Art column: “Transport” through time and place

Artwork can be a vehicle, transporting the viewer through time and place.

In a gallery space, passengers can visit artworks from a variety of artists, cultures and locations, bringing with them their own knowledge and experiences. The audience is transported to different times and different places, finding their own paths of connection.

Experiencing an original artwork in realtime exposes the viewer to the aura of the artwork. This is a direct connection to the object and, for me, one of the most rewarding parts of my job as a gallery research assistant.

Much of what I do is handle and inspect artworks, oftentimes outside of a frame, preparing them for display.

As a visitor to a gallery or as a handler of artworks, we are given glimpses into an artist’s process when we can see things such as the thickness of the paint, the variations in the glazing of a ceramic vessel, the embossments from the plate on an etching or the richness of the contrast on a photograph.

“Transport”  is the current exhibit on display in the  John A. Day Gallery in the Warren M. Lee Center for the Fine Arts. It is a tour through the University Art Galleries’ permanent collection.

Works in the exhibit include photography and quilting of artists from the Northern Plains, Ukiyo-e or “floating world” wood block prints popular during 17th-19th century Japan and primitive art and artifacts from New Guinea and  Africa.

Also included in the show are watercolor and oil paintings from Wilber M. Stilwell, a former art department faculty member and original signed lithographs and etchings of the Works Progress Administration Era.

These pieces include Thomas Hart Benton and artworks from professional contemporary artists, along with former University of South Dakota art department students.

My tour though the exhibit was through the multifarious use of the landscape. The landscape is a genre of painting attributed to 19th century academic traditions and has been a strong influence in my personal art work.

I have enjoyed finding my own connections between the differing styles and usages of the landscape as subject matter.

I travel between and compare the landscapes of the Japanese Ukiyo-e, rich in color, pattern and flattened space, with the surrealistic, dream-like style of Salvador Dali and the subtle use of color of the personal, journal-like landscapes of MFA Graduate, Nicole Geary.

(Chinese Famille Noir Square vases are displayed in an art gallery located in the Warren M. Lee Center for Fine Arts. Malachi Petersen|The Volante)