Ripple River Gallery
Original work by exceptional artisans
2006 Guest Artists
“Still Life”—Mixed media
on panel by Mike Marth
March 22 - April 23, 2006…
“STILL LIFE”
Mike Marth - Paintings, mixed media &
assemblage
Nuts and bolts, a swatch of fabric, a
fragment of wire—the ordinary flotsam and jetsam of
ordinary life—are the raw materials for Mike
Marth’s paintings and mixed media assemblages. Marth, an
award-winning sculptor and a painter, looks at everyday tools,
objects and vessels as points of departure. “I like
to push the limits of what a ‘still life’ can
be.”
“The objects I use are symbols for
people, occupations, life styles, and attitudes,” Marth
said. Marth usually keeps his reasons for creating a work to
himself, instead letting viewers find their own meanings
and connect with the work based on their own experiences. The
materials themselves—scraps of lumber or roofing
materials, hardware or fabric—can dictate the direction a
painting or sculpture takes. “Sometimes though, I make
work just to satisfy my love for gooey paint and wonderfully
oxidized surfaces,” he admits.
Mike Marth’s work has been shown at
regional galleries in both solo exhibitions and invitational
events including at Concordia College, Moorhead; Center for the
Arts at Fergus Falls, and “From>To,” a traveling
exhibit that began at the Plug-In Institute of Contemporary Art
in Winnipeg and concluded at the Minneapolis College of Art and
Design in Minneapolis. His work has earned top honors at Art on
the Plains, Fargo; the Midwestern at the Rourke Art Museum,
Moorhead; and Taste of the Valley at Hjemkomst Center,
Moorhead.
April 26 - May 21, 2006…
“EKLECTIC”
David Norstad & David Ekdahl, mixed
media assemblage
“Eklectic,” pairs two
artists—David Ekdahl and David Norstad—who draw
inspiration from a vast pool of influences. The exhibit
features carved and painted wood objects by David Ekdahl
and collage by David Norstad.
Ekdahl describes his carvings and drawings
as “a global mix of influences filtered down to come up
with something original from me.” A graduate of St.
Cloud State University with a Masters in painting, Ekdahl began
drawing seriously in high school and never stopped. “Pen
and ink drawings ran out of me like a river for ten
years.” For a number of years he turned to woodblock
prints. “I was attracted to their stark graphic quality
and primitive imagery that seemed to come naturally to the
medium.”
Ekdahl said he migrated into
three-dimensional carving because, “I wanted to simply
hold an actual object in my hand.” The influences for
Ekdahl’s carvings, which evolve as he works, are drawn
from a wide cultural mix, and include humans, animal and
“various hybrids”. Ekdahl currently lives in St.
Paul along the river where he hunts for wood and other
oddities.
David Norstad, painter, fiber and collage
artist who lives in the Detroit Lakes area, found inspiration
for this body of work in a bag of shredded currency. The theme
of money permeates his collages with titles like “Farm
Subsidy,” “Love Over Money,” and
“Retirement Fund.” Several pieces are tied together
through the lyrics of Billie Holiday’s “God Bless
the Child.”
David Ekdahl creates carved and painted
wood objects.
May 24 - June 18, 2006…
 | ||
Julie Crabtree & Jean Matzke, Fine Art
Embroidery
From colorful stitched story cloths and
embroidered samplers to woven tapestries and functional fabrics
designed for warmth, textile arts have enriched everyday human
experience and provided a thread to connect cultures across
continents and generations.
“Threads of Image,”
showcases the work of two fiber artists—Julie
Crabtree and Jean Matzke—who have taken the techniques of
stitchery, weaving and dying to a new level to create fine art
embroidery. Color, texture, technique and imagery provide the
threads that link the work of the two artists.
Julie Crabtree, who specializes in
embroidery, studied textiles and art at Mansfield College of
Arts, Nottinghamshire, England. Crabtree combines experimental
embroidery techniques with traditional methods to create
one-of-a-kind mixed media, painted and stitched landscapes. Her
work has also included restoration of historic textiles,
including an 18th century embroidered ball gown.
Jean Matzke divides her creative time
working in two separate areas of fiber design—hand
embroidery and tapestry
weaving. While the techniques differ,
Matzke’s textiles are linked with a narrative,
representational focus. Her work in "Threads of
Image" includes pieces that incorporate stitching,
applique and coiling techniques.
|
Embroidery by Jean Matzke
| ||
June 21 - July 16, 2006…
“THINK NATURALLY”
Anna Marie Pavlik, printmaker; Bill
Gossman, potter
Through etchings, monoprints and
stratographs, printmaker Anna Marie Pavlik considers the
interrelationship of humans and the natural environment. For
artist Bill Gossman, his relationship to nature is played out
every time he combines clay, water, air and fire to craft
his pottery.
