VOL 02 ISSUE
02 
January 22, 2003
VOL 02 ISSUE
02 |
| ATTACK OF/ON THE SIGNS: CONSULTANTS DIS BIG SHINY SIGNS | ||||
 D.B.HARTT, INC is the most recent consultant firm hired to help the
assembly know what to think and they were charged with proposing fresh sign regulations
for Anchorage. Their report has been shopped around in a few venues for public comment and
it does seem true that there is a constituency against advertising small business with
signage. Certainly the Anchorage Daily News would prefer its readers to have their sign
options reduced, as a recent editorial advocated. The charge of the purpose
statement of these regulations is suspect: "To promote the economic well-being of the
community by creating a favorable physical image, reducing sign clutter and distractions
... (and to) minimize the disruption of scenic views". Last among the purposes:
"To allow businesses, individuals and institutions a reasonable opportunity to use
signs as an effective means of communications." Consultant David Hartt
recently estimated that 58% of the current signs in Anchorage would be made non-compliant
by this proposed ordinance.
Reducing sign sizes and heights reduces the distance at which signs are legible and limits
reaction time for customers driving to their suppliers. The notion of requiring
lighted signs to have dark backgrounds in the name of reducing "glow" should be
too ludicrous on the face of it to have even been included in the proposal and if put into
law will not reduce the light of thousands of street lamps in our "city of
light". It is a shame to the creativity of city fathers to consider these diminishing
regulations. Anchorage's Fourth Avenue once had a reputation as a Las Vegas of the north
because of it's fabulously gaudy and scene-stealing signs (among other things). Now our
society humbles itself before cranky folks who can't see around a sign . |
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        -OPPORTUNITIES- 1/23,30/03 seminars LOS ANGELES METRO ART COMMISSIONS Workshops to inform artists about up-coming opportunities and how to apply www.mta.net/metroart 1/28/03 deadline MOA POLARIS K-12 RFQ Seeking qualifications (slides) for $120,000 budget Contact Jocelyn Young 907-343 6473 1/31/03 deadline CITY OF DENVER RFQ Seeking qualifications (slides) for future Public Art projects www.denvergov.org/artculturefilm 2/11/03 deadline MOA WENDLER RFQ Seeking qualifications (slides) for $150,000 budget Contact Jocelyn Young youngjh@ci.anchorage.ak.us NEXT: LOVE BUBBLES FEEDBACK Want a No Prize for proving us wrong?! Let us know your opinion or tell us about your upcoming event or opportunity and get a No, Thank YOU. Tell us about attribution errors you suspect. SHORTCUTS: Add 6 FREE months to your membership subscription if we use your 100 word reviews of any show you've seen recently, sweet and sour. Form makes it easy.
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LIVING MEMORIAL: MEADOWS
CHILLS Martin Luther King Jr Living Memorial at the west end of Anchorage's Delaney Park Strip is a popular destination for visitors, especially those staying at Park Strip hotels and b&b's. The memorial is a collaboration between Savannah Georgia artist Jerome B Meadows and the local Land Design North firm. Meadow's bust of King is the centerpiece of a landscaped group of cement bases. One plinth holds the bust, one the plaque referenced as the index graphic for this issue, and two hold nine laser engraved brass plates showing pictures and quoting Dr King as well as the thoughts of some familiar Alaskan names. During the recent holiday to honor this man the monument was cleared of most of its snow and ice and the sidewalks were open. Meadows has represented the man with what appears to be an Ivy League v-neck sweater over a shirt and tie. While the likeness is subtle and the expression is benign, articulation in the pupils is minimal and deliberate tool markings were left in the clay before making the mold to give a sensation of brush strokes. It is difficult to find the artist's name or the foundry marks directly on this bronze. Some of the concrete bases have cracked and are crumbling in the frost. The presentation of the text plates is nice for a desert environment, but might have been better protected from the elements with a different design. 'A GROUP OF EXHIBITION OF WORK' Anchorage's International Gallery of Contemporary Art takes a major step uptown this month with a ground level storefront in the center of the shopping district, at 427 D Street. 50 artists invited to help celebrate the IGCA's latest incarnation showed work that may be unexpected in Alaska. One such is Helga Berry's weaving Becoming Predestined, a piece created for an exhibition in Poland which required a larger scale than usual. Echoes of Gustave Klimpt and the Secessionists in the metallic yarns used in the checkerboard circle on the blue field appeared almost formal next to a very expressive red field with various marks and designs seemingly jotted down in the threads. The colors and impression made by this piece are best experienced in person at full scale. Becoming Predestined is priced just over $32,000 and one buyer could vastly improve the financial affairs of the Gallery, which splits sales 40%/60% with exhibiting artists. Ruth Sorenson has contracted for one of the five 'house' studios built into the space occupied by the gallery. While construction and remodeling went on around her, she created the untitled panel at left, Sky, and did not offer it for sale. Almost melancholy in its restricted pallette, this painting reveals the devotion of its creator in the careful blending of brush strokes and evocation of cloud forms as a symbol of emotional state. BERRY, SORENSON, DOWDY, et al The new location is much better for walk-in traffic and much more fun for the volunteers who used to read studiously during long vigils without visitors. Dr Julie Decker, on of three co-directors