"A Thousand Words"
January 9 - February 10, 2017
Work by artist Len Davis
Exhibit Notes
Opening Reception: Friday, January 13th. Show runs from January 9th thru February 10th, 2017
Workshop: Friday, January 13th, 9am to 9:50am
Classroom Visit Q&A: Friday, January 13th, 12pm to 12:50pm
Reception: Friday, January 13th, 5pm to 7pm
Artist Talk: Friday, January 13th, 6pm
Artist, Len Davis collage/drawings explores the interplay between the figurative & literal term consisting of 100 8” X 5” collages incorporated with drawings of peoples’ faces executed on text-filled newsprint pages. When looking at a person’s
facial expression, you can tell how they’re feeling at that particular moment. Where as text, words, verbiage and recognizable text/identity marks explains it for you. Either way, we’re provided a mental picture from both, which illustrate
the fact that “A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words” within... “A Thousand Words.”
Introspection: The Birds and the Bees
August 28 - September 22, 2017
Closing Reception Friday September 22, 5-7
Gallery talk at 6
The exhibition Introspection: The Birds and the Bees highlights artwork by two artists whose exploration of the natural world brings focus to our changing environment. While their art is about nature their expressions are wildly different. Renee
Taffee lovingly paints luscious, colorful images of birds and flora. Interpreted with loose brush work and a story tellers eye, she transports us to the marshes of Montana or an imaginary dreamscape where animals interact on the human stage.
Bev Beck Glueckert’s has a more scientific approach. In her mixed media prints images of honey bees, flies, and birds are repeated as they navigate their natural environment. Wings, nests, and feathers are displayed as though specimens of a disappearing
species. Background patterns shift from honey comb to window screen inviting the viewer to ponder our relationship with insects and how we are dependent upon them while also protecting ourselves from vexation.
“Much of my work is based on ideas of survival and transformation, focusing on the simple yet complex nature of organisms and how species evolve and exist.”
Bev Beck Glueckert
“Nature, real or imagined, has always been a source of visual inspiration and information for my art work. I glean images from observation, plein air sketches and from memory.”
Renee Taaffe
Painting in the Dark
September 25 - October 27, 2017
Opening Reception Friday September 29, 5-7
DeVore’s title, “Painting in the Dark” was realized too late for the exhibition announcement. But, that one small act was a revelation which explains so much. Her primary concern is to paint and analyzing her work, assigning a title, or explaining,
her process is all secondary.
I have only seen her paintings via a small screen but I recognized immediately the inherent beauty and rich textures of her work. These paintings are large and expansive, exquisitely rich with layering, texture and subtle color. For further
explanation, I must rely on a fellow painter, and friend, Tom Thorson to fill in some details about her approach.
“From my visits to her studio I can further describe what she has explained to me, which isn’t a whole lot. But she has explained and I’ve seen a couple of paintings through their progress, she layers and layers and layers her paint to
get to her finished surface and color. One painting had what was to me the most gorgeous Pierre Bonnard palette that I couldn’t stop ogling. The next time it was unrecognizable as the same painting. It had become mostly grays. Jan insisted
she needs that specific underpainting to get what she had in her final painting. The rest is, I suppose, self-evident in that it’s about surface, and the play between the absolute flat and the teasing tension toward illusionary space.”
Ancient Art New Images
Frederico Vigil: Contemporary Fresco
October 31 - December 1, 2017
Reception Friday November 17, 5-7
Gallery talk at 6
Born and raised in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Frederico Vigil first became involved with the ancient art of fresco painting during an internship in 1984 with Lucienne Bloch and Stephen Pope Dimitroff, who were apprentices to Diego Rivera. Inspired
by these and other fresco masters, Vigil has since completed more than two dozen major fresco pieces, including one of the largest concave frescos in the world. Located inside the Torreón at Albuquerque’s National Hispanic Cultural Center,
the fresco took nearly ten years to complete and spans 4,000 square feet. Vigil also created the fresco located in Benildus Hall on the SFUAD campus.
Vigil’s exhibitions have extended across the United States, Spain and Mexico, with one of his most recent works located at the University of Notre Dame. He has been the recipient of the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, the
Santa Fe Mayor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, an NEA Art Fellowship Award and numerous other awards.
For his exhibition at the Apex Gallery Vigil will show cartoons from his fresco projects. Cartoons (or cartones) are large drawings done to the exact scale of an architectural space. Following an ancient pre-Renaissance tradition these drawings
were the first step to realizing a narrative which was most often a biblical story.
His public lecture, Thursday, November 16 at 6:00, will take place off campus at South Dakota Public Broadcasting’s West River Bureau office. This will be followed on Friday with an artist’s reception in the Apex Gallery.
Wade Patton: Seasons
March 20 - April 28, 2017
Closing reception, Friday, April 21 from 5 – 7
Gallery Talk at 6
By Wade Patton
Patton draws the viewer into his interpretation of the natural elements and seasonal changes of the land.
The spare beauty of the prairie resonates in the work of Wade Patton. An enrolled member of the Oglala Lakota Tribe, Patton grew up in the Black Hills surrounded by a rich culture of music and art. After obtaining a BA in art from Black
Hills State University and showing at the Sioux Indian Museum in Rapid City he decided to move away.
It took leaving South Dakota for him to find his voice, represented in this most recent body of work. Yet, while pursuing other arts opportunity in Boston, Patton dreamed of home.
“Living on the east coast, I began expressing what I missed, the beauty and splendor of the Black Hills and the skies of South Dakota. I started to draw landscapes and clouds, as a reminder of home.
Something clicked, not only in my artistic expression, but with collectors and galleries. Their response was phenomenal. I started sending work back home for exhibits and to galleries and was getting recognition and making sales.
Finally, I realized my need to return. I missed my family and I needed to pursue my art in the place where I find the most inspiration. That decision brought me straight into the thriving Native art scene.
Interestingly, when I moved back people would say, ‘Oh YOU’RE the cloud guy!’. People didn't know me, but knew my work. I’m reacquainting myself with the land and my ancestry. This is most prevalent in my new works and it’s exciting for me as
an artist to look forward to the future in the works that I’ll produce.”
With elegant line and an almost hypnotic use of pattern, Patton draws the viewer into his interpretation of the natural elements and seasonal changes of the land. His mastery of graphite evokes the subtlest of phenomenon and his sparing use of
color inspired by beadwork, orchestrates the prairie grasses, stormy skies and the power of buffalo.
Deborah Mitchell, Director
Apex Gallery
“He’s establishing a style of his own. There’s nothing like it right now in the Indian art world.”
Artist Don Montileaux on Wade Patton’s most recent work.
"Baddawi: Identities in Transit"
March 30, 2016 - April 29, 2016
Exhibit Notes
Comic art has the ability to break down concepts and information that may seem lofty or hard to understand, and make these ideas accessible to people. This makes comics a powerful activist tool. The old adage “knowledge is power” actually has
a lot of truth to it—if we hope to create change, we have to make sure that those around us are educated on the issues that we care about. As a Palestinian, all my life, people have told me that the history of the Palestinian struggle is too
“complicated” and difficult to understand. Yet, any Palestinian knows this is far from the truth.
The Palestinian struggle is a struggle for justice, and for those of us in the diaspora, it’s often defined by many conflicting elements. It is the tension between our ethnicity and our nationality (or lack thereof). It’s a burning resentment
for borders, and a simultaneous desire to establish them. It’s nostalgia for a place we’ve never been, and the fact that too often our “mother tongue” is actually our second language. My work does not attempt to disentangle all the difficulties
of diaspora. Instead, it embraces them, illuminating the way that these apparent contradictions are actually complimentary, just like the stark black and white in my comics, or the way that text and imagery work together harmoniously.
By engaging issues of identity, immigration, diaspora, tradition, memory, present day reality, and rich history, I create comics that shift between stark reality and surrealist dreamscapes to show that, in fact, the Palestinian struggle for justice
and liberation is not so complicated after all. Rather, it is a human struggle, one that is inherently relatable to people from many walks of life.
Leila Abdelrazaq
There will be an opening reception from 5-7 p.m. and an artist’s talk at 6 p.m. Wednesday,
March 30, in the gallery located in the Classroom Building on campus.
Inside Out: NeoOutsider
August 22, 2016 - September 23, 2016
An exhibition exploring experimentation, obsession and play.
Exhibit Notes
There will be a closing reception, September 23 from 5 -7pm, with a gallery talk by the curator at 6pm.
Curators
Statement, Patricia Thornton:
A long time ago I learned that great things happen when I surround myself with people I admire. One of the ways I get to know and work with artists I admire is by organizing group art shows. For this show, Inside
– Out / Neo Surrealism, I asked four experimental, playful artists who I deeply admire to join me. My intentions for assembling this show are twofold: to pay homage to some of my favorite Outsider and Surrealist artists like Jean DeBuffet and
Frida Kahlo and to show the world that sometimes the answers lie in the creation of things.
Sheila
Miles:
I have long-worked in the surrealist tradition (one of the tenets is that the unconscious mind is as valid (or more valid) as what a person might conjure rationally), and I appreciate and value the happy accident. When I am making this work I
am accessing the child within, letting and making accidents happening to see new relationships between marks and resulting imagery. I am looking for a new way of seeing.
As an artist it can be difficult to draw the line between ugly and beautiful. If it is too pretty, it can be saccharine and unreal. Too ugly, it can look immature, and well, difficult for the viewer to enter.
New-outsider art puts me in touch with my imagination and inner voice. It reminds me to have an open mind, to let the work lead me instead of attaching some precept to it. When I make this work the possibilities are endless and the discoveries
of characters and narratives emerge.
For example, "My place and my neighbors" is made from my handmade pieces. I didn't start with a preconceived idea. After working on it for a while I realized it was about my neighbor who works at Ace Hardware. He brings piles of stuff home (hardware,
equipment, cabinets, dog kennels, cans of substances, etc.) They are strewn all over his property among the dogs he breeds (and leaves outside in freezing weather). I think I am the large person on the left, baring my teeth, maybe there should
be an audible sound coming out of the mouth but instead there is just a grimace of frustration.
Steve Muhs:
If life is crazy can art reflect that? Probably not. And it should come as no surprise that art establishments have trouble, and even the greater community, with art that doesn’t conform to standards and expectations. Many people want to think
everything is ok – and we all know there is no rhyme or reason to how things go. Outsider art is historically labeled to the work of the self-taught, insane, etc. I can’t think of a more appropriate tag for any authentic art form.
Kia Liszak
I am intrigued by texture and driven by the idea of taking simple art-forms to complex levels. I often find my own way by inventing new mediums or using strange materials such as rice, beans, or yarn, not unlike a kindergartener. My work has an
obsessive quality and I go through a lot of glue. My primary motivation for making art is my own desire to watch it unfold. For the last few years, I have been working on a body of work made primarily from hand dyed rice that is an homage
to the epic images of the album covers I grew up with, but I have recently embarked on a new love affair with felt and other soft materials.
Lady
Pajama:
My art is a reflection of my haphazard nature. Things happen and I let them happen. I move from thing to thing and I see what happens. All this art happened and now you are looking at it. This is what is happening.
Movement, Muscle, Measure
September 28, 2016 - October 28, 2016
By Michael Baum
Drawing and kinesiology to examine the convergence of sport and art.
Michael Baum's process for creating art
Exhibit Notes
Reception Friday, September 30, 5 – 7
Artist’s talk, at 6
Michael Baum left the plains of the Dakotas in his early twenties for the mountain ranges of California, Wyoming, Montana, Washington and Alaska. His interactions with nature and the wilderness became the impetus for his graduate studies
in fine art, which he completed at Washington State University with an emphasis in drawing and printmaking. Michael is currently an Assistant Professor of Art at Black Hills State University in South Dakota, as well as curator for the Ruddell
Gallery.