“Annunciation”—intaglio
print by Anna Marie Pavlik
“Growing concern for the survival of
nature and a need to understand the relationship of people to
the landscape has encouraged me to explore nature related
themes,” Pavlik said. “My images are
concerned with extracting tangible ideas from views of natural
sites, scientific data, and maps. By creating these works
I hope to direct the viewer’s attention to the value,
beauty, and mystery found within our natural
environment.”
Pavlik’s work is strongly influenced
by her sensitivity to and concern for the environment, in both
a natural and social context. She has served as artist in
residence at Amistad National Recreational Area in Texas and at
Voyageurs National Park in Minnesota, and most recently at
Denali National Park in Alaska as artist in residence.
“The universal powers of earth, air,
fire and water, and shapes from nature are the source of
inspiration for the forms I make and the decorations I
use,” said Bill Gossman, who lives in New London, MN.
Inspiration for his wood-fired stoneware and porcelain pots
might come from the positive and negative spaces created by a
tree in winter or the repeating patterns found on a leaf or
feather. “By assembling these images and combining them
with impressions from years of experience in Europe, Africa and
America, I try to convey a nonverbal message of a feeling of
‘completeness.”
July 19 - August 13, 2006…
“RAW MATERIAL”
Brenna Busse & Erika Mock, solo work
& collaborations
What happens when a fiber artist who
dreams, sews, knits and weaves in color collaborates with a
mixed media doll maker who finds inspiration in the clay, twigs
and fabric? Find out through “Raw Material,” an
exhibit of solo and collaborative work by Erika Mock and Brenna
Busse.
“Raw Material” explores the
metaphors of family, “our interpretation of how it looks
if we honor family by telling its stories instead of analyzing
or judging,” Mock said. The two artists spent a week
together at a cabin on the Mississippi River and created three
“families,” each made up of a dozen or more small
figures. The “raw materials” for their work
included twigs and beads, fabric, thread and found objects. The
collaborative work of the two artists, which also includes two
wall pieces and two figures, will be shown with work created by
Mock and Busse individually.
Brenna Busse, who lives in the Twin
Cities, combines “mud, sticks and rags” to
communicate and inspire. “I celebrate these raw and
humble materials in creating my mixed media figures,”
Busse said. “In my process, materials are the guide and
source of inspiration. Mixing the media is about letting the
materials speak and express their unique aspects.”
Erika Mock, who works in a studio in
Superior, WI, says, “My life is a web of connections, an
exploration into the riddles of rhythm. Weaving cloth,
stitching and knitting are my metaphors for building a balanced
relationship between all my worlds.”
Erika Mock and Brenna Busse installing
“Raw Material”
July 22, 2006…
SIXTH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION
Ripple River Gallery celebrated its sixth
anniversary with a variety of activities. Duluth area potter
Karin Kraemer led a day-long pit-fired clay workshop.
Nature printer and collage artist, Carol Hanson, Baxter,
gave an introduction to Artist Trading Cards; and artist
Richard Stephens, Minneapolis, demonstrated printmaking.
August 23 - September 17, 2006…
“ECHOES”
Stephanie Hunder, printmaker
An echo can be defined as a sympathetic
reaction, repetition or imitation, a lingering effect or a
reminder of an earlier event. Stephanie Hunder uses printmaking
techniques to create lingering
reminders—”Echoes”—of natural elements
and the repetition of their patterns in man-made structures.
Hunder uses botanical and figural imagery
to explore the transformation of basic natural structures into
models or expressions of human relationships and emotions.
Close-up images of plants and animals are often juxtaposed with
mechanical counterparts to suggest that nature is the basis for
all structure.
Potters Karin Kraemer and Nick DeVries led
a pit-fired clay workshop.
“Ghost”—serigraph by
Stephanie Hunder
September 20 - October 15, 2006…
“PAINTING THE BEAVER POND”
Esther SanFellipo, painter
“Painting the Beaver Pond” is
a study of light and color—two forces that move Esther
San Felippo. “However I start out, the subject of most of
my paintings quickly becomes the way the light shines on
things—how our perception is distorted, enhanced and
magically transformed by the way light shines on things.”