of the non-profit gallery, said "We've already had several hundred people come through the gallery this month to see it", thanking the participating artists and urging them to remove unsold pieces quickly, as no storage racks for consigned works were incorporated in the remodeled space. Rachelle Dowdy was the person to finish the sheetrock mudding for the gallery and her working attitude takes second place to none. Fresh from her shared show at the Decker/Morris Gallery in December, she presented a set of objects titledBirds of Passage. Luscious nudes with birds heads are captured in a small drawing accompanying the sculpture of an owl on a stand. The owl's belly is hollow, and it has a nest with eggs built inside it. A smaller bird perches on the owls head. The creation of impossible yet recognizable animals is a recurrent theme in Dowdy's work; her oversize dogs have found favor with collectors. Although she interacts freely and familiarly with her materials, there is none of the quality of thrown together junk that prompted one visitor to write "Be ARTSY Learn to Recycle Your F*cking TRASH" into the comments book. Other pieces combining gratuitous materials apparently were not as successful in the mind of this person. Dowdy's framed piece and many others, especially the selection of black and white photography, is victimized by the relentless pure white with which the entire gallery has been smothered. Many artists conserve their use of white for important moments in their composition, or matte their pictures with a pure white border to set them away from the wall. The pure white wall kills the incidental whites in all but the largest works and does nothing to separate the pictures from the wall. ALASKA ARMY KNIFE: DIANNE LIND Those who visited the short lived Toast Gallery in 1998 were lucky enough to see Dianne Lind's Alaska Army Knife when it was first exhibited. This punny object exemplifies the found conglomeration theory by emulating a multi-function jack-knife. Except this one has a pool cue, a Prinz Brau (early Alaskan mini-brew), a fishing pole, hunting rifle, ski, coil spring, and various other items critical to survival in Alaska. Lind's charming object was exhibited on the floor in a corner with all of the utensils folded away listlessly and is available for a depressed price of $600. Scott MacDonald worried that he would not have enough work for his solo show several months ago, so he made a lot of experimental canvases. His 6 Paintings were offered as a set for $400. Any semiotics are not top-level and the color yellow seems to be the only thing besides their similar sizes which relate these canvases together. They have a simple charm based on the vigorous paint handling which may entice the undemanding. RIVER CONSTRUCTION #2: DICKEY The triple cul-de-sac design of the new gallery space allows for only one wall to be parallel to the store windows and close enough to feature a modest size piece. Kenai's Paula Dickey exhibited work similar to that she provided to the Inner Landscape exhibition summer 2002 (cf Volume 1 Issue 6) which she has titled simply River Construction #2. Made from equal playing card portions of topographic maps stained and decorated with arrow shapes and attached to a trellis, this piece is typical of Dickey's recent explorations. A larger piece was commissioned for the meeting room at the Spenard Rec Center in the 90's. Colorful and seemingly fraught with meaning, this piece will be a challenge to any future art conservator and can be enjoyed at home for $1200. KNOCKING ON HEAVEN: MCPECK Among the many content-free paintings and forced assemblies, the work of UAA's Sculpture Department head Hugh McPeck shines. Knocking on Heaven's Door is the development of an artist's conception with high grade raw materials. The form of the nubile angel is clearly referential yet the attached wings elevate the concept, and the knocker ring integrates the detailed exotic hardwood this cast bronze artifact is mounted on. The cowrie shell shape of the knocker is suggestive while the figure is explicit ($450). McPeck has created a doorknocker for the house of a matriarch. The gallery has added to its weekend hours by opening Wednesday through Friday between 10 am and 2 pm. With a group invitational at the IGCA, the Decker/Morris Gallery, and at the Museum, January has an excess of egalitarian fever with a good chance that a working artist will have a piece exhibited. Why gallerists and curators did not follow the time-tested trend of having the group shows in December to accommodate holiday shoppers and to clear out inventory will remain known best by the g's & c's themselves. EISENHOWER STATEHOOD MONUMENT Katherine Coons sent a nice note: "received your two newsletters upon my return. mx city was a great place, spot - wonderful sights and culture everywhere". Kwon Jay in South Korea mentions: "nothingmuch ........ how is wheather up there?" Have a nuclear winter, look through the back issue Index.
Thank you to a patient reader who insistently
"tried to enter the artscene site but never found the logon entry Now they're running around frowning importantly.
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text & photos © 2002 ArtSceneAK; artist's works pictured ©2002 to artists credited.
This anonymous bust of the late president Dwight
Eisenhower combines the head, a guardian eagle, the flags of the USA and State of Alaska,
and a scroll with text and a map of Alaska into an integrated whole with a
confusing, flame-shaped profile. Erected to commemorate the signing of the Statehood
compact in 1959 and as a walking tour overlook, the ample text and accreditions of
sponsors associated with the monument plaza makes no mention of the person responsible for
the sculpture. Local visitors have also shown no respect, and most of the metal letters
naming the monument have been damaged or stolen from their plinth. Ike's forehead has been
annointed by live birds.
