Monthly Archives: January 2012

New Members Plastic Club 2012

Kevin Lehman, The Need for Fundamental Change @ University of the Arts, Hamilton Hall Public Arts Initiative

Kevin Lehman, The Need for Fundamental Change @ University of the Arts, Hamilton Hall Public Arts Initiative, Broad and Pine Streets, Philadelphia.

DoN walked past the sculpture vitrines in front of the University of the Arts and it appeared one of the sculptures had been pulled loose. It was January 3rd and the Mummers Parade crowd can get pretty rowdy, generally Philadelphians are art friendly but you never know. DoN felt anger and disgust that someone had damaged a public art piece, especially since some very beautiful and ephemeral pieces have graced the vitrines over the years with no vandalism.

But, this piece looks like it was moved across the plaza. In the light of day the reality of the installation came together – the sculpture had actually pulled itself loose from it’s mooring near the grand stairs to the Temple and crawled to the garden wall leaving a trail of wire and debris behind. In the garden, pod-like ceramic pots are birthing televisions and computer monitors, while the master motherboard hovers nearby protecting the brood. Smaller pots have already invaded the farther reaches of the Japanese-ish stone garden connected by umbilical cords of red wire to the mother pods. Kevin Lehman‘s studio is in Lancaster PA.

Kevin Lehman, The Need for Fundamental Change @ University of the Arts Hamilton Hall Public Arts Initiative.

Kevin Lehman, The Need for Fundamental Change is the artist’s MFA Thesis Exhibition through January 15th, 2012. For more information on the Hamilton Hall Public Arts Initiative contact jgirandola@uarts.edu

Kevin Lehman, The Need for Fundamental Change @ University of the Arts Hamilton Hall Public Arts Initiative

Photos by DoN Brewer

Castles Made of Sand

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Sanding Ovations, Treasure Island, Florida

DoN was reading the art blog on the Huffington Post and came across a story about a sand castle artist. DoN attended the Sanding Ovations Sand Castle competition on Treasure Island, Florida in November 2011 and was impressed by the high content level of the sand castles created with such lowly materials. Sand castles is a misnomer because the artist’s create sculpture out of a difficult and ephemeral material. DoNArTNeWs abandoned the story as vacation pics and not Philadelphia Art related, but it was a really good show, very competitive and extraordinarily creative. And if Huff Post can cover sand sculpture art, so can DoN.

The metaphors and memes are just all over this category of sculpture from fading beauty to art as play to time conquers all. The term sand castle just blows up with memories of childhood beach days. Sanding Ovations exposes art to the community in a fun, understandable if confounding way and creates an experience design that’s inspiring to kids and adults.

First Place Prize and Sculptors Award Winner at Sanding Ovations.

The sand castle metaphor is apropos for artists who have to pull together disparate elements creating an object like a painting to be accepted by the community as a work of art. Like herding cats, DoN chases after elusive grants, competes for wall space in art shows, makes new art, visits art shows, writes and promotes daily, constantly developing the DoN brand. The sand castle DoN is working on now includes this blog, Contributing Writer to Side Arts, a tech start up, Philly based company, offering an excellent web presence for artists and DoN is near completion of a new book about Lilliana Didovic based on her art and the reviews DoN has published on DoNArTNeWs and Side Arts.

Karen M commented she hadn’t seen DoN around much lately, he’s been building sand castles and the wind and the waves slow his progress. But, today The Philadelphia Sketch Club and The Plastic Club have openings with an abundancce of art and artists, last night DoN experienced Kile Smith’s, Vespers with Piffaro the Renaissance Music Band and The Crossing at Old Saint Joe’s Church in Old City – there’s another show today, if you can get tickets, the music, singing and orchestration is transcendental. Talk about castles made of sand, about forty singers and musicians come together and produce an hour of spectacular beauty that wafts away on the breeze like a sand castle erodes from the weather.