Art exhibit pushes borders and boundaries
In correlation with celebrating 100 years of art at USU, the art department is displaying a competitive photography exhibit in the Twain C. Tippetts Gallery, focusing on the theme and the title of the exhibit, Borders, Boundaries and Ranges, said Carolyn Cardenas, art department head.
Along with celebrating art at USU, the exhibit was created to celebrate the life and contributions of Twain Tippetts, who was the department head for many years, beginning in 1956. Tippetts’ goal was to help student artists at Utah State to see the diversity in the world of art around them, particularly the Intermountain West, Cardenas said.
“He’s a person who really portrays our need to go outside the valley to see what other artists are doing, he was a real purveyor of art,” Cardenas said.
Cardenas said Tippetts organized the art department and helped it to expand through his outstanding leadership capabilities. He also helped to develop and bring together the Fine Arts Center. She also said Tippetts had a deep commitment to his students.
“He was a person really interested in art all over the US. He would gather art from all over the states and hang them in his house and bring students over to look at them,” Cardenas said.
The exhibit is a celebration of his life because it contains photographs from many different artists in many different places.
“We wanted to perpetuate his legacy by finding out what artists are doing around the nation for this exhibit, so we put out an entry form that included a fee for people to submit their art. We had Sarah Linford, who graduated in art history at Utah State, act as our juror. She selected 17 entries out of 100 to be shown. She had to select these pictures raw, without knowing whose they were or where they came from, she picked them understanding the theme and tried to tie it to how well the photographs explored borders, boundaries and ranges,” Cardenas said.
Many of the photographs selected were done by professional photographers in a diversity of places, many of them professors from different universities. Many of them tie into the landscape and use borders, boundaries or ranges to offer a different perspective.
“This artwork is tied to the landscape, and to the heritage of the artwork being done in the past,” Cardenas said.
In her juror’s statement, Linford focuses on the different strategies the artists use in their work and diversity found in the prints.
“Artists selected for this exhibition explore the limits of limits,” Linford said.
Linford was unaware of who compiled each of the pieces, however, those chosen for the exhibit have been considered very prominent artists, many of them distinguished professors at universities.
“These are considerable photographers, these pieces represent the best in the West,” Cardenas said.
Each of the photographs has a uniqueness to it, Cardenas said. One of the most famous stories to be discovered in this exhibit is the story behind Steven Chalmer’s work, “Debra Estes (15).” The scene that his photograph conveys is one of serenity, playfulness and intrigue until one discovers the story behind it. The photograph’s primary focus is of a tether-ball in a damp wooded area, the image is sharp where the tether-ball pole stands and fades out softer on the edges, where the focus of the story comes into view, Cardenas said.
“Where the picture is considered fuzzy is where the Green River Killer buried one of his roughly 55 victims. Steven Chalmers has focused a series on the Green River Killer dump sites, which vary in place. This picture crosses a boundary because the photo looks harmless and beautiful until you hear the whole story,” she said.
Other photos in this exhibit express the idea of crossing boundaries, borders and ranges in completely different ways. One picture has an obscure vanishing point, another gives a new perspective on rain, and another still plays with an infinite number of depths of field, she said.
Cardenas said the exhibit is unique because it offers students and the public to see art they wouldn’t usually have the opportunity to witness.
“This exhibit represents some of the best photographs in the Intermountain West, and people don’t have to travel around many states to see them, they are all in one place at one time,” she said.
This is the first kind of exhibit, focusing on modern, professional artists, in the Intermountain West at Utah State.
“It’s really exciting because it’s an inaugural exhibition. The quality of the work is outstanding, it’s an important exhibition recognized across the state as being distinguished … it opens minds to seeing borders and boundaries beyond physicality,” Cardenas said.
Next year will be a clay show to perpetuate the idea of displaying different forms of art from the western area of the nation. Photography and ceramics will alternate every year at the exhibit. The capstone of the year will concern six distinguished art alumni who have become very successful in their respective focuses. It will take place on Feb. 23 and will conclude the celebration, Cardenas said.
–becka.turner@aggiemail.usu.edu