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Paul Jackson and Loran Creech: Watercolor Society Winners

Congratulations to CAL Members Paul Jackson and Loran Creech for their 1st & 3rd place awards in the Missouri Watercolor Society Members' Invitational, showing at CAL until October 11, 2008.

David Spear: Welcome Center Finalist

Congratulations too to CAL Artist and Board Member David Spear, who is one of 3 finalists asked to create a mural for the I-44 welcome center west of Joplin. Each of the artists' concepts are posted on the Southwest District website (scroll to the I-44 Mural Concept section). Or see David's designs on his website at www.alleywayarts.com. MoDot is asking for input on the designs, so spare a moment and drop MoDot a comment on the designs.

Dennis Murphy Receives Special Recognition

Artist Dennis Murphy of Columbia, Missouri, has received two Special Recognition Merit Awards for artwork in the 9th Annual Summer All Media Online International Art Exhibition hosted by Upstream People Gallery.

This international exhibition received approximately 250 entries from around the world and 45 artists were selected by the juror Larry Bradshaw, Professor of Art at the University of Nebraska. Professor Bradshaw states this about this specially recognized work:

"Dennis Murphy has some interesting works in the show. Especially nice are his two oil on paper pieces Map #3 and Map #5, both overlaying painted and drawn imagery onto maps. The latter is most compelling with the profile of a face connected to a can which is being opened with a can opener."

The exhibition will be featured online through August 31, 2008, at www.upstreampeoplegallery.com and continue for 12 months, closing July 31, 2009.

Dennis Murphy:

"These maps were extensions of my work on ballistic targets. I picked these particular maps because they are colorful, large and in Russian, providing me with the use of a familiar other. At first I despaired that as a compositional elements they were too pat: borders, boundaries and place. This reminded me of the sermon problem in Moby Dick; Melville certainly fits in the Jonah story well – but what about the other 51 Sundays? Likewise I thought I could only use the map elements once or twice but could not sustain a series. Experience and research proved me wrong.

"As I began to work I was confronted by a confusion of lines, the images I added to the map surfaces did not behave in a well ordered fashion instead swam, combined with and were swallowed up into the maps. Like a cacophony of voices in a crowded room. This was not only due to the preponderance of geographical line but also to the coloration, which acted, for me, as a chanced pattern in the way Duchamp used his stoppages. I arranged the composition in a call and response order where a single image observes and multiples echo. I intend the surface to act as a conduit/mediator, but here again the map asserts itself beyond this supporting role.

"I had hoped that map painting might be something new – research proved otherwise. It turns out that both the Surrealists and Situationists used map concepts extensively – the former issuing the Surrealist Map of the World in 1928, which completely (except for Alaska) eliminated the U.S. and other overly capitalist countries. The thought then arises that the map, rather than being referential is itself the real.

"'The territory no longer precedes the map, nor survives it. Henceforth the map preceded the territory.' Jean Baudrillard, The Precession of Simulacra

"From these two sources there has developed a vibrant movement called 'Radical Cartography' whose purpose is both personal and political. Their maps become moral diagrams, explosive visual essays and art.

"My urge is to continue to use the character of the map compositionally but with its essentials moving from the referential to the actual. To me, this seems similar to Greenberg’s idea that painting is not a window but the thing itself."

CAL Award Winners

Jefferson City Art Club's annual Adult Artist Exhibit awarded Best in Show to Bill Helvey for a pencil portrait, and Renate Brady 2nd place in the pastel division for a landscape. The exhibition continues through June 21 in the Miller Performing Arts Center. 129 artists participated in the juried exhibit.

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