Community Calendar

The new BNYMCA has a new art gallery! Jan Brandt curated the exhibition which will be on permanent display. It was a challenge to decide who to ask for this first phase because we have so many talented artist in our community. Using local artists seemed important to strengthen the message of community which is so important to the Y. The artists represented range in age from 13-60 plus. There are collaborations between a professional artist, Danell Dvorak, and Avah Waldschmidt, a neuro-diverse, non verbal, autistic teen. There is an intergenerational collaboration between a 13 year old artist, Ada Stojentin, and her great aunt, Jan Brandt. Two paintings include the theme of water, with scenes of swim instructors, by Danell Dvorak, and water aerobics, by Sheila Lamberson. One painting has a humorous tone, by artist Jeff Bess. A punch needle piece by Camila Marienela, broaches the topic of immigration services in McLean County. These will be on permanent display at the YMCA. I have attached a recording by Avah Waldschmidt done on her assistive device. I would love to attach more images of the paintings, or meet with a reporter and the artists about the work. The artists names again are: Danell Dvorak, Jan Brandt, Avah Waldschmidt, Ada Stojentin, Jeffrey Bess, and Camila Marianela. Hours of Operation are 5 am -10PM M-F 6AM-8PM Saturday and Sunday. Curator Jan Brandt of Jan Brandt Gallery 309 287 4700

Encompassing astronomy, history, materiality, attention, and labor, Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World presents drawings and textiles made by artist Anna Von Mertens from 2015 through 2022. She writes, “I think objects can absorb time, absorb our physical presence. That is why I make detailed drawings; that is why I sew quilts by hand.” The artist’s close observation and meticulous making are evident in the three discreet (yet in dialogue) series on view: Remnants, Measure, and Objects (100 Emojis).

This exhibition premieres Von Mertens’s Remnants drawings, for which she finds inspiration in the formation of precious metals through exploding stars. To acknowledge the chain of cosmic processes, the artist developed her own complex process. First, she gathered gold and silver necklaces and arranged them on light-sensitive paper in swirling forms that recall a nebula or supernova. Then, she exposed them to sunlight to complete the cyanotype process. The three-dimensional tangles of jewelry created both points of contact on the paper, and slippages into shadow, which she scanned and projected onto black paper. She then painstakingly drew the forms with metallic gold and silver pencils. Von Mertens writes, “A necklace might simply act as reminder of someone, the bestower of a gift. These elements are a connection to others. Here, in my drawings, they indicate the connection to all things. These elements came from cosmic events so far from our reality, so physically distant—and yet, here they are; here we are.”

The exhibition includes the entirety of works that comprise Von Mertens’s research on American astronomer Henrietta Leavitt (1868–1921). Leavitt was a Harvard “computer” who studied photographic glass plate negatives of the stars. Her observations and calculations of cycles of brightness in variable stars gave astronomers the first tool to measure the distance to faraway stars. Leavitt’s discovery led to those by other scientists who have become household names, including Edwin Hubble. Von Mertens celebrates Leavitt’s contributions with graphite drawings of some of the original glass plates that Leavitt studied, which the artist accessed through the Harvard College Observatory during the formation of her research-based exhibition at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. Von Mertens also used software to determine the position of stars above Leavitt’s birthplace on the day she was born and above the location of her death on the day she died. She hand-stitched the arcing star trails for each date into large black textiles, which are installed with a distance between them to represent Leavitt’s lifespan.

Colored-pencil drawings from Von Mertens’s Objects (100 Emojis) series animate the symbols we view on our phones using patterns that reference traditional quilts. In giving a different kind of attentive awareness to these objects, Von Mertens brings the virtual world into contact with our physical world, a revealing and enriching act.

Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World is the center point of multiple educational programs. Anna Von Mertens will give a public artist lecture and meet with students. University Galleries’ staff will lead art-making workshops for ISU students, families, K-12 students, and community members. University Galleries continues collaborating with the Children’s Discovery Museum for Art Around You, a series of exhibition tours and workshops for children ages 7 through 10. Free virtual and in-person curator-led tours are available by appointment for the duration of the exhibition.

Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World is organized by Kendra Paitz, University Galleries’ director and chief curator. This exhibition and programming are supported by University Galleries’ grants from the Illinois Arts Council Agency, Harold K. Sage Foundation, and the Illinois State University Foundation Fund.

