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April Issue 2005
Columbia, SC's Vista Area Presents Artista Vista 2005
Organizers of Columbia's annual Artista Vista art walk are looking to bring in even larger-than-usual crowds for this year's event. The Vista Gallery Group, which organizes Artista Vista, plans to distribute statewide dozens of publicity posters painted by artists. Several dozen more posters will be painted by area students and exhibited during Artista Vista.
Other events, too, are designed
to draw crowds beyond the local art lovers who usually attend
the event. Artists at the Vista Studio complex are pairing with
the South Carolina Philharmonic for a fundraiser for the orchestra
through a juried art exhibition. City Art Gallery will once again
offer its annual group show of recent college graduates from the
Southeast. Several galleries will feature artists from outside
the Midlands, including Greenville's Carl Blair, Georgetown's
Betsy Havens and Jim Calk, and Charleston's Marius Valdes. The
South Carolina State Museum will present artists from all over
the state for its Congaree Art Festival.
Artista Vista, which attracts thousands of art lovers each
year, takes place Apr. 29-30, 2005. Many of the exhibitions will
continue well into May. The event's Art Night is Fri., Apr. 29,
from 5-9pm. Art Day is Sat., Apr. 30, from 11am-3pm. Columbia's
downtown Vista district is along Gervais Street, just west of
Assembly Street.
"With the posters, we want to raise a broader awareness of this event," said Clark Ellefson, owner of Lewis & Clark Gallery and one of the organizers of Artista Vista. "We want more people to see the art we are showing and we would like to see more people from outside of Columbia and the Midlands come to the event."
Midlands artists and artists represented by Vista galleries will create original works of art on poster paper. The posters will then be distributed to museums, galleries, and cultural institutions across the state to generate interest in Artista Vista. By exhibiting posters created by middle and high school students from the Midlands, including students from Irmo Middle School, Artista Vista hopes to attract more people from the Irmo area and the rest of Lexington County, Ellefson said. The venue for the student exhibition will be announced later.
The students' posters will be
based on classical Russian composer Modest Musorgsky's 1874 piano
piece Pictures At An Exhibition. The student posters will
tie in with a juried art exhibition for Artista Vista to
be held in Gallery 80808 at Vista Studios on Lady Street. In cooperation
with the SC Philharmonic, resident Vista Studio artists have asked
artists to submit work inspired by Musorgsky's famous piece. The
show is a fundraiser for the SC Philharmonic, which will receive
part of the proceeds from the artworks' sale.
On Sat., Apr. 30, a selection from the exhibition, Pictures
At An Exhibition, will be on view at the University of South
Carolina's Koger Center for the Arts during the Philharmonic's
performance of Musorgsky's piece, which he wrote after seeing
an exhibition of drawings by his friend Victor Hartmann. After
Apr. 30, the artwork will stay on display at Gallery 80808 until
May 14.
Other venues participating in Artista Vista include Cameo Fine Art Gallery, Carol Saunders Gallery, City Art Gallery, M. Craig & Co. Cabinetmakers, Lewis & Clark Gallery, Mira, The Gallery at Nonnah's, One Eared Cow Glass, Paul D. Sloan Interiors, I. Pinckney Simons Gallery, River Runner Outdoor Center, and the SC State Museum.
Jean McWorther
Cameo Fine Art gallery on Lincoln
Street will present Masquerade, a solo exhibition of masks
by mixed media artist Jean McWorther that will run through May
16. McWorther, of Columbia, will show about 40 small works on
paper based on the theme of masks. In 1999, McWorther was selected
for 100 Years/100 Artists, the overview of 20th-century
South Carolina art at the SC State Museum.
City Art Gallery on Lincoln Street will open the third installment
of its successful School's Out group show. As in the past two
years, School's Out III: Emerging Artists of the Southeast
will present the work of talented recent graduates of MFA and
BFA programs in the Southeast. The exhibition will be up until
May 28.
I. Pinckney Simons Gallery on Gervais Street will offer exhibitions by Boyd Saunders and Katherine Dietzel DuTremble. Retired University of South Carolina professor Saunders is a printmaker with an enormous reputation. He will show etchings and lithographs with Southern subject matter. DeTremble is one of Saunders' former students. She will exhibit monotypes of South Carolina landscapes.
M. Craig & Co.
M. Craig & Co. Cabinetmakers
will present Transition, an exhibition of paintings by
Columbia artist Deanna Kuhlman, in its Gervais Street showroom.
The furniture company also will introduce its black walnut, stump
wood veneer Normandy Collection line of high-end kitchens.
Lewis & Clark Gallery on Lincoln Street, in cooperation with
If ART of Columbia, will offer a solo exhibition by Greenville
painter Carl Blair, one of the state's most prominent artists
of the past 40 years. The exhibition will be Blair's first gallery
show in Columbia in more than a decade. It was recently announced
that Blair is a 2005 recipient of the Elizabeth O'Neill Verner
Award, the official Governor's Awards for the Arts, for Lifetime
Achievement.
Heather LaHaise
Mira on Lincoln Street will exhibit paintings by Heather LaHaise, whose main subject is dogs. Mira also will display work by Columbia artist Cass Yates and Marius Valdes of Charleston, SC.
One Eared Cow Glass, Inc., will be hosting Artista Vista from its new home on Huger Street, three buildings south and across the street from its former location. The artists will present the new gallery, new art and a pictorial overview of One Eared Cow's history in Columbia. The gallery will be open 10am-4pm on Sat.
Jim Calk
Betsy Havens
Paul D. Sloan Interiors on Gervais Street will show Point of View Calk and Havens, an exhibition of oil paintings by Georgetown artist couple Betsy Havens and Jim Calk. Havens is the former owner of Havens Framemakers & Gallery in Columbia. Calk is a classically trained pianist and painter who has exhibited widely.
Columbia artist Jeanne McIntosh-Lirola will exhibit watercolors at River Runner Outdoor Center on Gervais Street. The paintings are based on photographs the artist took in the past few years while kayaking in South Carolina, Louisiana, and the Caribbean. The show will be up through May.
On Apr. 30, the second day of Artista Vista, the SC State Museum will hold its second Congaree Art Festival. Between 10am-4pm, some of South Carolina's best studio artists will show and sell their work. Roots rocker Danielle Howle will perform during the festival, and Greenville County Museum of Art curator Martha Severens will give a lecture.
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