Local Palette
Work by Matthew Feiner
Fri., Jan. 3, 1997
Mojo's
through December
Through sleepy, half-open eyes, I ordered a coffee from the cute, scruffy guy behind the counter. I ambled over to a table and took a seat. After a moment of gathering my thoughts, I looked up, surprised to see an eight-foot tall steel sunflower towering over me.
Matthew Feiner's Jack and the Beanstalk-esque flower stands with sunny resplendency in a corner of the coffee shop. It looks to have been quite an endeavor: Eight heart-shaped leaves, made from sheets of copper and steel, are screwed to the steel pipe stem. The leaves get bigger as they ascend to the flower's top, which is made of what appears to be a circular, yellow broom head, like what's on the bottom of those electric floor cleaners you see janitors in office buildings use. A couple dozen copper and steel petals dart out from the broom center. This all is attached to a base made of painted bricks. A few real leaves rest on the base, like the whole thing actually sprouted up from the earth, and the flower's slight lean makes it look like it has been swaying in the wind.
Feiner's style switches gears from one mixed-media piece to the next, moving from funky to creepy to cheery. One Audrey Hepburn collage has a distinctly Warholian twang to it, and 5 Icon Curse is a leaf-covered shrine of sorts, with huge key holes through which to view shadowbox-like images. But none are as complementary with coffee first thing in the morning as the deluxe flower.
Sculpture by Selma Burke
AMOA Downtown
through Jan. 5
Not that this exhibit will give you all-encompassing knowledge of Burke and her sculptures -- it's a small show, fewer than 10 pieces -- but it does give a glimpse at the work of a strong, resilient woman whose life has been remarkable, both as an artist and as a woman.
Living in New York in the 1920s after completing nursing school, Burke pursued her dream of becoming a sculptor and became a part of the New York art scene. These accomplishments alone are extraordinary for a black woman at this time, but that is only the beginning of her achievements. Through the years, Burke has been awarded numerous fellowships and scholarships, and a Ph.D. from Columbia at age 70. She founded two art schools, and has exhibited worldwide.
This collection contains one piece from almost every decade of her career. The oldest is "Red Torso," circa 1920's, a small, headless, female nude made of smooth, red stone. It's a beautiful, simple study, representative of her student days. The pieces get somewhat more complex as the years progress, of course, but they always retain a realistic simplicity. "Shame," a small bronze from 1965, is a woman in a flowing dress cloaking her sorrow-filled face with her long, sinewy arms. Its smooth, soft edges convey an almost a liquid movement, a characteristic found in many of her pieces. All the works here are of females, and her style is distinctly soft, feminine and sensitive. It's ironic that her most famous work is of a man.
-- Cari Marshall