Through rigorous physical practice he explores the intersection of kinesiology, drawing, and technology. He has an extensive list of exhibitions and was awarded a career development grant through the South Dakota Arts Council for a series
of drawings entitled Heart to Heart. This exhibition will include up to 40 drawings four different series and will track his process of creating.
Artist Statement
My work employs both drawing and kinesiology to examine the convergence of sport and art. I make work with the aid of drawing devices that have been designed to record various outdoor pursuits, ranging from long distance cycling trips, to backcountry
ski tours. The resulting work exists as a series of drawings, an indexical record of my travels. The images stand as a document providing the means of engaging and communicating with both nature and the self through performance.
Methods for automating drawing, particularly drawing from life, appeared simultaneously with the earliest accounts of constructing linear perspective. This long search for mechanical drawing approaches illustrates a connection between art and
technology. My interests and artistic practice is positioned between this complex relationship of technology, the machine and nature.
Over the course of the last few years I have been incorporating devices in the process of making drawings. In a time of digitization of the work process, one can easily forget the freedom and fun of play. By creating new drawing tools, I provide
an opportunity to break free from standards in design. In turn this furnishes me with the freedom of movement and access to the outdoors, leaving the confines of the traditional studio space behind.
Ultimately the landscape becomes a part of the process establishing a direct link to the concern for human conduct and natures role I affecting that conduct. One can argue that the natural epistemology of human activities can be conditioned by
nature. This work provides an objective lesson in the way nature and the artist can shape our understanding of an experience and place. The process of making these drawing confronts ideas regarding time, space and perception, all impacted
by the relationship between the body and nature.
The act of producing these drawings serves as a function for the human body to measure the landscape and systematically construct works of art. The work illustrates the body’s ability to operate various systems, continually tracing its relationship
to the land, coexisting as both a unit of measurement and a map, a recorder of space and time. Given the long history of artists who have created work about nature and their environment, part of my artistic practice is simply to finding new
ways to respond to nature today.
Dakota Scapes:
Images and inspiration from this land we call home.
November 2 - December 2, 2016
Paintings by Dede Farrar, David Horan, Lisa Shoemaker, and Jan Sohl
Exhibit Notes
Reception Friday, November 4, 5-7 pm
Artist’s talk, at 6pm
Four local painters share their love of landscape, natural phenomenon, and the people of South Dakota in this eclectic exhibition.
Lisa Shoemaker harnesses the wonder of nature through abstract paintings that describe the forces governing the natural world, while Jan Sohl’s contemplative paintings come from her connection to the land, Dede Farrar’s thickly painted canvases
are full of the energy of living beings, especially her side kick, Tiger, and David Horan muses on his place in both the landscape and the community.
Gallery director Deborah Mitchell asked them to think about what inspires them about living in our state, specifically in the Black Hills. Their words and art are testaments to an artist’s vision and life’s work. Visit the exhibit and see South
Dakota through their eyes.
J. Desy Schoenewies and Erica Merchant
"Surface: Texture and Illusions"
January 11 - February 19, 2016
Exhibit Notes
The Apex Gallery is pleased to announce "Surface: Texture and Illusion," an exhibition by J. Desy Schoenewies and Erica Merchant, both faculty at Black Hills State University. There will be an artist reception from 5-7 p.m. Friday, Jan. 22, with
an artist talk at 6 p.m. in the gallery. The exhibit will run through Friday, Feb. 19.
J. Desy Schoenewies: "Dakota Transformations"
Artist Statement: The idea of place is a concept that is almost entirely abstract. As human society dictates, we give a name and assign value to spaces that offers resources, beauty, shelter, or other humanistic needs. A place forms
our identity and forms the visual imprint of our memories. We share a sense of connectedness to other people who occupy proximity to a particular space. South Dakota, a place that of volatile weather, rugged landscapes, and great distances
between populace is largely a place that requires a certain amount of grit and stubbornness to live in. As a newcomer to the area, I have been both fascinated with and intimidated by this place. Through this series, I attempt to tell the many
varied stories of the people who have come to live and interact with this intense place.
Transformations: This 10-12 painting series juxtaposes the human figure with landscapes of eastern and western South Dakota in ethereal and sometimes surrealistic experiences. These existential works suggest the attractants and the deterrents
many people have with living in the Great Plains and the Black Hills, spoken through images of reality and the imagined. The works attempts to examine our ability to coexist with all the factors of survival and history within such an inspiring
yet wild space. Using layered imagery and surrealistic notions, I attempt to create a multilayered visual dialog in my paintings. Much of this imagery serves as personal metaphor to my relocation to South Dakota from major urban areas.
Process: The ideas begin with simple conversations with the people I have met. I ask about their background, what place means to them, and why did they come to this particular place. I take extensive photographs; every time I cross
the state I carry my camera with me. When I have collected some images that speaks of a story, I use Photoshop to put together the elements of the composition. I start with my photos, find patterns if necessary, move images around, and develop
a composition with a compelling visual literacy. From there, I transfer the image to canvas, work in grisaille underpaintings, and develop the tonality. My paintings tend to be a little heavier in contrast than most other realist or
figurative painters. By pushing contrast and bumping color intensity, I give the works a dream-like stage, where they are grounded in reality, but something is a little ‘off.’ I sometimes like to play with linework on my edges, veering between
natural visual boundaries and playing with simultaneous contrast, through color intensity and color compliment. This type of exemplified linework is predominant in Transplant and in Indian on Ranch Land.
Erica Merchant: "Encapsulating Symmetry"
Artist Statement: Using the Encaustic medium, this series of painted patterns and origami shapes began in 2015. In these works, origami imagery is infused with fabric-styled patterns. The series is mimicking impermanent substrates (paper
and fabric) through the use of oil paint, enamel paint, and encaustic mediums; materials with substantive lasting qualities. By recreating shapes typically made from degradable material, I am able to create works of art that are just as whimsical
as the original designs but in permanent form.
The inspiration for my work is grounded in our geological history. More specifically, layers of earth define our past and, much like memories, link our present with our immediate past. I find the action of accidental preservation of certain objects
to be one of the most beautiful and simultaneously the most saddening experiences. Viewing the beauty of sediment layers today belies the chaos and destruction that took place in the past to create them. My work employs tension, compression,
and metamorphic processes. Just as geological remnants are discovered, past memories intrude our present thoughts to evoke a nostalgic, reflective, and pleasing narrative. My work captures the joy of coming across a fossil and equates it to
the joy of capturing an intruding memory from the past. My work equally portrays the sorrow of realizing the deep history that has been lost at a historical and geological level, and of personal memories lost and irretrievable. What remains
is unintentional. The past that sticks around is not on purpose; past memories do not make themselves remain in the strata of our minds, nor does a fossil determine its fate. The serendipity of placement in time and space is the only determining
factor as to whether something survives to be discovered. I like to think of our memories as a fossilized narrative.
Bio: Erica Merchant lives in Spearfish, South Dakota. She teaches Ceramics, Sculpture, and Art History classes at Black Hills State University. Erica received her Bachelor’s degrees in Anthropology and Humanities from University of Wyoming
and her Master of Fine Arts, emphasis Sculpture, from University of South Dakota. Erica is a 2014 recipient of the South Dakota Arts Council Emerging Artist Grant.
Student Exhibition
"Communicate/Innovate/Fabricate"
February 26, 2016 - March 24, 2016
Exhibit Notes
South Dakota School of Mines & Technology students and alumni will exhibit their work at the Apex Galley on campus. The interdisciplinary exhibit, titled “Communicate/Innovate/Fabricate,” will feature work ranging from drawings and metal roses
to chessboards and chainmail.
There will be an opening reception in the Apex Gallery from 5-7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 26, with a gallery talk at 6 p.m. The exhibit will run through March 24.
Tim Peterson
"American Nocturne"
November 2 - December 4, 2015
"Ghost Church"
Exhibit Notes
The Apex Gallery is pleased to announce "American Nocturne," an exhibition by Spearfish artist Tim Peterson. The exhibit opens Monday, November 2 and runs through December 4.
A closing reception will be held in the gallery on Friday evening, December 4, from 5 to 7 pm with an Artist Talk at 6 pm.
The focus of Peterson’s work is to depict “random, small dramas that we experience in the routine course of our daily lives.” American Nocturne focuses on those moments after dark, after the sun goes down. The scenes depicted are from
both a random chance viewing of an intriguing scene as well as a concentrated effort to seek out interesting scenes and compositions. The 15 pastels on display at the Apex Gallery share a similar, dark palette with an accompanying air of mystery,
inherent to the night.
Peterson is originally from Minot, North Dakota, but attended Northern State University in Aberdeen, SD where he received his Bachelor’s degree. Peterson lives and works in Spearfish, South Dakota.
Erika Harvey
"Majestic Moments" - landscape and wildlife photographs
September 28 - October 30, 2015
"Hey Boo Boo" - photograph by Erica Harvey
Exhibit Notes
This photography exhibit features 21 landscape and wildlife images taken at national parks around the country as well as in Canada. Harvey’s use of rich color and subtle light give her images a stillness that allows the photograph to reveal itself
slowly as it tells the story of our national parks.
“The images you see today are not
only beautiful works of art, but some of my favorite moments. Together they
convey my greatest passion in life: traveling and seeing the world. Oddly
enough a map - my grandparent’s map to be exact, instilled this passion! As a
small child I would go into their basement and stare at this world map that was
full of pins. Each one of those pins represented an adventure, a life fully
lived. I swore to myself that one day I would have my own map and fill it
with my own pins. This collection of images is representative of some of what I
see when I look at my own map. Instead of pins I see moments in time. Each pin
in my map has a story to tell.”
Harvey grew up in the Black Hills. She attended the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara where she earned a degree in Visual Journalism. For the last 10 years she has run her own photography business in Rapid City and currently she
is working towards her goal of teaching others.
Artist's Reception: Friday, October 2 | 5-7 PM
Luke Gorder
"What Might Have Happened"
August 24 - September 25, 2015
Painting by Luke Gorder
Exhibit Notes
As the name suggests, What Might Have Happened offers scenes of “unreality,” juxtapositions of images arranged into scenes, which viewers can enter and make their own. Animals may appear, often cast as villains. Children are a frequent motif as
well, evoking childhood fables. These images, often in conversation with one another, suggest a kind of wildness that contains the unknown and the mysterious, a delicate balance of disparate components woven together. Gorder’s method involves
collecting images from family photos, magazines, and random Google searches, assembling these into collage, and finally painting the image in oil on canvas.
Gorder received his BFA in Art from the University of Wyoming in 2008, and an education degree from Black Hills State in 2012. Currently, he teaches drawing and painting at Central High School in Rapid City, SD.
Artist's Reception: Friday, August 28 | 5-7 PM
Bonny Fleming
"Every Now and Then"
April 6 - May 8, 2015
Postcard/photography by Bonny Fleming
Exhibit Notes
Bonny Fleming is a Black Hills photographer. She is fascinated by moments and how, with the camera, she is able to capture them and pass them along to others. Many of the pieces in this show were chosen because they were simply instants; fleeting
and fragile. They are records of her direct spontaneous experiences and thus open metaphors, inviting viewers to complete the stories or otherwise supply their own personal meaning.
Artists Reception: Friday, April 10 from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m., gallery talk at 6:00 p.m.
Sheila Miles
"Everything's A OK"
February 23 - April 3, 2015
Paintings by Sheila Miles
Exhibit Notes
The art exhibition, “Everything’s A OK,” by artist Sheila Miles opens Monday, Feb. 23, at the Apex Gallery and will remain up through April 3, 2015.
The exhibit will feature oils, collages and watercolor paintings with themes ranging from home and the prairie to odd characters and nature.
