After more than forty years of being creative Robert Sestok is still one of the most energetic, prolific and most shown artists ever spawned by Detroit’s Cass Corridor. He draws, paints, sculpts, constructs creates collages transforms space and transports audiences. Sestok acknowledges rules only to reinvent them and then break them. He works big he works small and in the finest corridor tradition uses anything he can find. If you haven’t seen what he has been up to of late you have four exceptional opportunities available right now.

“In, On, And Through” at The Johanson Charles Gallery turns paintings and drawings into a massive installation of large-scale abstract and figurative art. Sestok has created an environment that swallows the audience whole but it is the audience that slowly digests it from the inside.

“Painting is about the edges, surface, content and theory. It’s like a reflection of one’s soul. A good painting will hold your attention for some mysterious reason. I keep painting for more than enjoyment. It’s my way of seeing. It’s my life.”

“Purity is only relevant to the environment in which it exists.” – Robert Sestok

Gilda Snowden, Professor of Fine Art and Interim Chair of the Fine Arts department at the Center for Creative Studies, has provided a brief, tantalizing digital video tour of the gallery but you shouldn’t miss the closing reception Saturday, December 20th from 8pm to late. The Johanson Charles Gallery is located at 1345 Division St. in Detroit’s Eastern Market.

Sestok part 1

Sestok part 2

Sestok’s work will also be featured at the Yes Farm on Friday December 19th during their UnSilent Night celebration (http://www.unsilentnight.com/about.html). The UnSilent Night begins with a 42minute walk with music on boom boxes at 6:30 PM on the nose. The walk will end inside the gallery, with their first show - “In the Beginning” - to follow. The group show will feature work in various mediums from local artists. The show will run from 7:30 to 11:30PM.

The Yes Farm is a group committed to living and creating in Detroit. They believe the arts play an important role in the community and seek to bring art into the lives of the people in the community. The goal is to establish a permanent location for artists to live and work. They also hold a deep commitment to ecology, would like to grow food, and create artistic open spaces in the neighborhood. It is their hope to contribute something positive to the community through art. The Yes Farm is located at 5199 Moran on the corner of Farnsworth and Moran in Detroit and can be contacted at theyesfarm@gmail.com

If you’re hanging out in Ann Arbor stop in at Café Verde where Robert Sestok’s exhibit will be up until January 1. Over 500 current works on paper are on display in a relaxed community atmosphere reminiscent of the Cass Café.

Created out of an expansion of the People’s Food Co-op in 2001, Cafe Verde has very quickly become a Kerrytown staple. For a neighborhood abode, Cafe Verde is very welcoming and friendly to outsiders and its array of dishes can make up a full meal or just an afternoon snack. They provide exhibit space to a new artist each month. The Café is locate at 216 N. Fourth in Ann Arbor and can be contacted at (734) 994-9174, http://www.peoplesfood.coop/cafe

If you’re looking for a party in the arts community, on December 31st , 2008, Elements Gallery is ringing in 2009 with an enormous New Year’s Eve gala to celebrate and support Detroit’s unyielding art and music community. MOTLEY is going to be a versatile showing of both established and emerging Detroit artists: Robert Sestok, Julian Wilson, Brandon Strong, Lynn Spanke, and Izabela Steciuk. Opening reception includes an open bar of beer and wine, hors d’oeuvres, NYE toast and musical performances by Monica Blaire, Dj Dez, milieu and Dj Sicari. MOTLEY is a benefit for the Elements Gallery in Corktown, Detroit.

Please RSVP for this event at detroitreivalsociety@gmail.com. MOTLEY opens to the public at 8:00 p.m Closing reception will be held Thursday January 29 .

Elements Gallery is a multimedia gallery dedicated to enriching the artistic community in Metropolitan Detroit. The gallery currently operates through cross-promotional events aimed at showcasing progressive artists of various mediums from within the local community. Elements Gallery is located at 2125 Michigan Ave. in Detroit and can be contacted at detroitrevivalsociety@gmail.com, mike.woo@peoplemoverproductions.com and kh2695@gmail.com.

What does Artist Charles McGee think of the Kresge Foundation investing 8.8 million dollars into metropolitan Detroit’s creative community? “ It’s huge!” He says. “It’s like injecting a vital and sorely needed infusion into the veins of the city. The only requirement is to be creative. This is very unusual.” As he does in his work he is using nature to discuss the community. It’s not a reference to the $50,000 that he just received from Kresge Arts as the first ever Eminent Artist Award recipient. He sees that as the fortunate result of his insatiable hunger for understanding and the love, devotion and total commitment to what he’s been doing for over sixty years. He is referring to a program designed to develop and financially support individual artists, arts and cultural organizations and arts-infrastructure groups in the metropolitan area. Eighteen Kresge Artist Fellowships of $25,000 each and one Kresge Eminent Artist award of $50,000 will be awarded each year. Arts and cultural organizations will receive operating support. “Creative contributions to a community are like fertilizer, it grows and is enriched”, he said.

