Posted January 31, 2024in Art News
“We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon.” — Percy Bysshe Shelley Jeff Fleming paints “absurdities,” delightful, sometimes ghostly, works on canvas using gesso, India ink, white charcoal and pencil. The effect is that of a chalkboard used over and over again. To demonstrate that ongoing Geist, a very
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Posted January 03, 2024in Art News
It’s the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso’s death. The museums of the world are giddy. The Spanish rapscallion attracts crowds to this day because post “Me too” people either love him for his genius or hate him for his misogynist behavior. As Mark Antony said, “The evil men do lives
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Posted December 06, 2023in Art News
Moberg Gallery’s 20th anniversary show is up through Jan. 6. The gallery is a grand expression of Des Moines’ elevated role in the arts scene. When TJ and Jackie Moberg opened two decades ago, the gallery represented five guys from greater Des Moines. The new show’s artists come from Barcelona,
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Posted November 01, 2023in Art News
Des Moines Art Center’s new show “Transform Any Room” is a call to everyone’s inner artist. A mish mash of crafts, weavings, assemblages and mixed media, “TAR” is designed to show its audience that decorating, collecting and shopping can be artistic self-revelations. Glittering beads, vibrant Azerbaijani carpets and cologne bottle
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Posted October 04, 2023in Art News
Des Moines Art Center Print Gallery’s exhibition “Double Take” attempts to make a photographer’s involvement as much a part of the medium as his subject. Curator Laura Burkhalter and guest curator Ben Easter (a superb photographer himself) selected pairs of images — “one of which is a staged or posed
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Posted September 06, 2023in Art News
One person’s new year is another’s equinox. The calendar new year comes with January, the fiscal new year in July, the farmer’s in March or April. In the art world, the new year begins in September, like the football season and the school year. Some, including Picasso, say that’s because
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Posted August 02, 2023in Art News
The great Kickapoo artist Pahponee (Snow Woman) taught this writer about the religious qualities of clay. After seeing a sacred white buffalo and a white buffalo calf, she started dreaming about white buffalo pottery. She knew nothing about ceramics but was so moved by her dreams and visions that she
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Posted July 05, 2023in Art News
Robert Moore is an enthralling artist, a great story, and a humbling writer. His hand-touched archival prints recount his personal struggles within the context of the historic ordeals of black manchildren desperately trying to grow up in America. His story is how art can become therapy for drug addiction and
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Posted May 31, 2023in Art News
The Des Moines Art Center’s Print Gallery is an underappreciated gem. Almost every show provides great lessons in history, culture and “there is nothing new under the sun” humility. “Rembrandt and His World” doubles down on all that. Born too late to be a true Renaissance man, the melancholy Dutchman
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Posted May 03, 2023in Art News
Chris Vance is Des Moines’ artist. His murals are seen all over town. His paintings are so popular that even before his new show, “Moderate Restraint” at Moberg Gallery, opened, more than 30 new works had been sold. “That’s confusing because his collectors buy several paintings at the same time.
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