As part of our effort to continue to help artists and art galleries thrive, we’re proud to bring you this week’s “Virtual Gallery Walk.” Browse the artwork below and click the image itself to learn more about it, including how to contact the gallery.
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Want to see your gallery featured in an upcoming Virtual Gallery Walk? Contact us at [email protected] to advertise today. Don’t delay, as spaces are first come, first served, and availability is limited.
Gallery 1261 founders Quang Ho, David Uhl, and Christine Mileham are hosting a major collection of works by the original group of gallery artists, new artists, and some surprise guests.
At a Glance:
Gallery 1261, Denver, Colorado
August 30 – September 17, 2024
Opening reception August 30
gallery1261.com
Participating artists: Daud Akhriev, Carolyn Anderson, Mia Bergeron, Suchitra Bhosle, Daniel Bilmes, Gregory Block, Gordon Brown, Scott Burdick, David Cheifetz, Alexander Chistov, Robin Cole, Scott Conary, Tony Curanaj, Valerio D’Ospina, Michelle Dunaway, Hollis Dunlap, Scott Fraser, Ulrich Gleiter, David Grossmann, Ron Hicks, Quang Ho, Tony Hochstetler, Daniel Keys, Jeff Legg, Susan Lyon, Dan McCaw, Danny McCaw, John McCaw, CW Mundy, Tibor Nagy, Heather Neill, Rodney O’Dell Davis, Mikael Olson, Derek Penix, Megan Elizabeth Read, Dale O Roberts, Kate Sammons, Andrzej Skorut, Jill Soukup, Bill Starke, Adrienne Stein, David Uhl, Anthony Waichulis, Jason Walker, Kevin Weckbach, Fred Wessel, Jordan Wolfson, Michael Workman, Vincent Xeus, Elizabeth Zanzinger.
More from the organizers:
Gallery 1261 began as a lofty notion: give artists a space to show the work they made for themselves. “Artists need to experiment and make work for themselves,” Quang Ho says, when asked about the origins of Gallery 1261. “The principal thought was to create a premier gallery where the artists would produce works that were not exclusively motivated by sales. We would allow the art to flow from a deep dive into its source, to break through the usual gallery marketing parameters.”
David Uhl, Quang’s partner in Gallery 1261, recalls, “Quang and I were having lunch at the Denver Art Museum and started dreaming up the ideal art gallery.” Uhl happened to own a building just three blocks west of the Art Museum, an old machine shop with high arched wooden ceiling, steel trusses and sky lights that he had converted into his private design studio and bachelor pad. But he had moved his studio to the foothills, so the building was not being used. Now all they needed was a gallery manager.
“It was all David’s idea,” Christine Mileham says, reflecting back on the early conversations with Ho and Uhl about running the gallery. She had a successful gallery already, Abend, a family business, but she says she loved the idea. At first, she managed two locations but eventually brought Abend into the same Gallery 1261 space. “I’ve had a great partnership with the guys,” she says about the strengths each person brings to the table. “I think David put together the perfect trio.”
It wasn’t all smooth sailing, though. “Launching the gallery,” Uhl says, “I remember the gallery having a difficult time making enough to pay the rent; good thing I owned the building. It always looked beautiful for sure. In hindsight, it’s difficult prospect to launch a gallery based on artists creating work that’s technically not created to sell. It worked but took two decades!”
The gallery can also boast their ability to bring meld established artists with up-and-coming artists. Robin Cole, who started with 1261 in 2014, recalls, “It’s been a great honor to work with a gallery that represents so many of my heroes. I realize it’s a rare privilege to receive support for your creativity no matter how the spirit moves you—Gallery 1261 stands behind authentic creative endeavor and that is incredibly special.”
For Ron Hicks, who was there at the beginning, loved the comradery. “I was drawn to, and truly connected with Gallery 1261’s original concept of exhibiting works from artist that were experimental or were painted as if no one is looking over your shoulder,” he says. “Imagine… what would you create if left to your own devices, being free, without any external influences?”
And Daniel Sprick adds, “It has been a smooth and easygoing relationship, very productive for me and it only gets better throughout the years. Often times art galleries will steer artists towards some specific niche, or to something commercially viable. But at Gallery 1261 I’ve only seen the encouragement of authentic self-expression.”
Where do you find inspiration?
Poppy Balser: To be honest, I have an archive of ideas, a folder literally labeled “PAINT ME SOON” so usually, I have more ideas for paintings than I can keep up with, but when I need a creative boost, I take my paints and I go outside. I live in the woods and near the coast, so I do not have to go far before I catch something that speaks clearly to me, saying “Paint me! Make me look interesting!!”
What is the best thing about being an artist?