Portrait of the Artist with artwork, Regeneration, 2007 Ultraviolet cured inkjet paint on Dibond, 78″ x 264″, Commissioned for Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, Michigan
Photo by: Ray Manning

“Charles McGee exemplifies what it means to be eminent and what it means to be a Detroiter,” says Rip Rapson, president of the Kresge Foundation. “He is an artist of international renown who in his life and his work is energetic, passionate, always probing and eager to reinvent. It is fitting that he be named the first Kresge Eminent Artist.” He has also spent his life nourishing his community as he is nourished by it. In 1969 Detroit Artist Market asked him to curate a show. Seven artists were chosen who evolved into Gallery 7. They taught, exhibited and raised funds for World Medical Relief for ten tears. He s a mentor, teacher, and community arts advocate who also founded the Charles McGee School of Art, and the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit (CAID).

There are plenty of reasons to invest all this time, energy, money and talent in the city of Detroit according to Mr. McGee. First, it’s economically feasible; space, materials and other resources are readily available. Green spaces are cropping up all over the city that attract artists, art and audiences. It provides an opportunity to create a community or a culture in which art becomes useful. It’s spread out so you can find time to your self while creating energy that denies boredom. “Detroit is a blank canvass … it offers itself as a Mecca for creativity. Thriving communities are the way to eliminate war and mayhem”, he said.

At 84 years old McGee has had a distinguished career that includes hundreds of exhibitions in the United States and abroad as well as many important contributions to Detroit’s cultural and educational community. His paintings, assemblages and sculptures are in prestigious national and international collections, and are permanently installed at local institutions including the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History. “Life and nature created an artist. I was ordained by nature to do what I do, I can only be whole if I make art and that art is the structure in nature” he said.

Time Frames

Timeframes, 2007, Mixed media collage on Dibond, 60″ x 84″
Collection of the artist
Photo by: Charles McGee

“The Kresge Foundation, through Kresge Arts in Detroit, acknowledges the individual artist as a potent force in bringing about the change Detroit needs and deserves. We are proud to administer the Kresge Eminent Artist Award and believe that engaging the creative community is key to revitalizing the region,” said Richard L. Rogers, president of CCS and co-chair of the Kresge Arts in Detroit Advisory Council. “Charles McGee serves as an example to all aspiring artists with his exceptional work and ongoing commitment to our community. We are honored to announce him as the inaugural recipient of the Kresge Eminent Artist Award.”

Nominations for the award are made by the Kresge Arts in Detroit Advisory Council, a 19-member volunteer group of leaders in the Metropolitan Detroit cultural community who provide external oversight to Kresge Arts in Detroit.

The award recipient is selected by an independent review panel comprised of well-respected and knowledgeable artists and arts professionals in the local cultural community. The 2008 review panel included Gerhardt Knodel, artist and former director of Cranbrook Academy of Art, Dennis Alan Nawrocki, art historian and author of the recently published third edition of Art in Detroit Public Places (Wayne State University Press), and Dr. Cledie Taylor, founder and director of Arts Extended Gallery.

The Kresge Eminent Artist Award is unrestricted and given each year to one artist who has lived and worked in Wayne, Oakland, or Macomb Counties for a significant number of years, has a distinguished record of professional achievement in the arts, has made a significant impact on their chosen art form, shares their talent and expertise with the broader arts community and community at large and has contributed generously to the growth and vibrancy of Detroit’s cultural environment.

To commemorate Charles McGee’s work and share it with the community, The Kresge Foundation has published a monograph that will be distributed to arts organizations and institutions, and libraries in the region, including the Library of Michigan.

Information Sessions for those interested in applying for a Kresge Artist Fellowship are held each year at the College for Creative Studies. Please RSVP on our website www.kresgeartsindetroit.org to reserve your space at an upcoming Information Session.  

INFORMATION SESSIONS
Saturday, December 13, 2008 at 1 p.m.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009 at 7 p.m.

Held at the College for Creative Studies, Wendell W. Anderson Jr. Auditorium, Walter B. Ford II Building. Please see Map and Directions.  

Information Sessions provide an overview of the application process, an opportunity for questions and answers, and information about customized Professional Development opportunities offered to awarded Fellows by ArtServe Michigan.

Kresge Arts in Detroit, funded by The Kresge Foundation and administered by the College for Creative Studies, is providing significant financial support for eighteen (18) Kresge Artist Fellowships annually, each consisting of a $25,000 award and customized Professional Development opportunities for Metropolitan Detroit artists in the Visual, Performing, and Literary Arts.  

