It’s ‘Immaterial’

It’s a common complaint of artists, patrons and critics in the metro area: Where are the traditional galleries that not only display regional and local contemporary art but represent the artists as well, a necessary part of any vital community? In the past five years the closing of the Fluxion Gallery and Gallery 72 has left Omaha with only two such hybrid galleries, the Dundee and Anderson-O’Brien with a stable of area emerging and established artists that they regularly market and exhibit.

Despite this, or maybe because of it, any number of new art venues has risen Phoenix-like forming a new paradigm. This new model, not to be confused with the ubiquitous coffee shop-selling art on the side, vary in type, but they all have one thing in common: A commitment to show and sell regional artists by taking matters in their own hands.

Some galleries, like Jackson Artworks, are reinventing themselves with renovated spaces and shows that exhibit artists beyond their stables. Wanda Ewing, Susan Knight and John Prouty are currently on exhibit until Nov. 23. Recent start-ups, virtual storefronts, include Pulp and RNG, now featuring the art of Allyson Gibbs and Renee Ledesma Hoover respectively. Even more eclectic is the nomadic Moving Gallery which last exhibited Jim Hendrickson and Joe Broghammer. Then there are the DIY efforts of artists like Bill Hoover who regularly show their work out of their studios or homes which he will do again this Saturday, Nov. 15.

This trend toward a new venue type has not only made a growing number of artists more familiar to Omaha, it has placed them in its established neighborhoods including Benson, Westside and Dundee. The city’s newest venture in this direction is the Gallery at Bancroft Street Market in South Omaha at 2702 S. 10th St. Its inaugural exhibit features the large-scale, digital prints, cut paper pieces and studio experiments of artist Natalie Linstrom called “Wonder World,” an apt title for both show and venue.

“Wonder World” caused quite a stir of its own when it opened late October, and when it closes this Sunday, Nov. 16, the busy intersection at 10th and Bancroft streets will continue to take notice as the gallery gradually expands its hours from the current Sundays, noon to 4 p.m. At a return visit last Thursday, mid-afternoon, no less than a dozen passersby peeked in or tried to enter this storefront. In these economic environs, any new venture is bound to draw attention, especially relevant to galleries, which depend on foot traffic long after openings.

The 2,000-sqaure foot Bancroft is a pleasing combination of bright, open spaces, exposed rafters and utility ducts, and a rough-hewn, cobbled together wood floor. This welcoming, eclectic space would look right at home in the Old Market. Fittingly, Linstrom’s own blend of spontaneity and pristine professionalism seems right at home in this start-up.

Her cut paper and 3-D sculptural forms first grab one’s attention as they occupy center stage either sprawled across the floor or suspended on shelves, which hang by wires from the ceiling. It’s only after the initial surprise of these mini-installations that you begin to notice the large, well-lit and carefully framed and grouped digital images that circle the centerpieces on three walls.

Despite the differences in tone, form and style this interesting new media has much in common. Whether framed and matted or free form, the dominant motif in this exhibit is protoplasmic strands of Linstrom’s DNA. That is, these interwoven paper chains form the structure of much of her work. Perhaps it also shapes some of the chemistry of Linstrom’s own personal cosmos, the world within which she creates and lives, which must be true of any artist devoted to her work.

“Wonder World” is largely an abstract exhibit that flirts with the ethereal, the transient and the immaterial. Some pieces are more figurative, and understandably risk easy interpretation and oversimplification in an attempt to “understand” this conceptual show. Best to appreciate the artist’s adept layering and composition in her digital prints that contain 10 to 20 layers of elements that she has manipulated into uniquely pleasing designs.

Best also to view her 3-D skeletal sculptures from different angles and distances, which feels as if you have entered into one of the digital prints themselves. In fact, stand in the middle of the gallery, and you are indeed in the center of a single, noisy installation, where the sculptures seem to network a call and response from wall to wall of the similar images, patterns, textures and palette. Interestingly, though each piece is minimal, a distillation of whatever object or form it once was, they reinforce each other to where the show’s impact is greater than the sum of its parts.

Of course, individual pieces stand out as well, some more than others, as Linstrom’s style has evolved under an admitted array of influences. They include the new media of Jeremy Blake that experiments with “relationships between reality and simulation” and Thomas Demand’s photographs, often described “as one or more steps removed from reality, creating tensions between the fascinated and real.”

Linstrom says in her artist statement that her own work is a metaphor for the immaterial, “that which can be felt but not seen … the work seems familiar because of the implied connections to the world we live in.” The implication here is that her work is informed by universal forms and shapes, but her art is more personal and esoteric than that. Despite the show’s title, part of its fascination is to wonder at the world the artist lives in.

This is especially true of the sculptural work in that despite their new forms, they resemble the aftermath of something else or a past event. For example, the confetti on the floor after a victory celebration or gift-wrap and ribbons after presents are opened. It is as if Linstrom finds new purpose and meaning in the found objects or left overs of a throwaway culture in her recycled imagery. Yet, it’s not always this heavy. Her poured paint pieces, which are animated and border on the whimsical, were created “because I think it’s important to have fun in the studio … it’s not always about expecting to make a serious finished piece.”

While the fun, fantasy work gets first notice here, it’s the more serious, finished digital prints that will stay with you after you leave the gallery. The artist says she has been influenced by other art shows such as “Phantasmania” with its emphasis on “interior worlds” informed by fairy tales, dreams, myths as well as personal and collective memories. Though she admits to “photographing and appropriating my own images from past and current bodies of work,” in these multi-layered prints, her “interior world,” with a few notable exceptions, remains largely elusive, at least in this show.

Instead, this 2-D work with its wonderfully illusion of spatial depth is more interesting for where it takes us then where it began. Some of the work is pure escapism, such as earlier pieces like Forms 1, 2, and 3 with their golden ribbon floating freely in an atmosphere of blue sky and clouds in the first two, and possibly draping a prone pink figure in the latter. These are the most sensual pieces in the show.

More provocative yet are the companion prints, Forms 11 and 4. The former depicts three candy-coated hearts under attack by a relentless shower of arrows. The piece is decorative in spite of its simplicity in an overtly Victorian manner. Conversely, the latter portrays three lumps of clay hovering over an artist’s palette of colorful tiles. Interpret this as you wish, as one image wears its hearts on its sleeves and the other looks like love (art) in the making or manipulation. Literally or figuratively, these are the two most personal prints in the show.

Forms 7, 10 and 12 are easily the most abstract and sophisticated as they layer the familiar ribbon with more ephemeral bursts of color and light as well as fading apparitions of the same. No attempt at representation here. These organic works, whose “objects” are rooted to grids or hang suspended in outer space, have been distilled from whatever their source to pure energy, tone and perspective. Consequently, these mature studies in design and technique, as emotionally detached as they are, may be the most accomplished pieces in the entire show.

Less successful are two works, Form 9 with its melting and torn imagery and the unlucky No. 13 that emulates Forms 7, 10 and 12, but whose overly busy composition lacks a clear focus or center of interest. Nevertheless, these two examples are atypical. “Wonder World” works best when Linstrom successfully layers her imagination with her technique. When she does so, the results are virtually immaterial.