Local Art News: September Happenings

It's September already. Labor Day weekend ahead, a time of beginnings and endings. Summer is ending, the school year beginning. Days are getting shorter, the leaves will soon be getting brighter. It's harvest season for gardens and fruit pickers, and soon a time to batten down the hatches for the approaching winter.

In the arts realm we have transitions taking place and plenty to look forward to.

North End Arts Gallery

The gallery located upstairs in the Red Mug Building is closing this month. There will be a closing reception September 9. The gallery space will be vacated afterwards.

I remember the very first event held in that room, a book release by Savage Press. The Superior oard of Trade building was seeking new residents, opening after a long hiatus. There was no furniture, there were no other occupants. I imagined it would be a really fun place to play hide and seek if you were kids. There was a carpet on the floor and we all sat cross-legged for a discussion about the book. A humble beginning.

These past many years the Superior Council For The Arts (SCFTA) used that upstairs room for their gallery. A lot of nice work has been shown over the years, though the irregular hours made it a problem for patrons who were not well-versed as regards when the space was open. You can follow their future permutations on their website at http://superiorcfta.org/


Duluth Art Institute

From the Basement: Brent Kusterman
Sept. 22 - Nov. 6, 2016
The work of Brent Kusterman is raw and immediate, layered and mythic. His paintings incorporate found objects and collage, and are focused on keeping the process of art making visible to the viewer. Kustermann is not afraid of a heavy line or rich colors and generates a constant tension throughout the work. A combination of abstract gesture mixed with figural quotations create a middle ground for mind wandering in his canvases.

Rust & Flow: David Everett
Sept. 22 - Nov. 16, 2016
Sculptor David Everett works primarily in iron, exploring the push and pull of pairing seemingly everyday objects with larger mythological traditions. Everett’s exhibit presents two main bodies of work. In the first he transforms trash reclaimed from the beaches of Lake Superior and its tributaries into aquatic creatures and landscapes. The second combines weapons of war and violence with food and sustenance. Everett’s explorations engage us in a dialogue about the unintended consequences of what we purchase, consume, utilize and discard.

Fragments/Memory: Adam McCauley
Sept. 22 - Nov. 16, 2016
Employing traditional mediums alongside craft paint, print screens, antique book covers and the universal grid, McCauley builds artwork that is purposefully based in the physical world, staunchly refusing the comforts of representation for his viewers. Built with layers and focused on the formal, McCauley’s work is at once mind bending and fresh, focused and free.

Duluth Quantum Computing Project: Storytelling in a Digital Age
Oct. 1, 2016
Kathy McTavish is offering free workshops and lectures exploring digital-based art throughout August and September, held at an off-site location (3 West Building on Superior Street.) A composer and media artist who has over 20 years of experience working at the intersection of art, science and technology, McTavish has exhibited multimedia installations at the Plains Art Museum in Fargo, ND and at the 2015 Northern Spark Festival in Minneapolis, MN. Under her guidance the workshop experience will culminate in a collaborative installation in the downtown storefront. This project and exhibition is made possible by the Arrowhead Regional Arts Council. This is an eight week project which I introduced here. This week's discussion theme is code / algorithms ::: the confluence of text & choreography (literary forms in action) ::: code as improvisation / orchestration

EdNote: Congrats to Catherine Meier who has been appointed to serve as the new Program Coordinator at the DAI with Amber White joining as Interim.

Best Bets
Recommendations from the DNT
Lakeside Gallery
Photographer Ryan Tischer is the featured artist for September in the newly opened gallery space at 4431 East Superior Street. Saturday there will be an opening reception from 1-3 p.m. It's Free & open to the public. The weather will be nice and if you are heading up the North Shore for a drive you might want to time it to make a stop here before you head out of town. The event is featured today in the DNT's Best Bets.

Saturday evening the Vista Cruise has a special entertainer on board for what promises to be a very special evening on the "high seas." Mary Bue is slated to perform as Bellisio's caters the meal, and there will be hearts a-thumpin' on a port city dinner cruise that is sure to be tinged with magic. Mary Bue's effusive energy and spirit create atmosphere wherever she goes and I'm certain that whether you're with friends or lovers, you will enjoy Saturday evening if you get on board.

There's much more happening than I have space or time for here. You can rustle up info in all the usual places to learn more about the music and theater scenery here.

Meantime, art goes on all around you. Dig it. 