Poppy Balser: The best thing for me is being able to capture the best parts of the world around me in my paintings in a way that other people seem to easily respond to. I take pleasure in finding interesting views or subjects and making convincing paintings of those views. The best part of this is when people look at my paintings and they feel something about what they are looking at. Sometimes it is as simple as them telling me “It feels like I am there in the scene you painted.” But sometimes it is a deeper response in their hearts and memories, and that is precious.
To see more of Poppy’s work, visit:
website
Western Art > Prior to the opening of 43rd Annual Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale’s Live Auction Gallery, a carefully selected panel of judges studied the 104 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional works in the exhibition. The judges ultimately selected eight artists whose pieces best reflect the mission of the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale (BBAS) and represent exceptional craft and quality. The judges announced these eight winners during the opening reception of the gallery held on Friday, August 16.
A committee invites judges who represent three distinct categories within the art world, namely: art history and scholarship, art business, and private collection. This year, the three judges selected were Kendra Heimbuck, Executive Director at The Brinton Museum, Big Horn, WY, Susan Potje, Director of the Celebration of Fine Art, Scottsdale, AZ, and Scott Leinen of Omaha, NE, an art collector and Patron of the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale.
The Spirit of the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale Award Sponsored by The Collier Group
This award recognizes the artwork that is most representative of the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale in terms of location, history, and the grandeur embodied by the “spirit” of the American West. The judges awarded this honor to “High Noon”, a 30- by 26-inch oil painting (shown at top) by Ralph Oberg. The painting depicts the arid Wyoming landscape and several pronghorn antelope in the noonday sun.
Potje remarked that Oberg “truly captures the vast open space of the American West,” complimenting the artist’s composition which “draws your eye across the entire canvas,” as well as the palette in the sagebrush and the sky.
Heimbuck agreed, saying, “your eye is drawn from the hyper-focused realistic rendering of the foreground and primary subject and moves smoothly through each figure to the soft landscape and bluffs in the back of the image. The soft tones of the color palette are a perfect complement to the iconic pronghorn and the setting.”
Leinen called the painting “a true snapshot of the Spirit of the West and the Wyoming landscape. The muted colors of the sage, cactus and brush complement the beautiful sky and the well-arranged pronghorn.”
BBAS would like to thank The Collier Group for the generous sponsorship of this award’s prize money.
Two-Dimensional Award
The judges selected “Blue Chair” by Stephanie Hartshorn as the best in show for two-dimensional artwork. Hartshorn’s oil painting is 18 by 36 inches and depicts a weathered building with a sign that reads “Waltman Store.”
Heimbuck said, “Stephanie captures a despondent, yet true reality of the rural West. Through her impressionist style, she masterfully encapsulates a scene which we’ve all passed by and may not have paid close attention to.”
Leinen commented that “if you’ve spent any time driving through rural areas, you’ve passed this scene before. This painting is not just representative of the West, but rural America as a whole. There is a tinge of sadness or melancholy as I view the painting … and good artwork often leaves you affected in one way or another.”
Potje observed, “Stephanie captures an iconic rural setting that evokes strong emotions. Her signature style, crisp composition, and command of her palette work together for a fabulous piece. The title, ‘Blue Chair’, invites the viewer to take a closer look.”
Three-Dimensional Award
The judges selected “Home is Where You Find It” by Stefan Savides as the three-dimensional best in show. Savides’ piece is a bronze that measures 11 by 15 by 13 inches. The artist’s subject matter is a mother hen and four chicks, nestled tightly inside a crumpled metal bucket. Stefan Savides is participating in the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale for the first time in 2024.
Leinen said “sometimes artwork just makes you smile, and this sculpture did that for me. Growing up in rural Iowa, I can identify with this scene!” He praised Savides’ artistry, saying “the use of the trampled bucket as the new home for the hen and her chicks was very clever. The bucket was extremely well done from the handle and the rivets to the striping around the top – the design was perfect.”
Potje stated, “Stefan captures the warmth and whimsy of the mama hen making a home for her chicks in the unlikely, but functional vessel. He captures the texture of the pail and the feeling of family.” The sculpture is “technically excellent and artistically brilliant,” she added.
Heimbuck noted, “This piece tells the important story of a mother hen and the feminine instinct that is alive and important in the West. Savides carried this piece out so well, rendering the nesting mother hen and her chicks in a familiar crushed bucket that has come to the end of life on the ranch.”
Judges’ Awards of Excellence
As a mark of the overall quality of the 43rd Annual Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale, the judges felt it necessary to present five additional Awards of Excellence. They felt the following pieces required recognition for their design, execution, and embodying of the Western spirit:
BBAS limits the number of contemporary Western artists invited each year; the 2024 lineup features 104 artists, all of whom represent a high caliber of artistic knowledge and execution. These artists’ major works are available to view in the Buffalo Bill Center of the West until the Live Auction of western art commences on Friday, September 20.