"Wolf’s Clothing" presents selected works from the permanent collection of University Galleries of Illinois State University. Artists include: Robert Donley, Peter Bodnar, Krys Hendren, Miyoko Ito, Ben Mahmoud, Gladys Nilsson, William Otton, Ed Paschke, Seymour Rosofsky, Barbara Rossi, and Joseph Yoakum.

The few decades following the Second World War saw a flowering of the visual arts — particularly drawing and painting — in and around Chicago. In the 1950s, a group of artists known as the Monster Roster made freaky, psychological pictures inspired by their experiences in the war and the paintings of Jean Dubuffet. The following decade, several artists associated with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago exhibited together under the group name the Hairy Who. When they disbanded, their loud graphic style influenced a more diffuse set of artists who came to be known as the Chicago Imagists. Frequently, artists associated with all three of these movements are lumped together under the banner of the latter. “Imagism” has become a label of convenience for anything made in Chicago around 1970 that displays an interest in stylized organic forms, cultural reference, and playful, often perverted, content.

The works in this exhibition demonstrate a range of techniques and approaches used by mid-century Chicagoans. Between Miyoko Ito's lithe, muted compositions and Ed Paschke's wily portraits, for instance, there may seem to be little common ground. What connects their work, as well as that of all the artists in this exhibition, is a coy approach to the relationship between abstraction and representation. Just as there are landscapes latent in Ito's designs, Paschke's figures emerge from skeins of indulgent patterning.

The art critic Roberta Smith once called Paschke “a formalist in wolf's clothing”: the photographic precision of his representations belies the delight they take in tricks of ornamentation, framing, and perspective. Likewise, the works in Wolf's Clothing demonstrate how, circa 1970, Chicago artists thematized the tension between what an image shows and how it does so.

Exquisite fine art prints by contemporary artists are the focus of an exhibition at The Contemporary Art Center of Peoria’s Preston Jackson Gallery. The exhibition, "Artists Of Manneken Press", showcases works by 18 contemporary artists produced at Manneken Press, a fine art press located in Bloomington, IL.

“Artists of Manneken Press” is an unique opportunity for the Central Illinois community to view compelling contemporary prints by some of today’s top artists. “Artists of Manneken Press” includes works by 18 contemporary artists from across the United States and beyond, including several from nearby Bloomington, IL, and from as far as Chicago, New York, Colombia and Spain. This exhibition builds on a previous show at the Contemporary Art Center of Peoria of works made from 2000 – 2011, and extends the continuum with a focus on prints from 2012 to the present.

The artists included in the exhibition are Carlos Andrade, Mel Cook, Brian Cypher, Jack Davidson, Rupert Deese, Jonathan Higgins, Catherine Howe, Richard Hull, Mary Judge, Gary Justis, Anna Kunz, Judy Ledgerwood, Matt Magee, Jill Moser, Kate Petley, Sarah Smelser, Philip Van Keuren and Brenda Zappitell.

Gallery hours are Tuesday - Saturday, 11 - 5. The exhibition is suitable for all ages.

Manneken Press, located in Bloomington, IL, is a fine art press that publishes original, limited edition and unique prints, portfolios and artist’s books by significant contemporary artists. Owner/operators Jonathan Higgins and Sarah Smelser founded Manneken Press in 2000 and have established a reputation as leading publishers of contemporary prints. The press represents the work of more than 30 artists. Its inventory consists primarily of prints augmented by drawing, sculpture and photography in order to show the full scope the the artists’ oeuvres. The artists are invited to Manneken Press to work in close collaboration with master printer Jonathan Higgins on their projects, which are hand-printed on an etching press, using traditional, time tested techniques and materials. Manneken Press regularly participates in fine art fairs around the United States, including those in Baltimore, Berkeley, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Houston, Miami, New York City and Palm Springs. Prints from Manneken Press have been exhibited in many galleries and museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, NYC, and have been reviewed in publications such as Art In Print, Art In America, Grabado Y Edición, ARTnews, and Art On Paper.