“The set designer who has used my work in his film productions calls me an outsider artist, (meaning) an artist who accesses the child within. … I draw from life experiences such as current news events, relationships, folk tales, animals,
weather, landscape and the psychological, emotional, visual and intellectual world,” Miles said.
Miles has exhibited in over 300 shows, and 100 of her works are included in public collections such as the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, Provincetown Art Association and Museum, Yellowstone Art Museum, Holter Museum, Missoula Museum
of the Arts and the Missoula International Airport.
For over 35 years, Miles has exhibited widely throughout the country. She is currently an Artist in Public Places, New Mexico Roster Artist and was a San Francisco Public West Coast Artist for the Public Arts Projects. In 1999 she received
the $20,000 Gottlieb Foundation grant. In 2013, 11 of her oils, several of her drawings and studio accoutrement were used in a film “Big Sky.” Recently another 18 works were used in the movie “Jubilee.”
Artists Reception: 5-7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 27, including a gallery talk at 5 p.m.
RT Livingston
"Handwriting on the Wall"
January 16 - February 20, 2015
Artwork by RT Livingston
Exhibit Notes
The art of RT Livingston is multifaceted and engaged with challenging complacency. She asks her viewers to really look, and to look deeply. Versed in art historical knowledge she references not only the cannon but contemporary visual
culture. Her many projects embody and subvert the tropes of visual, and conceptual art, music, photography, and filmmaking.
For her exhibition in the Apex Gallery she has created a conceptual installation entitled, Handwriting on the Wall. This installation invites active participation and demands a level of engagement, yet allows the audience to interpret
the work in their own way.
Prompted by three simple phrases which are based upon word play and packed with meaning Livingston suggests participants contemplate their own interpretations.
Artists Reception: January 16, 4 to 6 pm, gallery talk at 5 pm.
Artist's Website
Cathryn Mallory
"Topography - a Mixed Media Exhibit"
September 29 - November 7, 2014
Fissure - by Cathryn Mallory
Reception
5 to 7 pm, Friday, October 24, with gallery talk at 6 pm.
Exhibit Notes
Cathryn Mallory manipulates mundane materials and transforms simple roofing shingles and scuffed linoleum into finely crafted works of art. Along the way as she builds these objects of beauty with her consummate attention to detail she also created
puns and visual metaphors. Her artist’s statement is a well-honed explanation and meditation on her life’s work.
Cathryn Mallory is Professor and Gallery Director at the School of Art at the University of Montana in Missoula, MT.
Artist's Statement
“The works in Topography are inspired from direct observation of the forms, patterns, and details found within the landscape. A lifelong interest in textiles, process and materials are reflected in these interpretations.
Obsessive process and passion for materials have always been significant elements in my work. Materials are selected for their aesthetic quality and communicative power. I enjoy using materials that have a familiarity, but are distanced from
usual reference and association. Preserving the intrinsic quality of these materials is also significant to me, and I rarely alter the color. The use of linoleum allows me to explore color in new ways, while maintaining its integrity. Vintage
scraps of linoleum and assorted metals are pieced together in a process similar to quiltmaking, resulting in an array of color, line, and pattern.”
--- Cathryn Mallory
(Various Artists)
Collage Aesthetic
January 13 - February 14, 2014
Be Armed by Robert Vore
Exhibit Notes
Artists and faculty from South Dakota, Colorado, Wyoming and Wisconsin will display their work in a group exhibition, entitled “Collage Aesthetic,” Jan. 13 through Feb. 14, with a reception from 5-7 p.m. Friday, Jan. 17, at the Apex Gallery. Gallery
hours are from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and from 1-5 p.m. on Sunday.
Employing collage, montage, assemblage or the mash-up, the artwork in this exhibition speaks to a contemporary aesthetic that found its roots in early Modernism. Whether the aim is to subvert, embellish or enhance the original image,
each of the artists in this exhibition relies upon a found source.
“Long before the Internet, Dadaists, Cubists and Futurists were breaking new ground with collage, performance and assemblage. From the quaint craft practice of decoupage to the scathing political critiques of Hannah Hoch, contemporary
artists working in this vein give ready-made images new life,” said Deborah Mitchell, associate professor of the Humanities Department and director of the Apex Gallery.
Artists in the group show are:
- Lauri Lynnxe Murphy, Denver, Colo.
- Mike Koppa, Viroqua, Wisc.
- Robert Vore, Beulah, Wyo.
- Jeannie Champine and Bob H. Miller, Rapid City
- Chris Francis, Madison, South Dakota
- Gina Gibson, assistant professor, digital communication, Black Hills State University
- Diana Behl, assistant professor, visual arts, South Dakota State University
- Cory Knedler, chair, associate professor, art education, and Jontimothy Pizzuto, associate professor, printmaking, University of South Dakota
- Angela Behrends, adjunct instructor, College of Arts and Sciences, and Giles Timms, assistant professor, College of Arts and Sciences, Dakota State University
Nathan Hurst and Chalice Mitchell
Embodied/Disembodied
February 18 - March 26, 2014
Left: painting by Chalice Mitchell; Right: Painting by Nathan Hurst
Exhibit Notes
The Apex Gallery at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology will host the exhibit, “Embodied/Disembodied,” by Nathan Hurst, M.F.A., and Chalice Mitchell, M.F.A., February 18th through Wednesday, March 26, 2014.
“Hurst fills his paintings with saturated color and solidity; Mitchell’s seems to dissolve as though seen through a veil or alternately as though illuminated by the staccato of a strobe light,” Deborah Mitchell, director of the Apex Gallery and
associate professor of humanities, notes.
She believes their starkly different styles are influenced by their respective artistic training in Alaska and Florida – two states which couldn’t be further apart. “Does someone spending days in the low light conditions of an arctic winter crave
color, and does an artist who seeks relief from unrelenting sun comfort themselves with low light and a muted palette?” Mitchell says.
Both artists chose the human figure as their subject, a form that has been portrayed and received differently in various cultures over time: revered in Greek art, elongated by the Mannerists and fractured by the Cubists, to name a few. This long
lineage of approaches converges in the 21st century where artists are liberated from style and are free to subvert the body in many different ways, as both fleeting and corporeal.
“As I look over these paintings I see light, presence, color, solidity, impermanence, enduring, fleeting and ephemeral. Paint is a substance that can take many forms depending upon the skill and the hand of the artist and can be all of these things.
Both artists are proficient in their handling of the material and the subject. The viewer will have their own take on the content,” Mitchell adds.
Kim Arthun
"Ah Shi Sle Pah - photography of New Mexico, printed on 3m vinyl"
November - December 5, 2014
Photograph by Kim Arthun
Exhibit Notes
SD Mines hosts the exhibition, “Ah Shi Sle Pah,” by artist Kim Arthun through Dec. 5. “Ah Shi Sle Pah” is an exhibition of photographs of New Mexico’s landscape printed on 3m vinyl, used in the sign industry for car wraps and other advertising,
and adhered directly to the walls with no glass or frames.
“I like using non-fine-art technologies to make fine-art images. The area of these photos is a hidden gem that we stumbled across looking for ancestral pueblo sites or outliers as they are called,” Arthun said.
Born and raised in Albuquerque, N.M., Arthun has a long-held fascination with Native American use of abstract geometry in art, a motif that appears in his three decades of work ranging from collage and sculpture to photography and film.
“The past two years I have been following a compulsion that I have had my whole life to study and better understand the peoples who have lived in this high desert for at least 10,000 years. I have been using Google maps and its satellite
imagery to find, locate and travel to these ancient sites,” Arthun added.
Arthun owns a billboard company in New Mexico and is co-founder of EXHIBIT/208, an art exhibition venue that has hosted more than 150 local artist shows.
Sandy Brooke
"Suspended"
August 25 - September 26, 2014
Climate Change - by Sandy Brooke
Reception
5 to 7 pm, Friday, September 5th with gallery talk at 6 pm.
Exhibit Notes
"Suspended,” featuring paintings by Sandy Brooke, opens today at the Apex Gallery on the campus of the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology.
“The work is suspended between the freedom of line and the containment of space,” according to Brooke’s artist statement about the exhibit.
The concept of contradiction is addressed through her body of work. For example, while the painting “Amelia” is brightly colored the viewer is aware of the tragic disappearance of Amelia Earhart. In “Climate Change,” bright happy colors
can’t hide the bleak future one may be facing.
Brooke’s dynamic quality is apparent, but what also comes through is her use of color. Moving from somber and moody in some pieces to lively and light in others, she mines images of her many travels with a keen eye towards contemporary
culture, the natural world and collective history.
Foremost a painter – her application of paint is lush and varied – Brooke also adds mystery to each image through layers of collage, encaustic, paint stick, graphite and gouache.
Jude Valentine
The Geometrical Foundation of Natural Structure
On the Beach - by Jude Valentine
Exhibit Notes
The Apex Gallery at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology will host its new exhibit, “The Geometrical Foundation of Natural Structure,” by Jude Valentine, March 28 through May 2. The artist’s reception will be 5-7 p.m. Friday, March 28,
with a gallery talk at 6 p.m. Gallery hours are from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and from 1-5 p.m. on Sunday.
Valentine says the genesis for this series of work originated in the book “The Geometrical Foundations of Natural Structure” by architect, mathematician and scientist Robert Edward Williams.
“I was interested in visually exploring in these prints how the numbers one through ten are manifested through nature and embedded in natural forms through symmetry and design. These pieces are inspired by geometric connections between
elements – plants, animals, crystals, people and the landscape – as a geometric field that unifies diversity,” said Valentine.
Throughout her 30 prints – three for each number – Valentine highlights different foci of the theme, inviting viewers to consider the idea that geometry underlies matter on a microscopic and macrocosmic level.
David Bower
Revival
September 30 - October 30, 2013
Journey - by David Bower
Exhibit Notes
Professor emeritus at Northern Illinois University, School of Art, DeKalb, and a Fulbright Scholar to Akademie der Bildenden Kunste, Germany, Bower’s exhibit reflects three distinct ideas he’s explored over the last 12 years.
“Ideas for my work come to me in many different ways. In the case of the "Lower 48" it was the fascination with the arrangement of the counties of each state which I found in an old geography book and what they suggested to me. Most
are very regular and geometric, which implied formal abstract interpretation, while others more organic in nature suggested human figures,” Bower said. “It was a playful exercise, and I could not stop until I had completed all 48 states.”
This enchantment with geometric forms drew Bower to an unorthodox purchase – a box of old, used cigar bands. “The colors were bright with gilded edges, and the shapes were interesting.”
He would later incorporate the bands into his art, not only for their “exquisite embossing” but the subtle reminder of “our visual culture of merchandising.”
Bower’s gravitation towards the idea of collage and found objects stems from his childhood in Chicago. Throughout his grade school years, the Field Museum had a lending program through which schools could borrow portable display boxes
of various topics, such as a bird’s habitat, cotton growing and coal mining.
“I really was fascinated by these portable museums. Inspired by these displays and the artist, Joseph Cornell, I began a lifetime pursuit of combining visual materials in box or box-like structures.”
Joe Davis
Hidden Knowledge
April 1 - April 19, 2013
Bio Artist Joe Davis, inset: imprinted rocks
Exhibit Notes
An MIT and Harvard Medical School research affiliate and world-renowned pioneer in the emerging field of bio-art, Joe Davis revealed his newest installation, “Hidden Knowledge,” created in collaboration with Mines students, at 5 p.m. Friday, April
5, in the Apex Gallery on the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology campus. There was also a film screening of HEAVEN + EARTH + JOE DAVIS, a documentary by internationally acclaimed filmmaker Peter Saskowsky accompanied by a Q&A with
both men.
Escaping tidy descriptor or simple explanation, Davis’ art, like the laboratories from which it springs, emerges at the vanishing point between experience and experiment.