A Visit With Artist Brent Kustermann

Kustermann in front of a portion of his piece "Surgery"

Brent Kusterman's paintings and prints have been making their appearance around town this summer. In May you could find some of his work at St. Luke’s Hospital in the new area set aside for artists. In June he was showing at the Red Mug Coffeehouse in Superior. In July you’ll find his work in the Atrium at the Zeitgeist Building in Downtown Duluth. This past Friday, July 11, more of his art went on display at the Washington Gallery which I wrote about in yesterday's blog.

Kusterman considers it to be the duty of an artist to bring a unique perspective to the world, a process "never fully mastered." He uses a variety of mediums to create his pieces, sometimes even found objects that others might discard to the trash bin. I found his art worth engaging. My guess is that he will continue to find venues for showing his art, and if you show up you may find it a worthwhile experience.

EN: Where did you grow up and how did you end up in Duluth?

Brent Kustermann: I have grown up in the Twin Ports area from Superior to all sides of Duluth. My family moved here when I was young from St. Paul. My parents were offered work here and they felt that the Twin Ports would be a good place to raise a family.

EN: How did you come to take interest in art?

Detail from "Surgery" 

BK: It's hard to pin point the moment when I took an interest in art. I feel that I have always been intrigued by the limitlessness of producing pictures. A portion of that appeal comes from a desire to communicate emotions and ideas with people while also remaining introverted, with respect to deeper questions about the world around us. A bigger appeal is the purity and honesty that comes from laying down colors and designs on a blank canvas or page. I am always interested in what people take away from my work. The freedom of interpretation is amazing. I love it when I have notions about what a piece might mean to me and what other people take away, it is usually completely different. That is the beauty of art; the direct and personal relationship with the viewer and the work. Without that symbiosis the whole thing is pointless.

EN: Where were your trained? Who have been your biggest influences?

BK: I have never really been formally trained. Yes, of course, I've taken classes in college and high school but my academic pursuits always formally fell short. I believe that after twenty plus years of producing paintings I have developed a relationship with the work I do that supersedes the rigid constraints of 'mastering' (per se) Art under the direction of the university. I have however had encouraging and artistic friends and people in my life that have really helped keep me focused when those tacit moments of insecurity and uncertainty have crept in. Nowadays I usually keep my long-winded diatribes about art on reserve for a really close friend who resides in Chicago. Influentially, I have always loved the allure of the German Expressionists. There is something that defies linguistics that is nostalgic and appreciable. Most certainly, the New York School of Abstract Expressionist are at the backbone of my love for painting. It would probably take a lifetime to get through all of them to fully understand the individuality and depth of each contributing member. And, my interest changes often; one day the intellect of Newman next, the seriousness and loneliness of Rothko.

EN: How do you balance career and creative pursuits?

BK: Making paintings is consumptive emotionally, physically, and spatially. I feel as though, if there were a balance that it happens naturally. I say this because I really don't force myself to make pieces. The work I do is a direct manifestation of the energy I feel I must exert artistically much in the same way a runner would feel unbalanced without the endorphin release of a run. At the end of it you feel great. You feel spent. My day job is a completely unrelated matter. I have to eat and I cannot imagine making a living off of art, as nice as that would be, it has never been that way. I am befuddled by the co-mingling of money and art. They are inherently unrelated matters. I don't even know how to price a piece of work. One dollar may as well be a million.

EN: What do you call your style? And can you explain your process of making pictures?

BK: My style? Well, I suppose would be Non-objective sometimes and Abstract the other times. The process for me is to spend time with the canvas (or whatever material) in the studio. Music has a great way of helping me focus and allow myself to sort of shake off outside noise. By noise I mean, all of those small annoying things that we think about through the day; schedules, bills, appointments, relationships, etc. and how we relate to them. Usually, I start without a plan... just an attraction to one color or another and I begin to lay out colors and see how they relate to one another and how they draw an emotional charge from me. This can take hours or months, sometimes completely annihilating a composition altogether or scavenging aspects of the work that should be saved. There is a great deal of time allowed for drying which affords me the ability to work on several paintings at once when things are going right. There are no limitations as far as materials used. House-paint, professional grade supplies, industrial supplies, dirt, found objects, linen; anything that I find intriguing will suffice.

Sometimes these things, compositional-wise, play out in my favor, other times they end in massive frustration. This is the ongoing process of all things, I suppose.

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Portions of this interview originally appeared in The Reader.