ISU News article: https://news.illinoisstate.edu/2023/03/queer-coalition-to-hold-transgender-day-of-visibility-sashay-march-30/

The new BNYMCA has a new art gallery! Jan Brandt curated the exhibition which will be on permanent display. It was a challenge to decide who to ask for this first phase because we have so many talented artist in our community. Using local artists seemed important to strengthen the message of community which is so important to the Y. The artists represented range in age from 13-60 plus. There are collaborations between a professional artist, Danell Dvorak, and Avah Waldschmidt, a neuro-diverse, non verbal, autistic teen. There is an intergenerational collaboration between a 13 year old artist, Ada Stojentin, and her great aunt, Jan Brandt. Two paintings include the theme of water, with scenes of swim instructors, by Danell Dvorak, and water aerobics, by Sheila Lamberson. One painting has a humorous tone, by artist Jeff Bess. A punch needle piece by Camila Marienela, broaches the topic of immigration services in McLean County. These will be on permanent display at the YMCA. I have attached a recording by Avah Waldschmidt done on her assistive device. I would love to attach more images of the paintings, or meet with a reporter and the artists about the work. The artists names again are: Danell Dvorak, Jan Brandt, Avah Waldschmidt, Ada Stojentin, Jeffrey Bess, and Camila Marianela. Hours of Operation are 5 am -10PM M-F 6AM-8PM Saturday and Sunday. Curator Jan Brandt of Jan Brandt Gallery 309 287 4700

"Wolf’s Clothing" presents selected works from the permanent collection of University Galleries of Illinois State University. Artists include: Robert Donley, Peter Bodnar, Krys Hendren, Miyoko Ito, Ben Mahmoud, Gladys Nilsson, William Otton, Ed Paschke, Seymour Rosofsky, Barbara Rossi, and Joseph Yoakum.

The few decades following the Second World War saw a flowering of the visual arts — particularly drawing and painting — in and around Chicago. In the 1950s, a group of artists known as the Monster Roster made freaky, psychological pictures inspired by their experiences in the war and the paintings of Jean Dubuffet. The following decade, several artists associated with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago exhibited together under the group name the Hairy Who. When they disbanded, their loud graphic style influenced a more diffuse set of artists who came to be known as the Chicago Imagists. Frequently, artists associated with all three of these movements are lumped together under the banner of the latter. “Imagism” has become a label of convenience for anything made in Chicago around 1970 that displays an interest in stylized organic forms, cultural reference, and playful, often perverted, content.

The works in this exhibition demonstrate a range of techniques and approaches used by mid-century Chicagoans. Between Miyoko Ito's lithe, muted compositions and Ed Paschke's wily portraits, for instance, there may seem to be little common ground. What connects their work, as well as that of all the artists in this exhibition, is a coy approach to the relationship between abstraction and representation. Just as there are landscapes latent in Ito's designs, Paschke's figures emerge from skeins of indulgent patterning.

The art critic Roberta Smith once called Paschke “a formalist in wolf's clothing”: the photographic precision of his representations belies the delight they take in tricks of ornamentation, framing, and perspective. Likewise, the works in Wolf's Clothing demonstrate how, circa 1970, Chicago artists thematized the tension between what an image shows and how it does so.

Encompassing astronomy, history, materiality, attention, and labor, Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World presents drawings and textiles made by artist Anna Von Mertens from 2015 through 2022. She writes, “I think objects can absorb time, absorb our physical presence. That is why I make detailed drawings; that is why I sew quilts by hand.” The artist’s close observation and meticulous making are evident in the three discreet (yet in dialogue) series on view: Remnants, Measure, and Objects (100 Emojis).

This exhibition premieres Von Mertens’s Remnants drawings, for which she finds inspiration in the formation of precious metals through exploding stars. To acknowledge the chain of cosmic processes, the artist developed her own complex process. First, she gathered gold and silver necklaces and arranged them on light-sensitive paper in swirling forms that recall a nebula or supernova. Then, she exposed them to sunlight to complete the cyanotype process. The three-dimensional tangles of jewelry created both points of contact on the paper, and slippages into shadow, which she scanned and projected onto black paper. She then painstakingly drew the forms with metallic gold and silver pencils. Von Mertens writes, “A necklace might simply act as reminder of someone, the bestower of a gift. These elements are a connection to others. Here, in my drawings, they indicate the connection to all things. These elements came from cosmic events so far from our reality, so physically distant—and yet, here they are; here we are.”