Ranging from placing a map of the Milky Way into the ear of a transgenic mouse (where the genes of one species are placed inside the cells of another) to transforming light information into sound in order to hear living cells, his artwork
and research probes the fields of molecular biology, bioinformatics, sculpture and space art, using tools as diverse as centrifuges, radios, prosthetics and magnetic fields of genetic materials.
Davis’ newest installation proves to be just as unorthodox. Partnering with Mines students, he will stamp around 500 stones with the DNA sequence of the wild apple Malus sieversii – the first apple to ever exist. Until now, the wild apple’s
DNA had never been sequenced, allowing Davis’ project to also serve as a test bed for next-generation nanopore DNA sequencing technology. After the exhibit ends, the stones will be transferred to the courtyard of Chemical and Biological Engineering/Chemistry
building, a fitting tribute to the work unfolding within.
The School of Mines exhibit will serve as a prototype for a permanent, larger-scale installation at Harvard Medical School entitled “Shadow Garden,” which will be displayed in an atrium housing more than 180,000 rocks, 46,000 of which
will be stamped.
Deborah Mitchell, director of the Apex Gallery, seizing the opportunity to explore the nexus of science and art, invited Joe Davis to the School of Mines to share his work. Mitchell is currently working on developing a visiting artist’s
program to bring more such opportunities to campus.
A wild progenitor species of the domesticated apple, M. sieversii was initially dispersed via the Silk Road, a historic trade caravan route leading from Central Asia east to China and west to Europe. As trade declined over the last few
centuries, this flow of apple germplasm slowed, ceasing completely in the 20th century as Central Asia became isolated for political reasons.
Katie Adkins
Midway
November 1 - December 6, 2013
Photograph by Katie Adkins
Exhibit Notes
“Midway explores the fusion of disparate relationships that occur in the chaotic environment of a carnival. Perhaps the most obvious of these is between the average carnival visitor, who experiences the sights, sounds and smells of the fair as
an outsider, and the carnival workers (or carnies), who operate on the inside of that world,” Adkins explains.
The project began as an exploration of the carnival worker, peeling back the surface of spectacle to reveal the human struggles and triumphs underneath. But as her discoveries deepened, it became less about peering into a world and more
about looking outward through its inhabitants’ eyes.
“Once I began photographing carnival workers behind the scenes I began to see a bit more through their eyes. I saw the ‘fun rides’ as the huge metal machines they are; I saw the wide-eyed faces of children as economic reality for the
men and women who work the fair; I saw real faces behind the garish colored suits and face paint that mark the carnival barkers’ ‘show.’”
Adkins’ medium reflects this exposed human element, stripped of the fair’s fantastical kaleidoscope. Her entire exhibit is in black and white, a starkness that reveals patterns “that disappear when saturated with color” and monsters that
come alive “when the motion of their colored lights is stripped away.” Most importantly, it brings to light “relationships between people, relationships that move to the forefront once they are seen in stark black and white.”
Her work has appeared in the Rapid City Journal, The Argus Leader, the Dahl Arts Center and the Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta, Georgia, among other publications and locales.
Kyle Fokken
Some Assemblage Required
August 26 - September 27, 2013
Exhibit Notes
APEX Gallery launches the fall, 2013 semester with the exhibit “Some Assemblage Required” by artist Kyle Fokken, to run through Sept. 27.
Fokken weaves his fascination with vintage toys and mechanical objects throughout the exhibit, combining atypical elements to create captivating sculptures. Yet, upon deeper analysis, many of his seemingly whimsical adaptations of found
objects take on a deeper meaning. Referencing greater issues in society and raising questions about long-held beliefs, Fokken’s attention to detail and his consummate crafting of the final product gives this work broad appeal.
Fokken grew up relatively poor in a small farming town where a “make do” ethic and aesthetic was instilled. Out of necessity he would rescue other children’s discarded toys and plastic models from the trash. However, he rarely stopped
at a simple reconstruction. Rather he labored to give a fuller context to his found toys, enhancing their wear and tear and including them in historically correct dioramas.
His youthful reassembling was put on the back burner while he worked on his M.F.A. in ceramics and pursued various careers in arts education, administration and fundraising. With the support of his wife and family, he has returned to
being a full-time artist. Over the past 10 years, his work has shown internationally and garnered awards, grants, commissions and rave reviews.
Bill Ohrmann
Truth: An Exhibition of Paintings
January 12 - February 14, 2012
Director's Note
At the age of 94, Ohrmann has been an artist for a very long time! Since he began creating as a young man his career in the arts has been interrupted by the death of his parents, war, and cattle ranching.
Until 1995 he was best known as a sculptor, first as a wood carver, then a bronze artist. His wildlife sculptures have been sought by collectors throughout the country. Then, at the age of 80, he turned his attention to producing life sized, anatomically
correct, welded steel sculptures of elk, moose, bear, etc.
In 1995, after semi-retiring from 57 years as a rancher he began painting. Although he had done a number of paintings through the years, he had put most of his efforts into sculpture.
Allegorical themes have always interested him. But when he tried his hand at oil painting the narrative possibilities expanded beyond what was possible in sculpture! It was a natural medium for his expression!
At this point in his life Ohrmann is content to remain in his studio in Drummond, Montana. He won’t be attending a reception at the Apex Gallery. But, I encourage everyone to visit the Gallery, as well as his website! http://www.ohrmannmuseum.com/
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
MaryAnn Bonjorni
Recent Drawing and Constructions
February 17 - March 27, 2012
Director's Note
MaryAnn Bonjorni reflects her experience of what it means to live in the “Last Best Place” with all its attendant commercialization and romanticization. Gathering found elements and constructing them into assemblages of wry humor she mines her
profound love of the place with a Duchampian sensibility. “Trained under the influence of late Modernism and practicing within the linguistic chatter of Post modernism, much of my work has emphasized process and signing.”
Drawing is another form of expression for Bonjorni, serving both as a place to start and for developing finished works. “For me, drawing is a mainstay and often the first step in exploring an idea. It is also something that can be pursued pretty
much at any time in any place.”
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
“My interest in the West and Western society developed long before "Last Best Place" espresso bars and t-shirts. Like many contemporary regional writers I arrived at my pursuit through personal investigations into family and place. Over the years
I have slowly integrated this information into a larger context. In the past I have supported myself as a farm worker, commercial fisherman, bartender, and ranch hand. I have literally and figuratively sweated out any romantic notions I once
held about "western-ness". While these experiences are about physicality and solace amidst a beautiful natural environment, they are also about economic stress, injury, death, and beating the odds. The essence of my work has attempted to link
these characteristics.”
MaryAnn Bonjorni
Sam Chapman
Unhindered by Glass
March 29 - April 25 2012
Director's Note
Sam Chapman is an international photographer who is a 2000 graduate of Rapid City Steven’s High School and North Dakota State University (NDSU) with a degree in Landscape Architecture. His resume also includes an award winning thesis design for
a downtown walking corridor from the Dahl Art Center to the Journey Museum.
Upon his graduation from NDSU he headed to the skyscraper landscape of San Francisco for employment with the global landscape architecture company EDAW Inc., at least until the 2008 economic crisis took hold of the economy. In 2009, he took off
to South East Asia for a photo expedition financed after long office hours and encouragement of Rapid Citian Patrick Franklin, another international traveler and business entrepreneur.
When he returned from his five month travels in Asia, finding employment to sustain his photography passion is a familiar story to many artists. His however has beaten the odds in these economic times, if you can weather a third world living experience
in the “oil rush” of North Dakota. Over the past year, he purchased the necessary equipment to mat and build the frames in a family garage and at the worksite shop. Employed in a wireline fracture business, he worked over 100 hour weeks with
intermittent days off. “Photography is an exciting lifetime skill because it works where every you are and whatever you are doing,” Chapman said, “Even when there is not much time.”
His photography website, www.therocketfactory.com has more photos from the exhibit and as for most artists they are for sale. It is the combination of the crisis and the “strike it rich” oil rush that makes Chapman’s specialization in street photography,
architecture and landscapes compelling. His style of photography is not about the photo but about what the photo captures.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Bob Newland
Pique of Action
June 24 - September 26, 2011
Artist's Statement
The last time I stepped into a rodeo arena with a camera was in 1984. In 2008, I met Isaac Diaz at a poker table in Deadwood, South Dakota. He was there primarily to ride a bronc at the Days of ’76 Rodeo. His PRCA stats suggest he’s a pretty salty
rider.
I mentioned that I used to shoot rodeos, and the time period. He said, “That was when all the pictures were black and white.
This exhibition contains images from 26 negatives. They represent the most interesting shots I could cull from around 25000 negatives I accumulated in the rodeo arena. They’re interesting to me because, aside from being the capture of a peak of
action, they evoke curiosity, they pique the imagination. What happened next? Were there broken bones?
Today, I can post photos in a website album, and interested parties can visit and buy if they like. I can capture as many images as I like without spending anything for film or developing. I can print photos almost indistinguishable from silver
halide darkroom prints.
For those reasons and others, it’s unlikely that I will ever shoot film or print in a darkroom again. The pictures in this exhibition were all photographed by me in the period 1977-1984. The prints were made on an Epson R2400, a medium-priced
professional-grade inkjet printer, with pigment-based inks.
Jill Poyourow
The Natural Progression of Things
October 4 - November 4, 2011
Director's Note
Jill Poyourow’s most recent work is in the genre of “history” painting. This style of painting, in the traditional sense usually depicts a defining moment in a narrative. However, Poyourow’s work holds our attention by its dynamic and eclectic
references to multiple sources.
The artist mines family history, art history, biology, and evolution. These sources are, in her own words: “refracted through an imagination populated with visions of fractal-like organisms, creatures and life forms.”
Her artwork takes us on an expansive romp through history and around the world to disparate cultures all connected on a molecular level through our common humanity and the human need for art and beauty.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
"In my latest work, The Natural Progression of Things, the words 'historical' and 'cosmological' go hand in hand, bringing together my long-standing practices of painting and personal narrative. Working to create a new hybrid form of history painting
while taking an allegorical view into the cosmological and biological processes essential to life, these new works are informed by ideas about the environment and evolution currently making their way to the forefront of global consciousness
via popular culture.
As I painted these works, a couple of global environmental catastrophes occurred; simultaneously, my own life changed dramatically. In my work I explore how all our cognitive experiences influence and determine how life is evolving on this planet,
not only as scientific phenomena of a very distant past, but also as a current process that is happening with our every thought and breath. My fascination with the 3.5 billion year history of the human body is expressed as I invent these plankton-cum-fish-cum-man
biomorphic and geometric marks, symbolizing how we all are connected viscerally and how technology influences the natural world inside and outside each of us. By studying our origins, we become more human."
Jill Poyourow
Corky Clairmont
The Place We Live
March 25 - April 20, 2011
Artist's Statement
Corky Clairmont, a member of Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation finds inspiration in his identity. Working as a conceptual and installation artist he challenges the viewer to consider alternative ways of looking at
the world.
His early work was inspired by the German performance artist Joseph Beuys. And while Clairmont’s work is politically charged it is also gently humorous, and subtly subversive. In essence he becomes the coyote and turns the tables on Beuys’ 1974
performance piece, “I like America and America Likes Me”
“Much of my artwork centers on the place that I live, personal experiences, and issues that impact our communities. Being a member of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, located in Northwestern Montana, I have frequently been influenced
by tribal issues of sovereignty, colonization, culture and history. Monoprints, drawings, photo imagery, and installation works are common contemporary art media, which provides a vehicle for an intended dialog with the viewer. The abstraction
of imagery, color, and a few unexpected surprises can engage the viewer, and trigger the start of a personal journey of interest connecting a few of the dots for greater awareness of the intended concepts represented in the artwork.”
