Dave Alsobrooks

Annemarie Gugelmann at Durham Arts Council.

// September 17th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Picks

Annemarie’s work is up in the Allenton Gallery at the Durham Arts Council until November 1. Here’s a bit from Annemarie…

In my current work, I combine my interest in political science with art and investigate how cities and communities form and change. Just as a family is bound by the house they live in, a city ties its people together through common spaces. I am interested in the public domain and how people create an atmosphere and commonality within it. In my art, I want to capture a city’s unique atmosphere and how it separates itself from other urban landscapes.

The series of paintings and prints completed in October 2008 explores the public square of Munich, Vienna, and Zurich. After spending the summer of 2008 in Philadelphia, I completed a group of paintings focusing on New York City and Philadelphia. I just finished a series of work inspired by a trip to San Francisco. Right now, I’m focusing on Durham and NYC.

If you love Durham, then you’ll love you some of these paintings. And an example of her latest work:

Brad Williams at Durham Arts Council.

// September 8th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Life, Picks

Brad’s work is up in the Semans Gallery at the Durham Arts Council until November 1. There’s a lot more to these pieces than their visual impact and juxtaposition of animals, landscapes, abstraction and big tents. The surfaces of the paintings display a variety of sheen and texture. Their scale adds to their presence as well. If you enjoy paint — I mean really enjoy paint — stop in for a viewing.

Here’s a bit from Brad:

In my paintings, I insert representational images into abstract distorted and agitated environments. The effect is a tactile surface – my immersion in painterly improvisation – set into an uneasy alliance with the more delicately rendered objects of metaphor. The resulting juxtaposition, of the representational and the abstract, is full of conflict and contradiction, generating a space in which everything competes for rational comprehension because there is too much to take in. And an example of his work:

2009 Pin Project.

// May 30th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Art

The Pin Project is in its fifth year. It’s a fundraiser for the Troika Music Festival which occurs in November. I dropped off my pin, “Finagle’s Law of Dynamic Negatives” last night at Pinhook in Durham. The poo, or paint, was still drying.