Look! Look! – Art

Milwaukee Arts Board grant to restore Esperanza Unida mural

Public Art Conservation Advances in Milwaukee with a Grant from the Milwaukee Arts Board;

“Mural of Peace” Receives Restoration Money

The Milwaukee Arts Board is pleased to announce the first recipient of a grant from its fund devoted to the conservation of public art in the City of Milwaukee. The goal of the fund is to preserve that part of the city’s cultural and civic heritage embodied in its public art. At the recommendation of the Public Art Subcommittee, the Board has allocated $5,000 to Esperanza Unida, Inc., for the restoration of sections of the “Mural of Peace” located at 611 West National Avenue.

The 80’ x 160’ mural was created by artist Reynaldo Hernandez in 1994 on the former Kroeger Building, once the hub of the Walker’s Pont commercial center. Poet Carl Sandburg worked there briefly as an advertising copywriter. The International Building, as it is now called, serves the diverse communities that make up Milwaukee’s south side. The mural, located close to Interstate 94, is subject to damage from pollution and dirt, and was first restored in 2000. Mr. Hernandez will return with assistants next spring and summer to repaint several of the mural’s 285 panels.  The mural will be cleaned, resealed and a protective UV coat will be applied. Esperanza Unida will provide the matching funds required by the program; these funds have been raised primarily from individual donors. It is expected that the project will be completed in fall 2012.

“The mural is of historical, cultural and aesthetic importance to our city,” observed Alderman Michael Murphy. “It is exactly the kind of project the Milwaukee Arts Board is interested in funding. We are particularly pleased that Esperanza Unida is using this opportunity to educate the public about the conservation of public art by documenting the process on video and establishing a Facebook page for the project.”

As the fund reopens this month, $10,000 is available to conserve public art in the city. This next round of grants will be made in increments of $1,000, with no single award greater than $5,000. Qualifying works must be fully accessible to the public. The guidelines and application will become available at http://city.milwaukee.gov/MAB later this week. Applications will be due January 31, 2012.

If you have questions about the application or the process, or would like to alert the Public Art Subcommittee to a piece of public art that requires conservation, contact the Arts Board at artsboard@milwaukee.gov.  Please put “Public Art Conservation Fund” in the subject line.

 

Bay View Art Stop

Here is everything you need to know about the Bay View Art Stop competition.
If you need more information, contact Alderman Tony Zielinski or 414.286-3769.

Project Budget: Up to $150,000
Submission Deadline: Friday, January 6, 4pm, Central Time Zone.

Read the Request for Proposal here.

See the Project Map here.

Learn about Milwaukee County Transit Service Requirements here.

See Images of the Site for the Art Project here.

Marc Sijan’s Being Alive at Waukesha County Museum

Through Labor Day, the lifelike sculptures of Marc Sijan will be on display in Being Alive, the largest contemporary art exhibit ever hosted at the Waukesha County Museum.

This is the first show in southeastern Wisconsin in over 15 years for the internationally renowned artist, whose studio is at 2601 S. Delaware Ave. in Bay View.

The exhibit features more than a dozen Sijan works, including torsos, busts, heads, and six full figures positioned throughout the museum’s gallery space.

According to the museum’s press release, the show is expected “to generate more than one embarrassing and awkward moment between visitors and inanimate sculptures.”

Guests will also have an opportunity to view an assortment of local works by members of the Waukesha West End Artists, featuring two- and three-dimensional works in an array of media also being shown in an adjacent gallery during the Sijan showing.

The exhibit is made possible in part by a grant from Arts Waukesha in collaboration with the Wisconsin Arts Board.

The Waukesha County Museum, 101 W. Main St. in Waukesha, is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10am-4:30pm. Admission is $5 for adults, $4 for seniors (62 & older), $3 for students; children under age 6 are free. More info: (262) 521-2859 or waukeshacountymuseum.org.