I don't put work out that gives solutions but provokes questions.
Corky Clairmont
Susan Harris and Brian Hoover
Mythical Cycles
August 29 - September 30, 2011
Artist's Statements
Mythical Cycles pairs the paintings of Brain Hoover and the ceramics of Susan Harris. Each artist expresses their different interests, Harris in ritual and ancient historic styles, and Hoover in a spiritual world where surrealism and narrative
are melded. This seemingly disparate pairing is brought together through elements of the natural world and exquisite detail.
From the two year old child who got in trouble for playing in the mud to the accomplished artist and faculty member at Southern Utah University, Susan Harris has developed her work to perfection. Texture, detail, and sculpted bio-morphic creatures
adorn forms of perfect balance which have been inspired by ancient Chinese and Etruscan ceremonial vessels. She has shown extensively throughout the US, in Asia and Australia, and her work is included in numerous permanent collections as well
as numerous text books and catalogs.
Her work, even when used for utilitarian purposes “maintains a ceremonial sensibility, an impression that has deliberately been cultivated.” Susan Harris
Brian Hoover uses dream imagery and surrealism to create paintings with mysterious often spiritual narratives. He approaches his work with two different techniques, not unlike the two roots of surrealism. In his “splash” paintings he uses accidental
marks made by random splashes of paint. His other, more traditional way of creating an image relies on a fully conceived idea and careful planning.
“Dreams are important to me because they stand as a reminder that all is not orderly in the universe. Life is an enigma. Life is surprising,”
Brian Hoover
Jeanne Gumpper
In Place
November 7 - December 9, 2011
Director's Note
Jean Gumpper works in the ancient tradition of woodcut. But what makes her art all the more interesting and amazing is the reduction printing technique. This process leaves little room for error because only one block is used. The technical aspects
are fascinating and complex. Her description of the process reveals the care needed to create each print: "Each color is mixed carefully and applied in a series of transparent and opaque overlapping layers through a reduction woodcut process
and gradually, the layers build up into a completed image. Making the print is a way to relive an experience and to share it with others."
Gumpper’s inspiration is from the natural world. By immersing herself in the experience of nature and the process of reduction printing she shares her world; the artist as a conduit for the contemplative life.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
"In my work as an artist and printmaker, I respond to landscape as a metaphor for emotions and experiences. Being alone in nature helps me to listen to my intuition and to have the patience necessary to really see. I seek to integrate the memories,
sounds and feelings of being in the landscape into the making of the print. The carving of the woodblock and the layering of the ink echo natural processes such as the layering of leaves, water, trees and light."
Jeanne Gumpper
Toby Brusseau
The Magic Hours
May 6 - June 24, 2011
Director's Note
Brusseau’s book of photographs, I Am South Dakota is an in-depth portrait of our state. Brusseau captures the people and the landscape in gorgeous color and detail. For his exhibition in the Apex Gallery he has blown a selection of images up to
a size that reflects the scope of the land and the grandeur of nature while also engaging us with the very personal lives of our friends and neighbors.
Toby Brusseau grew up in the Black Hills of South Dakota. After graduating from the University of Montana in Missoula, Toby traveled the world and found himself back in his home state taking photos. Brusseau has a passion for the continuing challenge
of capturing moments in everyday lives. "I love natural light of early morning and late afternoon," he says. "There's nothing like it."
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Moishe Smith
Intaglios from a Master Printmaker
January 13 - February 12, 2011
Director's Note
Do a web search for the words, “Moishe Smith artist” and you are faced with over ten pages of entries about the man and his artwork; the exhibitions, the awards, the collections and museums, and the current market prices for his work. Clearly
this artist has a long line of credentials.
Here is an example of one entry that popped up repeatedly:
Moishe Smith (1929 -1993) was one of the most accomplished etchers of the 20th century, as technically sophisticated as Whistler, but with the vigor of an American regionalist. His honors included both Fulbright and Guggenheim fellowships and
his work is in many public collections, including those of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Metropolitan Museum, the Galleria Degli Uffizi in Florence, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington.
This exhibit of 23 prints is on loan courtesy of Carolyn Waller Smith and the artist’s estate. It maps his work chronologically from his early prints of the 1950’s to the end of his life and shows the full breadth of his artistic vision. Smith
is best known for his highly detailed and finely crafted images of the natural world. He used the full range of possibilities with the intaglio process such as line and texture, aquatint, dry point, soft ground and mezzotint. He also emphasized
pentimento in his process, allowing earlier states and marks to remain on the plate.
As head of printmaking at Utah State University (USU), Logan, Utah, from 1977- 1993, Smith taught legions of students with his keen eye and gentle manner. I came to know Moishe Smith as my major professor and the head of my graduate committee,
when I received my MFA in printmaking at USU. Smith was an old world style artist; steeped in the craft and mystery of printmaking, but also knowledgeable about art history and the greater world. He had a profound effect on the direction of
my life. I felt fortunate to be able to study with him then and I am honored and inspired to speak about his work during a lecture in the Apex Gallery on Friday, January 28. I will be joined by Carolyn Waller Smith.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Bob H. Miller
The Land of Gold
February 26 - April 1, 2010
Director's Note
The allure of gold is legendary. From Croesus, and Midas, to the Medici’s, gold is the currency of wealth and the hall mark of beauty. In this, our 125th year, we celebrate a great institution of higher learning that evolved from the practical
concern for mining gold in the Black Hills. Departments across campus are participating in our anniversary celebration in a variety ways. As director of the Apex Gallery I chose to present one artist’s visual explorations into gold. Not as
an element of material wealth but for its vibrancy and seductive surface. For Bob H .(as he is known) gold is an element which captured his imagination as a child, to which he regularly returns, and which led him to this body of work.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
“This series of paintings was inspired by my life long attraction to the color gold. As a child I loved the color and knew that it was worth something but not totally understanding the concept. I horded and even stole gold crayons because I thought
they were valuable. What possessed me to “The Land of Gold” in my father’s Audubon book still evades me but it was instrumental in conceiving this exhibit. Using a gold crayon, in my young mind, automatically infused my drawing with value,
regardless of what I drew.” ….. These paintings, both on panel and Rives paper, are abstractions. They could be abstractions of the prairie landscape I grew up in but I think it would be more accurate to say they are renderings of subconscious
feelings I have fostered since childhood and, just like the drawing in Dad’s bird book, they are difficult to explain.”
Bob H. Miller
Nicholas Bonner
Installation of Natural Forms
April 7 - May 7, 2010
Director's Note
Nicholas Bonner has been creating installations for many years. Inspired both by his work as a studio ceramist and the tradition of earth artists, Bonner takes over the gallery space and alters our perceptions of the natural world. Using natural
materials which have been altered or which he alters in the installation process he brings organic forms into geometric compliance on a large scale. His aim is to create a new relationship between the viewer and the natural world.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
“We don’t often think about the relationship between objects and their natural immediate surroundings, unless that relationship is altered or changed. Then things which we wouldn’t normally give a second thought to are seen in a completely new
way. Artists such as Andy Goldsworthy, Nils Udo, Patrick Dougherty, and other Environmental or Earthworks artists often use this principle as a basis for their work.
Whether altering natural objects in their natural setting in order to bring attention to them in some manner, or by bringing those natural objects or materials inside the build environment, this changing or altering process results in the opportunity
to see things in a new light or to notice what had previously not been considered.
With the piece I hope to create at the Apex Gallery, I’m bringing natural materials into the gallery and altering the way we would normally see them. This is a considerable task, and the success will be largely determined by the degree to which
volunteers are willing to assist me in making this piece a success.”
Nicholas Bonner
Art and History from the Museum of Geology
Artifacts from the Ages
July 6 - August 27, 2010
The Museum of Geology has been on the School of Mines campus since its founding in 1885. In the last 125 years the museum has collected, produced, and commissioned many pieces of art that illustrate the natural history of the region. Many of the
artworks on exhibit in the Apex Gallery have never before been seen by the general public. These include works produced by professional artists such as Dan Varner and R. Bruce Horsfall, and works produced by museum staff and SD Mines students
such as Margie B. Swift and Alice Beebe. Natural history illustrations bring the past to life and excite the imagination to wonders of a world long gone.
(visit the Museum of Geology website at:
www.sdsmt.edu/MuseumOfGeology)
Don Jones
Form and Variation
November 3 - December 10, 2010
Artist's Statement
“I would like people to engage my wall work from more than one angle. See how the colors are effected by shadows, how the appearance changes from different points of view. Though there is no representational content in my work, it can still be
engaged intellectually, emotionally, and aesthetically. I let the viewer use their imagination, perhaps come up with their own meaning if it symbolizes something or reminds them of something. On the other hand a specific title of a piece will
state immediately what the work is about from my point of view. For example in the work samples there is a piece called "Depression Services Inc." It is abstract but the humor can be seen in the symbols of color and form I have used. In all
the pieces I create, I simply want to communicate beauty.”
Don Jones
Julia M. Becker
Intuitive Topographies
September 3 - October 1, 2010
Artist's Statement
The work in this exhibit spans many lifetimes. Printmaking is a way of making tracks, of leaving traces, of embedding our mark. Printmaking combines the accidental quality with the technical practice of working in stages along a designated path,
within a chosen spectrum of possibilities that offers endless results. Working with plates, ink and paper makes me happy. The smell, the tactile quality, the physicality, the chemical reaction, the action of the press, the paper, the solitude
and comradery of the print studio . . . these I love.
I also paint, draw, collage, make sculptures, films, installations, take walks, travel and love being alive and present in this lovely world. I am the mother of Eula, a remarkable 18 year old young woman with complex disabilities and amazing genius.
I have always made art, sometimes with great obsession and passion, other times as a way of living in the world, but always prolific. Getting the art out presents its own challenges and inspiration, and alters the way I work.
For this exhibit it has been a joy to pull out prints spanning many years, places, and events. This is the first time the prints have been shown together in a print exhibit. Some are carved from wood blocks, or etched into copper plates, painted
onto Plexiglas (monoprints), or drawn with greasy crayon onto a slab of limestone. In much of my imagery there are stories, memories and/or desires. Some come quick and flashing, others are laborious and layered. All come from a place of intuition
and imagination: this I cherish and delight in.
My work is like a map or chart of a lifetime, spanning now 50 years, a topographical journey across the landscape of a soul, … traveling, aging, dreaming, loving. It is an experience of a body; touching, flying, swimming, touching down and lifting
off again. The prints help keep me connected, like occasionally taking a finger print, just to remember who I am, or more so, where I am.
Julia M. Becker
Adam Roosa and Chris Yushta
Post Processing
October 4 -October 29, 2010
Photograph by Adam Roosa
Artist's Statement - Adam Roosa
My work is a reflection of the way I see the world. I am influenced by the past as well as the potential of contemporary photography, which will allow me to carry out more experimental techniques in the future
I am greatly interested in the history of the places I shoot, even though I rarely do any research into them. I think about the people who lived in, or visited these buildings. Who they were, what they did, and how their property ended up in their
currently shape. The thing that draws me to my subjects are the stories behind them, and not even I know what these might be.
Adam Roosa
Artist's Statement - Chris Yushta
In this day and age, everyone is a photographer. What I hope sets me apart from the rest of today’s photographer isn’t my equipment, my editing process, or even what I shoot. It’s me, the person behind the camera. It’s the late nights till 3
am and early mornings at 6am in the digital dark room. I feel my ambition sets me apart from the next guy. Along the way I have picked up a few techniques that have helped me to turn my vision of into images. My hope is that ambition, hard
work, and passion for photography will lead the way for my photographic career. In my travels as a photographer, I have experimented with a few processes that have intrigued me. HDR and Infrared photography have been a focal point of my
interest for some time. HDR or High Dynamic Range, is achieved by taking a minimum of three different exposures and than using computer software to mold them together. This reveals detail in both shadow and highlight areas that you would not
usually have. This process will sometimes over-saturate colors and will soften the image. Often times the image seems almost surreal.
