Born Again

Tawara Yusaku at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. I received a copy of Benjamin Hoff’s The Tao of Pooh when I was in the seventh grade. The book, an introduction to Eastern thought in general and Taoism in particular, came as a revelation to my young mind. For the first time I encountered a belief […]

Curious George

“A Fine Line” at Malton Gallery Richard Allan George might be one of the most remarkable painters that you’ve never heard of. Born in Chicago in 1935, Richard George spent three years at the Art Students League under the tutelage of the legendary Frank Reilly before going on to graduate studies at Miami University. Later […]

Thunder-Sky’s the Limit

“Hard Knocks:  Art without Art School” is a loosely curated collection of more than one hundred works of art by thirty-one artists from around the globe.  By making use of their three curators (visual artists Antonio Adams, Ran Barnaclo, & Spencer van der Zee,) Thunder-Sky’s Face Book page, and exhibition blog to cast a wide […]

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

Harry Reisiger at The Phyllis Weston Gallery Clement Greenberg once said that “the superior artist is one who knows how to be influenced” and the current survey of paintings by the late Harry Reisiger reveals just such an artist. Born in 1922, Reisiger studied at both the Art Academy and the University of Cincinnati, eventually […]

An Afternoon with African Artists

Northern Kentucky University Hosts Five Ghanian Artisans Northern Kentucky University’s Ceramic and Sculpture Studio is brimming with teachers. They come from all corners of the U.S. to grind glass, cast bronze, and weave cotton cloth under the tutelage of master Ashanti artisans of Ghana, West Africa. MaryCarol Hopkins, professor of Sociology, Anthropology, Philosophy at NKU, […]

Art For Change

Saad Ghosn – Art For Change as a Non-juried Enterprise Walking into the interior of Saad Ghosn’s house near The Cincinnati Zoo carries an almost physical impact, shifting from the bright leafy world of his front walk to shady rooms replete with colorful and exuberant art, some of it his own. This is the ninth […]

A Star is Born

A Star is Born:  the Douglas S. Cramer Collection at the CAM. If you go to the Cincinnati Art Museum this summer you will see artwork from the contemporary art collection of Hollywood producer Douglas S. Cramer in two separate exhibition areas:  one just upon passing the entrance foyer, where the Museum often houses small-scale […]

Versoza’s World

                        “All things resist being written down,” Franz Kafka writes in an October 13, 1913 diary entry.  Joey Versoza’s 2011artworks survey that resistance – objects refusing to go along with meaning, and meaning finding its way out of the experience of seeing.  It’s hermeneutics […]

Insects and Astronauts:

Jeff Casto’s “Future Tense” at 1305 Gallery Jeff Casto’s shadowboxes and assemblages in “Future Tense,” his current exhibit at 1305 Gallery ending July 15, 2011, conjure Joseph Cornell’s Utopia Parkway workshop, as well as Pee Wee Herman’s Playhouse, extracting wistfulness from detritus, seriousness from folly.  The toys, junk and other materials used in Casto’s art […]

“Outsiderness”

                        Outside of “Outsiderness” Thornton Dial, Courttney Cooper, and other “Hard Truths” In an essay in the catalog for “Hard Truths,” Thornton Dial’s brilliant retrospective at the Indianapolis Museum of Art (up until September 15, 2011), Greg Tate takes on the “hard truths” involved […]