Organized by the Cody Country Chamber of Commerce, the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale strives to support established and emerging Western artists, engage patrons of the arts, and enliven the Cody community with events that provide education and entertainment. The proceeds from sales and events benefit the artists, the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, Cody Country Chamber of Commerce, and local arts organizations.
For more information, please visit buffalobillartshow.org.
Browse more western art here at FineArtConnoisseur.com.
There is a lot of superb contemporary sculpture being made these days; this article by Allison Malafronte shines light on a gifted individual.
Zoe Dufour (b. 1990) is a sculptor who creates unconventional compositions that capture the powerful dance between the physical and the philosophical. “There is a strong dialogue between practice and thinking, a direct relationship between the hand and head,” the artist explains. “This balance is echoed everywhere in nature and is a constant source of inspiration. The potential for tactile, emotional, and physical connections among objects, space, people, and nature is what draws me to sculpture.”
Dufour continues, “Sculpting gives me a dynamic framework to engage with the world. My practice is a conscious study of nature, people, and animals, born of affinity, love, and curiosity. This study allows me to become more aware of my perceptions and biases so that I can better understand our world as it exists, in reality. As I sculpt, I am balancing intuitive response and rational assessment. Ultimately, I want to sculpt to create art suspended between how we experience the world and what we think we know about the world.”
Originally from Thailand, Dufour studied for five years at the Grand Central Atelier in New York City, where she learned to sculpt primarily in clay and to cast in bronze. More recently, she has been experimenting with ceramic sculpture, a medium she finds fascinating for its challenges and chemistry-based process. “The material science involved in producing ceramic work is much more rigorous than anything I’ve encountered in traditional sculpture,” she says. “Projecting results that will occur when you combine various clay bodies and glazes to particular temperatures and atmospheres in a kiln feels primal, magical, and scientific all at once.”
Illustrated here is “Ray,” a sculpture that shows a man surrounded by masked versions of himself, either whole or partial. Created in ceramic stoneware, 18-carat gold luster, and steel, these gilded reflections represent the gradations of influence on a person’s identity over a lifetime. “In geometry,” the artist notes, “a ray is part of a line that has a fixed starting point but no end point. One example is a sun ray. ‘Ray’ was sculpted as I thought about the many iterations of self we pass through from birth, and the many outside influences that shape us in our indeterminate lifetime.”
In 2021, Dufour was sculptor-in-residence at the national historical park dedicated to Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848–1907) in Cornish, New Hampshire. For the better part of six months, she worked on ambitious life-size compositions while studying the artistry of one of America’s greatest sculptors. Following are some of the pieces she worked on while there:
View more artist and collector profiles here at FineArtConnoisseur.com.
LANDSCAPE LALAPALOOZA
Hindes Fine Art
San Antonio, Texas
hindes.com
Through August 30, 2024
Artist Janice Yow Hindes opened Hindes Fine Art in 2018; five years later, artist Andrea Wollenzin joined her as co-owner. Now their gallery is presenting the exhibition “Landscape Lalapalooza,” what they call “a serious look at fun and a fun look at the seriousness of America’s vanishing landscape.” On view are recent landscape paintings by such talents as Mitch Baird, Scott Burdick, Bill Farnsworth, Janice Yow Hindes, Kyle Ma, Kevin Macpherson, Ned Mueller, Kathie Odom, John Poon, Patrick Saunders, and Matt Smith. Also here are works by the Russian-born newcomer Vladimir Krillov and by Scott Christensen, whose two-artist museum show is running simultaneously only an hour’s drive away.
WILL GULLETTE: LANDSCAPES
Santa Ysabel Art Gallery
Santa Ysabel, California
santaysabelartgallery.com
Through September 1, 2024
Santa Ysabel Art Gallery is premiering a group of recent landscape paintings created by Will Gullette. Inspired by the plein air painters of 19th-century France, especially the impressionists, this talented local resident explores the fields, forests, deserts, and mountains of Southern California, with special emphasis on San Diego County. He brings to these vistas all he has learned through more than 40 years working as a professional photographer and teacher.
McLarry Fine Art is set to exhibit recent landscape and still life paintings by Whitney Gardner. Based in the Mojave Desert for more than a decade, she has titled the show “Romance of Solitude” to underscore the desert’s role in her life as a “sanctuary for creativity and contemplation.”
“These artworks,” she says, “capture my experience in finding companionship with nature, with tales of mountains, skies, and nocturnal blooms in moonlight. They are also a testament to the profound connection between the human spirit and the untamed wilderness.”
Born and raised in Southern California, Gardner earned her B.F.A. at San Francisco’s California College of the Arts in 2010.
McLarry Fine Art
Santa Fe, New Mexico
mclarryfineart.com
August 28–September 11, 2024
As part of our effort to continue to help artists and art galleries thrive, we’re proud to bring you this week’s “Virtual Gallery Walk.” Browse the artwork below and click the image itself to learn more about it, including how to contact the gallery.