The exhibition includes the entirety of works that comprise Von Mertens’s research on American astronomer Henrietta Leavitt (1868–1921). Leavitt was a Harvard “computer” who studied photographic glass plate negatives of the stars. Her observations and calculations of cycles of brightness in variable stars gave astronomers the first tool to measure the distance to faraway stars. Leavitt’s discovery led to those by other scientists who have become household names, including Edwin Hubble. Von Mertens celebrates Leavitt’s contributions with graphite drawings of some of the original glass plates that Leavitt studied, which the artist accessed through the Harvard College Observatory during the formation of her research-based exhibition at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. Von Mertens also used software to determine the position of stars above Leavitt’s birthplace on the day she was born and above the location of her death on the day she died. She hand-stitched the arcing star trails for each date into large black textiles, which are installed with a distance between them to represent Leavitt’s lifespan.

Colored-pencil drawings from Von Mertens’s Objects (100 Emojis) series animate the symbols we view on our phones using patterns that reference traditional quilts. In giving a different kind of attentive awareness to these objects, Von Mertens brings the virtual world into contact with our physical world, a revealing and enriching act.

Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World is the center point of multiple educational programs. Anna Von Mertens will give a public artist lecture and meet with students. University Galleries’ staff will lead art-making workshops for ISU students, families, K-12 students, and community members. University Galleries continues collaborating with the Children’s Discovery Museum for Art Around You, a series of exhibition tours and workshops for children ages 7 through 10. Free virtual and in-person curator-led tours are available by appointment for the duration of the exhibition.

Glass, Metal, Thread: Building Our Observable World is organized by Kendra Paitz, University Galleries’ director and chief curator. This exhibition and programming are supported by University Galleries’ grants from the Illinois Arts Council Agency, Harold K. Sage Foundation, and the Illinois State University Foundation Fund.

Exquisite fine art prints by contemporary artists are the focus of an exhibition at The Contemporary Art Center of Peoria’s Preston Jackson Gallery. The exhibition, "Artists Of Manneken Press", showcases works by 18 contemporary artists produced at Manneken Press, a fine art press located in Bloomington, IL.

“Artists of Manneken Press” is an unique opportunity for the Central Illinois community to view compelling contemporary prints by some of today’s top artists. “Artists of Manneken Press” includes works by 18 contemporary artists from across the United States and beyond, including several from nearby Bloomington, IL, and from as far as Chicago, New York, Colombia and Spain. This exhibition builds on a previous show at the Contemporary Art Center of Peoria of works made from 2000 – 2011, and extends the continuum with a focus on prints from 2012 to the present.

The artists included in the exhibition are Carlos Andrade, Mel Cook, Brian Cypher, Jack Davidson, Rupert Deese, Jonathan Higgins, Catherine Howe, Richard Hull, Mary Judge, Gary Justis, Anna Kunz, Judy Ledgerwood, Matt Magee, Jill Moser, Kate Petley, Sarah Smelser, Philip Van Keuren and Brenda Zappitell.

Gallery hours are Tuesday - Saturday, 11 - 5. The exhibition is suitable for all ages.

Manneken Press, located in Bloomington, IL, is a fine art press that publishes original, limited edition and unique prints, portfolios and artist’s books by significant contemporary artists. Owner/operators Jonathan Higgins and Sarah Smelser founded Manneken Press in 2000 and have established a reputation as leading publishers of contemporary prints. The press represents the work of more than 30 artists. Its inventory consists primarily of prints augmented by drawing, sculpture and photography in order to show the full scope the the artists’ oeuvres. The artists are invited to Manneken Press to work in close collaboration with master printer Jonathan Higgins on their projects, which are hand-printed on an etching press, using traditional, time tested techniques and materials. Manneken Press regularly participates in fine art fairs around the United States, including those in Baltimore, Berkeley, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Houston, Miami, New York City and Palm Springs. Prints from Manneken Press have been exhibited in many galleries and museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, NYC, and have been reviewed in publications such as Art In Print, Art In America, Grabado Y Edición, ARTnews, and Art On Paper.

This is a free adult drop-in drawing workshop. Create observational drawings inspired by artworks on view at University Galleries. Instruction and materials will be provided by University Galleries staff.