Infrared photography (IR) is a process which allows only IR light to reach the camera’s sensor. The results of this process is an image that is heavily toned in red, while certain colors you expect to see dark, such as green grass and trees are
rendered white. Through my work I hope to share some innovative and interesting perspectives of the way I view the world.
Chris Yushta
Denise Bellezzo
Made in Italy
January 13 - February 24, 2010
Artist's Statement
Selected Sabbatical Work: Made in Italy/Made in Mexico is part of the body of work produced during my sabbatical, Spring Semester, 2009. For the last two decades, I have taught Studio Art and Art History at Morton College while at the same time
working as a professional artist, exhibiting my work in regional and national exhibitions. My Sabbatical Project involved working with monoprints; a painterly form of printmaking that produces a print made in a single version and incapable
of being repeated, through workshops with monitored printshop time and personal studio time. I attended two workshops on monoprinting, one in the Centro Historico de Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mazatlan, Mexico at the studio of Elina Chauvet-Garcia
and one in Florence, Italy on the “Left Bank” of the Arno River at Il Bisonte International School of Graphic Arts
My work includes an exploration of shape, gestural movements, and color. The process of monoprinting afforded me great freedom and spontaneity to explore graphic mark-making and textures that are inherent to printmaking. My aesthetic sensibilities
are centered on producing lively biomorphic shapes that promote a sense of power, vitality and strength. These shapes are chosen for their spirit and the primitive responses they can evoke. The semicircular movements; the juxtaposition
of straight lines; the unexpected twists and turns; the accidental marks and bleeds of the ink are all spontaneous and intuitive. Editing is done by emphasizing shapes through stencils that are then printed again on the piece
An organic emphasis is preferred while contrasting with the geometric boundaries imposed by the plexiglass plate. Color, of which black and white are included, is used to reinforce the path of the large shapes as it settles on the surface to
create its own liveliness. The explosion of the organic shape is upbeat as it pulsates and bulges, oftentimes creating the appearance of multiple layers on the picture plane. The life force of the forms draws one into the spatial awareness
of the plane and the path that the form takes.
Source material for my work can come from abstractions of organic shapes from land patterns, plants, bulbs, and roots. I have been intrigued by land patterns and maps and used the plan of the Boboli gardens in Florence as one of the stenciled
shapes and river charts of the Mississippi to print on and to use as chine colle. For the larger monoprints, I incorporated dance pattern steps found in the fox trot and tango dances.
Throughout my sabbatical time, I allowed myself to be influenced by my surroundings of Italy and Mexico, whether it be by sunlight, color, shapes, textures, sounds, or flavors. Both experiences of place have left me with a multitude of ideas
and source material that continue to be incorporated into my work.
Denise Bellezzo
Ken Dalgarno
The Crooked Trees of Alticane
May 10 - June 5, 2010
Artist's Statement
"From the earliest times forests have been a place where those who seek knowledge and wisdom venture. This idea has become embedded into our collective psyche through religion, myths, and stories. Whether it be “The Tree of Enlightenment” from
Buddhism, or when Jesus of Nazareth ventured into the wilderness to confront good and evil. In Norse mythology, axis mundi or the center of the world was Yggdrasil or the “World Tree”. In literature, Henry David Thoreau decided material wealth
does nothing to augment happiness and withdrew to Walden - a cabin in the forest - to experience the divine through nature. This idea of nature imparting wisdom to those who choose to see was never more succinctly stated when the Cherokee
Indian, Chief Sequoia said, “To be one with the trees is to know Life within your own spirit.”
The “Crooked Trees of Alticane” are nothing less than a remarkable botanical phenomenon. To call them crooked is an understatement. They are a mutant clone of trembling aspen exhibiting a weeping architecture where the trunks and branches twist
and contort at incredible angles. At times, a branch will actually loop 360 degrees like a corkscrew. Other times, an entire tree will grow horizontally, intertwine and balance on an adjacent tree in a bizarre symbiotic mass. Trembling aspen
already possess a peculiar whispering trait since their leaves will spin and flutter with the slightest breeze moving through their canopy. This rustling sound can be unsettling especially when everything around is seemingly still. To add
to the allure, in an adjacent grove, not more than 20 meters away, the trembling aspen grow perfectly straight and tall.
The spirit of the Crooked Trees is palpable. There are so many rhythms flowing in this small tract of land located near Hafford, Saskatchewan. And yet, amazingly this incredible place has gone virtually unknown. I’m reminded of Northrop Frye’s
book The Bush Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination. Frye writes, “The countries men live in feed their minds as much as their bodies.” “The land (Canada) is still not imaginatively absorbed, and the incubus moves on to haunt artists.”
The Crooked Trees of Alticane need to absorbed. We need to hear their whisper and know Life within our own spirit. These trees are gladiators in a fracturing landscape bewitching us with a sense of mystery and the sublime. They are strange
things, surfacing, moving targets, wilderness tips, negotiating with the dead, surviving in God’s garden.
Frye, Northrop The Bush Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination House of Anansi Toronto, 1971 p.199
Anthony Capra
All the Paintings Anthony Did
February 20 - March 18, 2009
Director's Note
In 1969 Anthony Capra suffered severe reactions to a routine immunization that left him unable to function in the mainstream. He came to Rapid City in 1988 for services provided by Black Hills Workshop.
Anthony had started doing art on his own as a youngster. With the assistance of artist Jan Sohl, he has completed a body of work full of color and joy. Sohl, who has worked diligently on Anthony’s behalf, brought his artwork to my attention.
Anthony’s work reflects detailed observations of the ordinary that would be difficult for him to express in every day conversation. Every canvas contains the significant fine points of what he remembers. No part is lost, no color is forgotten.
In spite of his disabilities, a good part of the shadow of who Anthony is shows throughout his paintings.
His art is what he does by ‘heart’. It is this particular kind of work that enables him to triumph over the restrictions of his reality.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Bently Spang
New American Relics-Redux
January 16 - February 20, 2009
Director's Note
Bently Spang contemplates issues of identity with both humor and breathtaking beauty. This installation presents the viewer with objects from a lost culture in the standard way of a museum of anthropology; discrete objects displayed reverentially.
The objects, each one created from fused glass, are suspended on light boxes that glow in the darkened gallery.
These forms are the focus of Spang’s speculation on meaning and the interpretation of a culture long forgotten yet somehow familiar. With witty commentary he takes on the role of interpreter from outside the culture seemingly lost in his own ethnocentric
views. His interpretation, posed as an arbiter of the dominant culture, underscores the assumptions that many tribes have experienced. For you see, the word Vit-heut means white man in Northern Cheyenne.
The ghostly glow of the objects
and our realization what they actually are brings a disquieting feeling to our gallery experience. With technology and dominance hand in hand threats of annihilation come to mind. Could these objects have been the result of a nuclear blast? These
feelings are halted however, for in the corner there is a video tape of Spang during a faux interview. He speculates with bluster and absurdity and his role of the clown adds a light hearted quality to the installation.
It would be a sad testament if a future archeologist found the shopping mall as the most prominent “place or worship” amongst the remains of 21st Century culture. Yet with Spang’s gentle chiding we can actually imagine what such an interpretation
might be like!
Deborah Mitchel Director -- APEX Gallery
Daniel Fielder
Layers
April 27 - May 29, 2009
Director's Note
Daniel Fielder seems to gather many influences into his dynamic textural mixed media pieces. It is hard to categorize his “paintings’ because he has taken old paintings and given them new life. He has literally torn them apart and sewn them back
together again. They could be referred to as constructions, or as assemblage. Mixed media as an identifier seems one dimensional because they are so much more.
Fielder’s work calls to mind the early work of Antoni Tapies while reaching further back in time to references of Fayum portraits through his use of encaustic medium. And a link to ancient mummies is even more evident when one considers the rich
textural quality and the stitched “mark making” of broad strips of linen sewn together. But these are not neatly wrapped for he seems to be channeling Art Brut while applying encaustic with all of the gestural quality of an Abstract Expressionist
painting.
In all the gathering together of old work and the transformative process that Fielder uses hints at the human journey of change and decay in life cycles.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
The body of work, “Layers,” begins with a radical process of recycling my old paintings, stacking and sewing them together with metal wire. As a traditional painter, this is an intuitive departure from previous figurative work that deals with
anatomy. I use burning techniques as a type of glazing and drawing method. Egyptian, Greek, and Roman encaustic paintings have inspired wax transparencies that I layer over the bits of canvas and linen.
As a student of anatomy, I am interested in structure and pattern in the human body and in the natural world. The structure of these works is similar to the way fascia, or tissue layers are woven together in the body. I have found parallels to
these intersections in nature, for example, the way various parts of plants synthesize. Intersections as a philosophical concept have become an important part of the content and direction of this work as it relates to the human global community.
Just as each part of these deconstructed paintings depends on one another, we as global citizens are much more interconnected than we often imagine.
Daniel Fielder
Dustin Price
A Discourse in Stillness: The Language of Silence
September 28 - November 6, 2009
Director's Note
Dustin Price has deep roots in western South Dakota but he has traveled far and wide to pursue his artistic career. He studied drawing and paint restoration in Florence, Italy before returning to the Black Hills. He received his B.S. from Black
Hills State University majoring in fine and commercial art. Price then went on to Washington State University and received his MFA in painting this year graduating summa cum laude.
His life on the family ranch outside of the Badlands is filtered through the lens of world travels, intense study, and the hard work that one undertakes to complete an MFA. One doesn’t automatically relate meditation or Buddhism with ranch work
but the isolation and long spans of time and landscape conspired to make Price apply the lessons of self reliance in a unique and poetic way.
The Buddha Tree is reminiscent of the golden autumn leaves that are torn from their branches in the fury of the prairie wind. The Sound of Falling Snow is richly textured and spare and speaks to expanses of prairie grass; a close look brings a
world into focus that a cursory look simply can’t.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement
“My work is an investigation of the direct correlations between the act of contemplation, discourse and emotional stillness, and the making or experiencing of my work. My process often involves a repetitive, physical act in search of self-dissolution
and meditation. During this repetitive process, I conceptually and aesthetically consider topics that involve the limitations and possibilities inherent in elements of discourse. I understand that my process repeatedly gives way to questions
that cannot be answered, but I believe attempting to understand these questions is often just as significant as answering them.”
Dustin Price
Robert Doherty
Dead On: 50 years of Photography
August 28 - September 25, 2009
Director's Note
his exhibition of photographs showcases the life’s work of Robert Doherty. From gelatin silver prints of Freedom Marches during the Civil Rights movement to color prints from his work travels Doherty’s work encompasses a wide range of subject
matter and media. That he is a master is indisputable. Yet his photography is only a small part of his professional career. He has also been active in other professions in the filed of art, historical preservation, and letter press. Among
his noteworthy accomplishments are his directorship of the International Museum of Photography at the George Eastman House, founder of the International Archives of Photography, and the driving force in reestablishing the Wells College Press,
founded by Victor Hammer.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Roy Deforest
Reyfuse: Selections from the Graham Collection
June 1 - August 21, 2009
Director's Note
The title of this exhibit is a word play on the famous Salon de Refuses 0f 1863 in Paris when avant garde artists rebelled against the Academy. From that point in time to be avant garde was to be on the cutting edge of what was new and perhaps
more relevant to contemporary society. This selection shows how art can reflect a particular place in time, geography, and as personal taste.
There are sophistication and folksy, soulful expressions. Roy DeForest's series of lithographs comes out of the Tamrind Institute's printing atelier. His imaginative approach treats the dog as both object of reverence and man's best friend.