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Want to see your gallery featured in an upcoming Virtual Gallery Walk? Contact us at [email protected] to advertise today. Don’t delay, as spaces are first come, first served, and availability is limited.
Ray and Lori Allen of San Diego have assembled a collection of contemporary realism that got its start through Ray’s long-standing love of art. In high school, he took classes in drawing and sculpture that triggered this interest, and while he was studying at Chicago’s DePaul University, it wasn’t uncommon for a professor to ask if anyone had seen Ray. Usually the answer came back, “He’s at the Art Institute” downtown.
Today the Allens own works in their art collection by such gifted artists as Richard Becker, Michael Bergt, Anna Chervonnaya, Claire DeLandro, Yuriy Dymshyts, Dan Ferguson, Geraldine Grove, Jacquline Hurlbert, Joan Irving, Lauretta Lowell, Peter Matosian, Willie McGrath, Daryl Millard, John Modesitt, Jacob A. Pfeiffer, Craig Pursley, Artem Rogowoi, Dennis Sarazhin, Jan Dorian Whitney, Will Wilson, and Jeanne Zvetina.
Ray is not certain, but he thinks their first acquisition was Peter Matosian’s colorful scene of women and animals in nature, “Rio Papagayo.” The Allens spotted it in the window of a gallery in downtown San Diego, and that was that. If dealers still wonder if displaying art in their front windows is worth the effort, here’s more evidence it is. Years ago, San Francisco’s John Pence Gallery graced its window with the painting by Will Wilson illustrated here, “Canary Watching” — now the Allens’ favorite artistic possession.
“When I first spotted it there,” Ray recalls, “I was flabbergasted. I had never seen a painting with such emotion. We went in to look, but felt the price was beyond our reach. John Pence told us about Will’s background and about a new show he’d be in a week later. Every night I would just dream of that painting! Lori took pity on me and agreed we should go back to San Francisco from San Diego for the exhibition opening. When we got there, we made a beeline for “Canary Watching” but were shocked to find a ‘red dot’ on its wall label. My heart was broken! John Pence came over, saw the sorry looks on our faces, and confided, ‘I knew you’d be back.’ He had been saving the painting for us.”
Beyond underscoring what a gentleman John Pence is, this recollection reminds us that an artwork can inspire us not only through its appearance, but also through the story behind it. Wilson told the Allens that “Canary Watching” depicts a bouncer he had met in front of a bar. The young man was going through chemotherapy as part of his cancer treatment, which explains his baldness. His pet canary was also sick, which we can gather from its ruffled feathers. Fortunately, the man recovered, though his bird did not.
Also illustrated here is “Mocked,” one of six paintings by Michael Bergt that the Allens own. It too came via John Pence, who explained that it is the artist’s homage painting to Hieronymus Bosch’s famous “Christ Mocked (The Crowning with Thorns)” at London’s National Gallery. Having traveled to London specifically to see that masterpiece, the Allens learned that a strike by security staff would make it impossible to explore that area of the building. Clearly a return to London is in order.
Over the years, the Allens have been gratified to watch realism become “much more mainstream” in the world of contemporary art. Today they buy from galleries and fairs (such as the LA Art Show), and also directly from artists. Indeed, Ray says they have met several of “their” artists and correspond with a few.
The Allens admire aesthetic approaches other than realism, too, noting that “it’s hard to explain why a specific work triggers the sense of joy we get out of it.” Their only historical work is a painting by California’s Selden Connor Gile (1877–1947), though they note that John Modesitt’s contemporary landscapes are very much in the style of another California master, Maurice Braun (1877–1941).
As with so many art collectors, wall space has become a challenge for the Allens. Ray says, “We now store some paintings and rotate them on our walls,” a worthy process that often revives that dopamine hit of joy owners got the day they acquired the piece in the first place.
Arcadia Contemporary proudly presents its 10th annual Five and Under exhibition, a celebration of artistic diversity and price accessibility. Running from August 15 to September 1, 2024, this highly anticipated event showcases over 200 new works by more than 60 internationally acclaimed artists, many who are exhibiting in the U.S. for the very first time.
More from the gallery:
Five and Under is a unique invitational that provides a platform for new talent while also highlighting works by some of the gallery’s most renowned artists. Every work in the exhibition is priced at $5,000 or less, offering collectors a rare opportunity to acquire high-quality works at an accessible price point. This intersection of affordability and excellence makes the exhibition a cornerstone of Arcadia’s annual programming.
The show features a vast array of themes, styles, and mediums, reflecting the rich diversity of the participating artists. Because the invited artists have the freedom to create in any medium and explore any subject, collectors are assured a dynamic and eclectic collection of works that will surely excite and inspire.
The opening reception is August 15th from 6-8 pm. For more details, please visit ArcadiaContemporary.com.