Sitron Gallery opens, hosts new exhibition

Sitron is Norwegian for lemon. Brianna Ziebell, whose plans to open floral design studio Gro with partner Ryan Clancy fell through, chose that name for her new art gallery and studio in the same space at 2671 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. because she wanted to make lemonade out of life’s lemons.

Sitron opened Feb. 26. Through April 3, the gallery hosts Fields of Color, an exhibition featuring visual artists Amy Jo Arndt, Beki Borman, James C. Klingbiel, and KTRE.  »Read more

Fabric Collage Workshops at Bay View Book Arts

FABRIC COLLAGE WORKSHOPS AT BAY VIEW BOOK ARTS

Saturday, Feb. 20 & Sunday, Feb. 21
1-4:30pm
All ages

Camryn Robert’s collage shown here

Join us for one or both fabric collage workshops. Create a mixed-media collage using fabric, leather, notions, paper and more. All tools and supplies are included. No sewing experience required. Workshops are free, but a $5.00 materials fee is due at the beginning of each session.

REGISTRATION REQUIRED.
EACH WORKSHOP IS LIMITED TO 8 PARTICIPANTS.

CONTACT ROBIN KINNEY AT 414-758-8699 TO RESERVE YOUR SPOT

Bay View Book Arts
At the Hide House, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53207

Foundry Work — Michael Schultz

Show honors workers, captures foundry drama and scale

Although the initial impression of Michael Schultz’s exhibit at the Grohmann Museum is photographs of colossal, towering machines on a shop floor in Hell, a careful examination reveals his work is really about the men and women at work in the industrial infernos.

Foundry Work: A View of the Industry features 22 large-format color photographs of the metal-casting process, from pattern making to freeing a casting from its mold, photographed in foundries in Germany and the United States, including Falk and Maynard Steel Casting in Milwaukee.

Schultz, a professional/industrial photographer for 30 years, took his first foundry photographs in 2004 when he became impressed by their spectacular nature.

His subject matter recalls the industrial photographs of Charles Sheeler and Lewis Hines, his colors the sepia palette of Thomas Eakins, and his painterly style, ironically, conjures the work of photorealist painters Richard Estes and Ralph Goings.

Each of the photographs in the exhibit was shot with full-frame 35-millimeter digital cameras. Most of Schultz’s photographs are composed of three to six exposures shot in rapid succession and then digitally blended. The blending technique enables him to create images with a greater range of shadow and highlight detail. Schultz rarely uses a flash to illuminate a subject because he prefers to “maintain a sense of what the environment was like including its natural light.” That “natural” light, however, is sometimes light radiated by hundreds of thousands of exploding molten ore droplets.

To maintain the correct vertical perspective, Schultz employs a number of “shift lenses” that permit him to shift the lens upward rather than tilting the camera.

Many of his compositions are defined and ordered by dramatic light that creates a sense of the surreal. In some, the light is amorphous, reflected from clouds and plumes of steam, while in others it is concentrated and searing, radiating from molten metal glowing at 2,850 to 2,900 degrees Fahrenheit.

The real significance of Schultz’s work — beyond its beauty, spectacular formal elements, and subject matter — is his representation of the foundry workers engaged in their craft. However, at first glance, it may not be readily apparent that there are human forms in the compositions. Workers are dwarfed by the enormous scale of the machinery. They’re also camouflaged by garments that reflect the fiery light of the foundry or are nearly the same blue and slate gray hues as those of the molds and machines.

During his gallery talk the evening the show opened, Schultz said his photographs are his way of honoring the people who work in “the tough, hard, hot, often dangerous foundries where one slip can cause death.” He has written that the richest part of his foundry experience was getting to know some of the men and women who labor in them and hearing the stories of their work and lives. Viewers who take the time to step into his complex, rich images are bound to be awed by the people, their work, and the foundries Schultz has portrayed.

Foundry Work: A View of the Industry
Jan. 15-April 5
Grohmann Museum, 1000 N. Broadway (MSOE campus)

http://msoe.edu/about_msoe/manatwork/exhibitions.shtml