

From historians, we know the past. From the news, we know the present. From philosophers and science fiction authors, we suspect the future. But visual artists, embrace all these functions – and more. They reveal past, present and future. They represent the visible world, often selecting those aspects of everyday life that others do not notice or choose to ignore. They explore their invisible inner-space – the mind’s eye and the spiritual journey. They depict the real and the ideal, the technological and theological, and the ‘pro’ and ‘con’ of most every issue.

Book Fair This Friday

Support contemporary art this Friday by participating in the Salt Lake Art Center Book Fair at the Gateway Barnes and Noble. A portion of your purchase will be given to the Art Center to fulfill its mission of encouraging artists and art that challenge and educate public perceptions of civil, social and aesthetic issues affecting society.

It's easy:

1. Visit our website and click on the link to print a voucher for the Book Fair. Print it out.

2. Bring the voucher to the Gateway Barnes and Noble between 11 am and 5 pm this Friday, February 22. Use it when purchasing books, magazine, snacks and coffee or gift items.

3. The Art Center will receive a portion of all purchases made with a voucher. This money helps us fund the thought-provoking educational and exhibition programming we offer to the public free of charge.

Hope to see you there!

Join Us - Gaylen Hansen Opens Tonight

Gaylen Hansen: Three Decades of Paintings opens this evening at the Salt Lake Art Center during a public reception from 6 pm to 9 pm. This event is free and open to the public. We encourage you to drop by and see us during tonight's Gallery Stroll.

Hansen's paintings are colorful, large and whimsical. The image above, Bison, Fish & Tulip, 1994, is representative of his interest in animals and the natural world, as well as interesting pairings that produce a compelling visual experience.

At 6.30 pm, the exhibition's curator Keith Wells will deliver an Art Talk. This event is also free.

The exhibit runs through May 31, so if tonight isn't your night out, you'll have plenty of time to enjoy Hansen's imaginative reinterpretations of the western landscape. We hope to see you soon.

Support the Art Center and Expand Your Mind

The Salt Lake Art Center Book Fair, at Barnes and Noble Gateway, is a great opportunity to support our mission and broaden your horizons. Print out a voucher from our homepage and join us next Friday, February 22, from 11 am to 5 pm. A portion of your purchase, be it a book, magazine, coffee, CD or gift, will go to the Salt Lake Art Center's education and exhibition programs for the coming year!

Check It!

Valentine’s Day is the day to show your loved on how much you care. Those who want to learn more about the contemporary art world (and who doesn't) will appreciate a Valentines gift that shows you want them to relax and take time for themselves. What better way to do that than curling up with a good book? The Salt Lake Art Center’s Bookstore has a wild selection of books to choose from.

One of our favorites is Gaylen Hansen: Three Decades of Paintings, your loved one will be blown away by this hardcover retrospective catalogue and its highly personal interview with the Utah-based artist. It has more than 70 color reproductions of his paintings, some of which have never before been exhibited publicly.

Mention this Blog at the front desk and receive 25% OFF your next purchase.