While Eastman's folk art juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated objects and a portrait of Al Kaline speaks to the youngest player ever to win the American League Batting title, while injecting mysterious biographical clues.
There is also precision and pattern in this selection. Nina Elder paints a rendition of industry with an almost clinical adherence to a set idea of color, shape, and form. Michael Hart gives us a strange vision of two worlds and asks us to question
the question of the title. Jim Jacom's, Slight Portage is a geometric expression of color and shape. And Radenbaugh's Sherman's March is almost Oriental in its restraint and its composition.
In all, this selection shows the diversity of one person's choices, and inspires us to open our eyes to the great diversity of contemporary art.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Steve Babbitt
Recent Photographs
March 20 - April 24, 2009
Mark McGinnis
This World of Ours
November 17 - December 19, 2008
Artist's Statement: Mark McGinnis
In the past two decades I have created numerous projects with a literary base. This World of Ours… is latest in this series. The sixty paintings in this exhibit are based on haiku poems by Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828), who is considered to be one
of the four greatest masters of the Japanese haiku tradition. Issa’s short poems explore nearly all aspects of human experience with delightful brevity. In my selection of poems for this project I favored those that had qualities I knew I
would enjoy translating to visual form. The poems were translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue of Xavier University of Louisiana and were used by his permission. If you would enjoy reading more of Issa’s haiku, I invite you to go to Professor
Lanoue’s website haikuguy.com where he has over eight thousand (that is right -- eight thousand) of Issa’s poems translated for the public.
The works of art in this showing are painted with acrylic (mostly Golden Fluid Acrylics) on watercolor paper (300 lb. Fabriano Artistico soft press). The linen scroll presentation alludes to traditional Japanese scrolls and also creates a light-weight
method of touring the exhibition.
A number of the haiku’s I chose might be viewed as being melancholy -- dealing with topics such as death and loss. What appeals to me in these poems is the clear sense of acceptance and non-resistance. These are qualities that I find (as I grow
older) to be of the utmost importance to live a life of contentment. The paintings were a joy for me to do. My hope is that they will also be a joy for your viewing.
David W. Osmundsen
Forged Iron
January 16 - February 24, 2008
Director's Note
David W. Osmundsen of Arrowhead Forge, in Buffalo, Wyoming melds his artistic ability and technical knowledge to form functional objects of unsurpassed beauty and grace. In his shop he has perfected an age old craft while integrating modern technology.
His forms are inspired by the natural world as well as historical traditions. He and Arrowhead Forge have been active through out the U.S. from Colorado to Wisconsin to Maine, and finally to Wyoming in 1994. Accolades and commissions have
followed him where ever he has lit his forge! His accomplishments are many and an extensive list can be found on his web site.
In February 2007 he was an artist in residence at the School of Mines, during Engineers’ Week. While here he shared his passion and talent with over 200 visiting middle school students as well as conducting a workshop for students in the Materials
and Metallurgical Engineering Department. This year we have welcomed him back and are excited to share with the public a larger view of the man, his technique, and his teaching abilities. He has also graciously invited Metallurgy students
to join in his exhibition with their own creations!
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: David W. Osmundsen
Years ago ornamental ironwork was forged from wrought iron, a material not readily available today. In my work I use mild carbon steel. The basic process I use to shape the steel is to heat it in a forge to a temperature about 1,800 degrees which
will make it work a little like stiff clay. The hot steel is shaped by striking it with hammers, working it under swages and various other tools to obtain the shape I desire. Two or more pieces will be attached together by traditional methods
like rivets or tennons, or I will use more modern techniques like MIG welding. The finished piece is cleaned with a wire wheel and sealed with a mixture of linseed oil, bees wax and turpentine or sprayed with clear polyurethane.
My designs are usually influenced by natural forms. Since all my work is functional art the biggest challenge is how to combine form and function. How to make iron look like wood and put all the pieces together to make a functional table or chair
or pot rack.
Diane Fox
Unnatural History
February 26 - April 4, 2008
Director's Note
Diane Fox has traveled the world documenting dioramas in museums large and small. Her elegant images are printed in monochrome on paper giving them the look of a hand-printed lithograph. A monochrome image is unencumbered by the competing visual
information of color and allows the artist to focus our attention on the subtleties of texture, value, and reflective surfaces. These reflective surfaces reveal interesting juxtapositions. At the same time the angle from which the artists
shots her photographs contribute a sense of dislocation or disruption to the original intent of the museum’s curatorial staff. In this exhibition Fox has in essence turned the tables making the museum itself the subject.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Diane Fox
I am interested in the ways we objectify nature, both positively and negatively. The dancing, happy pigs used as icons for BBQ joints and meatpacking plants have always struck me as deeply ironic. Plastic animals take us for rides in theme parks
and animated versions sell us products. Nature comes to us, viewed through glass windows at the zoo, natural history museum or framed on television. Likewise, the photograph objectifies the world as seen through the lens of the camera.
We visit natural history museums for a glimpse of our natural world, a world we often do not experience first hand. We view animals from far off places and times at a safe distance. Dioramas (and photographs) create a framed moment of nature frozen
in time. The more closely they resemble an actual space and event, the more closely the taxidermied animals appear to breath life, the deeper our sense of wonder and connection.
Kim Henkel
Delicate: Sculptures and Pinhole Photography
August 1 - September 12, 2008
Director's Note
Kim Henkel has a poet's heart and an artist's eye. She is drawn to the ephemeral, the shadows and remains of our existence, and the traces we make as we negotiate the Western landscape. There is a dichotomy between the physicality of her medium
and the nostalgia her sculptures and her words express.
By nostalgia, I don't mean the sweetly sentimental, but more a recognition of the fullness of life, primordial struggles, and the process and products of decay.
Henkel is enamored by the things that many of us over look. She is drawn to the remnants of life, the margins or footnotes the land and its occupants.
She refers to her work as an "excavation." Her art reveals and interprets the natural world. Yet at the same time she is building and forming objects which have the patina of ancient archeological artifacts. Henkel seems to occupy the space between
visceral immediacy of life and the contemplative reflection of times past.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Kim Henkel
What is Delicate? Stillness and slowness. Time. Being. The things I collect and find.
A moment of discovery is delicate: immediate thoughts in my imagination, the memory of an imagination that was.
What is Delicate? The memory of Place: national parks, wilderness. What is wild is delicate. Remarkable, beautiful, treasured, respected, preserved, conserve, protect, appreciate, savor, explore, educate, rest. Stillness and slowness.
Neal Ambrose-Smith
Impacted Nations
September 15 - October 17, 2008
Director's Note
Impacted Nations is a traveling exhibition sponsored by Honor the Earth, an organization whose mission is to create awareness and support for Native environmental issues through the arts. This exhibition gives voice to Indigenous wisdom and asks
people to recognize our joint dependency on the Earth while listening to those who are often not heard.
With 44 artists included in this show and limited space the Dahl Art Center and the Apex Gallery decided to share this exhibition between our two galleries. We also come together to provide a forum for issues affecting our lives and our country
through educational programming and public discourse.
As Director of the Apex Gallery I wanted to show more examples of one artist in particular, Neal Ambrose-Smith. Ambrose-Smith comes from a family strong in artistic talent as well as political activism. His mother, the artist Jaune Quick To See
Smith has been a revolutionary force combining contemporary imagery, traditional symbolism, and political issues in her artwork. She has also been a tireless activist, promoting equity for Native artist within the entrenched gallery system.
As a child Ambrose-Smith was surrounded by many of the best known contemporary Native American artists. These luminaries came and went through his mother’s studio and it was there, observing their talents and absorbing many traditional practices
he has worked to find his own voice, a voice which honors the examples they set.
Neal Ambrose-Smith will be an honored panel member on Oct. 9 at the Dahl Art Center’s special event. It will be an evening of dialogue and discussion. It is telling that Ambrose-Smith’s statement anticipates the current dialogue on the energy
crisis! Please join us!
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Neal Ambrose-Smith
Education is a binding contract for life. Alter-native energy is as well. In Coyote Sees Two Worlds, the Coyote is the creator’s helper. And because all things are connected, he’s an integral part of our world – a gear. The sun turns so we can
turn, and we turn so the moon can turn. But, Coyote sees two worlds. He sees the dark side of oil – the underworld. He also sees the future with alternative and renewable energy sources, like wind power.
Peter M. Spizziri
The Journey Continues
June 27 - July 30, 2014
Director's Note
Pete Spizzirri started his long career in art when he took classes at the Chicago Art Institute and the American Academy of Art in the 1950’s. With a keen eye for color and an innate sense of composition he painted in the style of the day. These
early works hold the seed of what was to come. As is often the case his instructors tried steering him into the current of abstraction. Pete’s leaning toward realism was too strong and with his consummate drawing skills and his passion for
painting he forged ahead on his own path. He is a successful illustrator of over 200 curator approved books, which have sold in museums, zoos, aquariums, and schools, since 1978. As well as the CEO of a professional printing company which
has created books for the Field Museum, the Chicago Museum of Science & Industry, Art Institute of Chicago, Philadelphia Zoo, Cabrillo Marine Aquarium, Woodland Park Zoo of Seattle and the Mammoth Site of South Dakota.
This exhibition will show paintings by Pete Spizzirri which have never before seen publicly. With artwork from his earliest days to his current work which shows his various talents this exhibition will illustrate how he has arrive where he is
today. His journey has been a steady one towards his goal, to spend most of his days painting in his studio in Rapid City. Pete Spizzirri, a man content with his life and his accomplishments and more importantly, his artwork!
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Robin Smith
Objects in Quiet
April 8 - May 5, 2008
Director's Note
Subtlety is a rare commodity in painting of late. Artists in general and painters in particular are in competition with the constant state of visual noise of contemporary society. While we need visual acuity to safely negotiate our predominantly
urban environment we are needlessly bombarded with information. Easily decipherable icons or sound bites seem to have given advertisers license to invade our lives. Even in the middle of watching a favorite television program advertisers have
found a way to blast us with information about the next show, the big finale, or the season’s line up.
So, when an artist with the gift of quiet craft and subtle color appears it is refreshing. Robin Smith’s paintings are meditations. Robin Smith’s paintings don’t shout for your attention. But if you are craving a sense of contemplation and the
opportunity to wonder at numerous juxtapositions of form, value, and color Smith’s paintings will be a refreshing journey into a quiet world, which is a rarity in this day and age.
Smith was born into a family of artists and was raised in the idyllic New England landscape of Cape Cod. This area is long known for its beauty which has attracted artists for centuries. Both his mother and father found inspiration for their artwork
in the land and instilled in Robin his fine sense of craft and color.
Smith currently teaches at Chadron State College in Nebraska where the large open prairie has the vastness of the sea.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Rollin Wagner
Landscape Inspired Geometric Abstractions
May 14 - June 25, 2008
Director's Note
This work was derived primarily from pencil and watercolor studies done at locations in the Black Hills. The wood reliefs are meant to reflect the vertical solitude of pine and aspen stands by arranging monochromatic rectangular elements to establish
subtle patterns of light and shadow. The reliefs are constructed from common wood lath that was cut, stained and mounted on hardboard panels.
The paper collages are an attempt to convey a sense of place and season while intuitively exploring formal relationships between visual art elements such as color, value and division of space. The collages are made from acrylic stained Japanese
paper adhered to gessoed hardboard.
Rollin Wagner is a graduate of the School of Mines in metallurgical engineering. His engineering career began in Detroit, Michigan where he worked at Chrysler Corporation’s Missile Division. He then joined NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center
in Huntsville, Alabama where he served as Chief of the Metallurgical Analysis Section. He completed his professional career at 3M Company in St. Paul, Minnesota where he supervised mechanical and chemical manufacturing process research groups.
He retired from 3M as a laboratory operations manager.