Working with tiny brush strokes of different colors next to
each other and inside patches one apparent color, San Felippo
catches the magical effect of light. “Familiar things are
really strange, and strange things are really known by the
heart, and it all eludes rational explication,” she says.
San Felippo looked at the snarl and
bramble of unmown grasses and weeds, felled trees and wood
chips and murky pond water of the beaver pond behind her house
near Aitkin and asked herself if it could be recorded in a
visually meaningful way. For two years she painted the ruined
landscape, watching as the beavers deforested the woods behind
the pond. “I could not keep track of where I was
painting,” she said. “For a while I had to paint
inch by inch, starting at the most interesting point and
working out in all directions, thinking only about the inch
under the brush.” When the beavers got tired of human
interference and moved on, San Felippo recorded the normal
changes of time and season—light and color shifts and
vegetative growth or decay.
San Felippo, who holds a BFA from Kansas
City Art Institute, paints “primitive statements of light
worship” in oil on canvas or linen, and in dyes on silk
and cotton fabric. “I care with a passion beyond
comprehension, even to myself, about color and light and oil
paint,” she says. “If my paintings make people feel
like their eyes are being fed, bypassing all that stiff
mechanical knowledge of ‘what’s what,’
I’m glad. Because I want to speak directly to the
viewers’ eyes. Touch their eyes properly and they decide
for themselves how they feel and from that what they think
about what the painter believes.”
“Pond 1”—Oil painting by
Esther SanFelippo
October 18 - November 19, 2006…
 | ||
Handmade Tile Association, curated by
Karin Kraemer
Color, texture, surface decoration,
application and form may differ, but tile artists see the world
as an environment ripe for their work.
“Tiles of the North,” featured
20 regional clay and mosaic artists and members of the Handmade
Tile Association. Artist Karin Kraemer, who owns Duluth
Pottery, curated the show.
“Tiles, mosaics and ceramic
materials are beautiful, durable and versatile building
materials,” Kraemer said. “This exhibit shows us
they are also great for artistic expression.”
The Handmade Tile Association is a group
of independent and diverse tile makers who work throughout
Minnesota and surrounding areas. Members share a vision of
their art and craft form that includes its expansion and
development on many levels—geographically as well as
aesthetically, and collectively as well as separately. In
short, the association envisions a world richly tiled with
designs of exquisite beauty, adaptable functionality, matchless
durability, and infinite variety!
The contemporary ceramic tile that makes
up “Tiles of the North” includes colorful glazed
terra cotta tiles by Minneapolis artist Josh Blanc. Maiolica
glazed red earthenware serves as a vehicle for images painted
on tile by Cot LaFond, Karin Kraemer and Pat Joyelle, all from
Duluth. Carved clay with
terra sigilatta and glaze came together
for St. Paul artist Deb LeAir’s “Red Fern
Tile,” while clay tiles colored with fused stained glass,
exhibited by Catherine Rosengren, Lakota Tile Studio, Lakota,
IA, resulted in “Full Moon Landscapes.” Broc Allen,
Foxboro, WI; and Janis Andler, Duluth, both use stoneware clay
for their tiles.
|
“Red Fern Tile” by
Deb LeAir
| ||
Judith Poe, Danbury, WI, combined
stoneware and paper clay with beads to create “Brook
Trout,” one of several fish-inspired tiles in the show.
Artist Greg Bolstad, Virginia, MN; used underglazes and clear
glaze for his koi tiles; while Bill Gossman, New London, turned
to wood-fired stoneware for his fish tile. Stephanie
Kaczrowski, Brooklyn Park, used china paint on tile for her
walleye tile.
Artists showing clay tile mosaic
compositions are Pooka Ness, Elk Hollow Pottery, Viola, WI;
Kirsten Walstead, Minneapolis; Wendy Penta-Nelson, St. Croix
Falls, WI; and Norma Hanlon, Somi Tile Works, Minneapolis; and
Sheryl Tuorila, Minneapolis. Jane Swan, Swan Tile Inc.,
Minneapolis; combines ceramic tile with wrought iron; while
Terri Hagenah-Wingness, Duluth, combines stoneware tiles and
Lake Superior stones for “Rising Trout.” Offering
another take on mosaic, Sharra Frank, Minneapolis, combines
stained glass, mirror, ceramic pieces, found objects, glass
gems, beads and rods to create “Serenity Peacock
Mosaic.”
|
Copyright 2007 ® Ripple River Gallery