Throughout his adult life, Wagner has pursued an avocation in visual art making. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in studio art from the University of Minnesota – Minneapolis.
His work is represented in several private collections.
Wagner currently lives and works in Spearfish, South Dakota.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Jerry Rawlins
Third Places
November 16 - December 15, 2007
Gallery Notes:
The artist Jerry Rawlings, fascinated by the social places where people congregate, created a room sized installation of The Saloon Number 10. The idea of a “Third Place” came from his musing about the loss of locally owned establishments to corporate
franchises.
The contrived space of the installation was a place to dialogue about the need to find alternatives to our primary environments. These are places where we learn social skills and form bonds of our own making, as opposed those imposed by familial
ties or dictated by the work environment.
“Here is the place one goes to add texture and a sense of community to our lives. These are places, where we as a society and culture, can come to understand that it is the diversity within a culture, which makes it function as it does. The Saloon
#10 is but one example of these types of spaces. They also are found in coffee shops, hometown diners, gyms, and beauty shops, or wherever individuals gather on a regular basis. The sad thing is that we are losing these types of social and
public spaces at an alarming rate.”
Rawlings stressed that his installation was not about bars and drinking, although these types of establishments often become Third Places.
“It is not the alcohol that is important; it is the public gathering place that holds value for society.”
He addressed this issue in his installation by bringing to light the fact that one of his subjects passed away from sclerosis of liver. His thesis, entitled: “A Bartenders Guide to the Visual Arts” was also on display for those that wished to
explore in detail, the importance of all Third Places. With winter upon us we gravitate inside and with the holidays ahead we turn to the social rituals that become traditions. This installation was about camaraderie and where we may find
it.
Quotes: Jerry Rawlings
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Shawn Skabelund
Stigmata at Wounded Knee
October 4 - November 9, 2007
Artist's Statement: Shawn Skabelund
About ten years ago while doing research for one of my installations, I came across a photo of the Minneconjou Chief, Big Foot (Si Tanka or Spotted Elk). This photo had been taken on January 1, 1891, two days after the chief was killed by a revengeful
Seventh Cavalry gone berserk. Big Foot’s body had frozen into a pose that reminded me of Giotto’s fresco of St. Francis with the Stigmata. I was not only struck by the beauty of the pose but also overwhelmed by the events that had occurred
on that sad day near Wounded Knee. I knew then that I would have to use the photo as part of a future installation.
Stigmata at Wounded Knee highlights another ugly mark made in the name of progress, discovery, and manifest destiny which has contributed to the “unsettling of America”—a tragic mark culminating in the massacre of 300 Lakota at Wounded Knee.
Sara Langworthy, and Julie Leonard
Pages: Artist Books and Prints
August 28 - September 28, 2007
Artwork by Julie Leonard
Director's Note
Both Julie Leonard and Sara Langworthy are well known book artists that use different approach to creating books. Each mines personal experience to inform the content of their books. Some with words, and others that are dependent upon our “reading”
of the visual image.
Leonard alters found texts to create sculptures that take the notion of a “book” to a new level. We are asked to observe the book no longer as a container for information but as an object which engages us on aesthetic level. By piercing, cutting,
and using collage she gives each an essence of its previous readers and is a sense of time
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Sara Langworthy and Julie Leonard
Making use of the book as an artistic medium is possible partly because of what we (Westerners) bring to the book, our collective connection with it. Since its inception we have imbued books and writing with a spiritual or magical aspect that
goes beyond its physical or contextual properties. Experiencing a book is a tactile, intimate and private activity. It requires time, a slowing down and settling in. Books can act on us as an icon or reliquary does, evoking a spiritual reaction,
a contemplative psychic space.
For me, books speak of the past, of what is gone or perhaps never was: a kind of slow beauty, longing and melancholy. I am drawn not only to the stories within, but the texture of the type, the smell of the paper, the feel of the covers, the physical
presence of the book.
Drawing on these impressions, I am looking at the visual quality of writing, language in its physical form. Writing has a power to evoke meaning and emotion that go beyond its literal meaning. Text, visually, can weave its own stories. In much
of my edition and one of a kind work I am using words and the book, its physical form and textual content, as image, in order to weave a meaning that can be sensed rather than literally understood.
Content is necessarily selective. We create stories by inclusion and omission. Obscuring the text, changing the weave, can represent that selectivity. Using a nonlinear or partially unintelligible text is a way to suggest that it possibly could
be told or heard in a different way.
Working with these ideas I began to alter existing texts. The books I usually work with are old reference and botany books; old for the sense of the past they evoke, reference for their focus on words, their origins and meanings, botany books
for their ability to bring the natural world into a closed and intimate space.
Tom Thorson and Kristen Anderson
Plain Air Paintings
January 17 - February 17 2006
Painting by Tom Thorson
Director's Note
In the depth of winter what better time to enjoy memories of the milder months? From muted tapestries to vibrant hues the landscapes by Kristen Anderson and Tom Thorson are awash in color. As siblings they grew up in the beautiful Black Hills
and from the same origins; these two individual voices speak of their close relationship with this land, paint, and each other.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement:Tom Thorson
Painting for me is the process of transcribing light and experience into chords of color with the compositional subjectivity of a songwriter. A subject and my response to it meet at the surface of a painting in the paint. I believe that the “isms”
of style should be used to express something about a subject rather than the subject serve the “ism” and no one movement of ideas excludes it from combination with the ideas of any other movement. Having personally passed through academic
involvement with abstract expressionism, conceptualism, installation, Fluxus and performance, I've been drawn for the past several years to the earlier movements of the first half of the 20th century. The exuberance of this period lends itself
to what I like to express about where I live.
Cedric Chatterley, Jean Laughton, and Michael Shapiro
Photo Show
February 22 - March 24, 2006
Photo, left, by Jean Laughton
Director's Note
Almost anyone alive today would have a difficult time imagining life before photography. Many of the assumptions we hold about the world have been changed, manipulated, or reinforced through the use of photographs. At one time people could look
at a photograph and believe that it spoke the truth. To quote Susan Sontag from her book On Photography: "What is written about a person or an event is frankly an interpretation, as are handmade visual statements, like paintings and drawings.
Photographed images do not seem to be statements about the world so much as pieces of it, miniatures of reality that anyone can make or acquire."
What kind of reality do we project for the camera? We now realize that a photograph can lie as much as the subject can! Knowing we are being photographed can cause us to take on a different persona. Conversely, taking on a persona can also reveal
much more about our humanity than we had planned.
When photography was first invented it was indescribable. Cries were heard that taking a photograph could get you killed for stealing a soul. Nothing that came before could compare with the verisimilitude of a photograph. Artists had always searched
for ways to create a likeness of the human face. Great portraiture was the product of a few exceptional painters, and was therefore expensive. The camera fulfilled the need to connect in a way that made it accessible to everyone.
The fact that photographs are ubiquitous attests to this drive to make meaning of the world and to somehow connect with other people. The public has come to assume that events and people in their lives must be photographed to attain some sort
of validity.
The artists in this exhibition share a passion for documenting who people are and where the way in which they live their lives is paramount.
"All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another person’s (or things) mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time’s relentless
melt."
Their dedication to the art of photography helps us to place ourselves and our own lives within the continuum in a more meaningful way.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Cedric Chatterley
While editing the work for this exhibit, and while having conversations with Deborah Mitchell about it's meaning, I was forced to think about something I might not have articulated otherwise.
I prefer to work with individuals or small groups of people over the course of many years...Invariably, the most important moment came just before making the first photograph, or shortly after. Somewhere within that initial face to face communication
we shared--and I remember these feelings very well--there was an agreement made, a bond, an invitation to go on a journey.
I feel fortunate to remember this now
Artist's Statement: Jean Laughton
It has been said that Art of the American West is about documentation and romance. These two principles form the core of my "GO WEST!" series. My fascination with the documentation of the American West stems in part from my love of silent Cinema
– the backdrops and sets - the posturing of reality - and in part from my desire to photograph the everyday people of the region. I am intrigued with the way ordinary people inhabit characters of their own fascination, imagination or creation
and instill the clichéd mythology with a look and feel all their own.
A self taught photographer, I grew up in rural Iowa near the South Dakota border, on the edge of the West. When I began this series I was living in New York City. I was longing to "GO WEST!" to photograph the people of a region that so captivated
me - to escape back to reality and wide-open spaces – on a journey that became not only a photographic one but also a personal one.
My journeys West from New York City took me through Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming and Montana over several summers. Along the way I stopped in small towns to attend the local rodeos. Rodeos were the venue I chose to set up my makeshift
outdoor studio consisting of my painted scenic backdrop and my 4x5 view camera. When I looked through the camera lens, I marveled at the transformation that took place when the subject stood in front of my backdrop. The use of the painted
backdrops allows my subjects to establish a relationship with the iconography they both inhabit and represent. The subjects stay real but the reality is objectified and romanticized – they take on mythical qualities. Through my technique I
strive to balance a heightened sense of dramatization, which arises out of the process of backdrop portraiture, with the acute reality of the real life roles the subjects play in the drama of their own lives. I feel this is not only a documentation
of the people of the region but also a documentation of what they represent.
Three years ago I moved back from New York City to the Badlands of South Dakota to immerse both life and work in the daily rhythms of the land and its community of fierce individualism that has so inspired me. I am ranching & photographing - happy
to be a part of the ranching community and documenting ranch life and work from horseback. I continue my commitment to photograph the people and land of the region, more specifically now the Badlands of South Dakota - through documentation,
portraiture, and landscapes - although my perspective has changed somewhat – having now stepped inside the photo.
Bev Beck Glueckert and Stephen Glueckert
March 28 - April 28, 2006
Director's Note
The work of Bev Beck Glueckert is an exploration of the fragility of life and a joyous expression of process as she develops images based upon her relation with the natural world. As a native Montanan, she is strongly connected to the earth
and the cyclical nature of life. The layered mixed media pieces she produces reflect an accumulation of symbols and mark-making that evokes archeology and evolution.
Stephen Glueckert’s Drawing Machines are kinetic sculptures which generate drawings in the Minimalist vein. With great imagination Glueckert has challenged the prevailing trend towards Minimalism with humor as well as a deep understanding of
art history, theory, and the creative process.
Deborah Mitchell, Director -- APEX Gallery
Artist's Statement: Bev Beck Glueckert
My recent work involves layered surfaces — collage and printmaking techniques — on both paper and fiberboard. This body of work is based on ideas of survival and transformation, exposing the fragility of organisms and how species change and
evolve. I am interested in the duality of the natural world — its simplicity along with all of the challenges and complexities. There is generally a fine line between life and death.
Ultimately my personal process involves aspects of ordering and making sense of the world around me. The work is informed by living most of my life in Montana, including my early years on a rural Montana hi-line wheat farm, as well as my interest
in avian life and the subsequent metaphors for us as humans. I have been interested in the interrelationships between life and death, and ideas of afterlife.
The processes I have utilized include linoleum and styro-foam relief print, intaglio, collage and acrylic transfer. Other materials include wallpaper, rice and bark papers, pattern paper, fiber fragments, acrylic mediums, and printing inks.
I am drawn to the use of multiple images that printmaking offers. By making numerous small shaped plates, I'm able to carry through with a continuity of imagery as I work, returning to the same plate again and again.
Artist's Statement:Stephen Glueckert
Since the 1970’s my work as a visual artist has emphasized audience participation. I have participated in over 200 group and solo exhibitions in the region.
I feel fortunate to have been raised in Montana and think that living in this place, to some degree, has informed my work as an artist. Montana can be both brutal and kind. I love the long summer days, and sometimes despise the cold short days
of winter. Montana has four distinct seasons, an observation that informs our health as much as any thing else. I am fortunate to have been able to have a livelihood within this region as an artist, an art educator and as a curator.