Fellowship applications are only available online at www.kresgeartsindetroit.org. For more information on guidelines and application requirements, please visit our website.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS
February 27, 2009 - Fellowships in the Visual Arts
February 26, 2010 - Fellowships in the Performing and Literary Arts

College for Creative Studies’ Woodward Lecture Series presents:
Sculptor John Chamberlain, In Conversation With Sculptor Michael Hall
 
Wednesday, December 10
7:00 p.m.

Born in Rochester, Indiana in 1927, John Chamberlain is an American sculptor, painter, photographer and film maker whose work has been widely acclaimed since the late 1950s.  He studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and at Black Mountain College in North Carolina where he was exposed to the vanguard theories of both artists and poets.  He moved to New York City in 1957 and developed his method of assemblage, making his first works out of crushed automobile parts, a practice for which he became immediately recognized and renowned.  In addition to working with steel, the medium for which he is best know, Chamberlain made films in the late 1960s, and has employed various other media such as automobile spray paint on canvas, chrome photography, foam, foil, paper bags, and Plexiglas. Both the Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles have organized major retrospectives of his work, which is also included in over 60 major public collections around the world.

Michael Hall, a renowned sculptor, was sculptor-in-residence at Cranbrook Academy of Art from 1970 to 1990.  He is a widely published author, a legendary educator and lecturer, and a noteworthy collector of folk and regional art.  

The Woodward Lecture Series is made possible by a generous endowment gift from an anonymous donor.  
 
All lectures are free and open to the public.  
Seating and parking are available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Wendell W. Anderson Jr. Auditorium
Walter B. Ford II Building (corner of John R and Frederick Douglass)
College for Creative Studies campus
Detroit
T: 313-664-7800
http://www.collegeforcreativestudies.edu

———————————————

Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit presents:
A Lecture By Jacob Proctor

Thursday, December 11
7:00 p.m.

Jacob Proctor is the curator of the current MOCAD exhibition, Business as Usual . He is the Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA), which will reopen to the public in Spring 2009 following a $41.9 million expansion and renovation project. Proctor is founding curator of UMMA Projects, a new series of exhibitions and publications focusing on emerging artists. Upcoming UMMA Projects include Walead Beshty, Lisa Anne Auerbach, Heather Rowe, Cory Arcangel, and Simon Dybbroe Moller, among others. Proctor is also currently organizing the first North American retrospective of seminal conceptual artist (and Michigan native) Douglas Huebler, who died in 1997.

Prior to joining UMMA in late 2007, Proctor spent three years at the Harvard University Art Museums while pursuing his PhD in History of Art and Architecture. His most recent exhibition, Multiple Strategies: Beuys, Maciunas, Fluxus, was presented to critical acclaim in early 2007 at Harvard’s Busch-Reisinger Museum. Between Object and Event, a volume of essays drawn from a symposium Proctor organized in conjunction with the exhibition, is forthcoming.

MOCAD
4454 Woodward Avenue (at Garfield)
Detroit
T: 313-832-6622
http://www.mocadetroit.org

Kathryn Brackett Luchs and Michael Luchs

New Work by School of Art & Design lecturer Kathryn Brackett Luchs and Michael Luchs. Both were part of the group of artists and writers living in the 1960s and ’70s in the Cass Corridor in Detroit. The exhibit, co-sponsored by the School of Art & Design, is presented at the College of Creative Studies in Detroit through December 20, 2008.

“Moths, bark, birds, rabbits, squirrels, fishing lures: these are not images routinely associated with the often rough and tumble Detroit aesthetic. But Kathryn Brakett Luchs and Michael Luchs are inherently Detroit – their art, their practice, their legacy. Though they have not lived and worked in Detroit for many years, they remain straight-up examples of what it means to live and make art in Detroit: furiously dedicated and quietly unabashed. Kathryn (a CCS alumna) and Michael (MFA from Wayne) both traversed the waters of the Cass Corridor artistic scene back in the 1960s and 70s, contributing great substance to that culturally rich moment in our history. Kathryn, a noted printmaker and filmmaker, directed the quintessential documentary on Detroit art from that era, entitled “Images from Detroit’s Cass Corridor.” Michael was the first to show at the famed Willis Gallery and, early on, was one of the few local artists to bring the scrappy, expressionistic Detroit aesthetic to national view in New York. “

Kathryn Brackett Luchs, Blue Copper, mixed media on carved birch playwood and glassine, 2008

“Though they live in Lewiston, Michigan now, 200 miles from Detroit, they remain true to their work and investigations. Married, divorced, and married again, “For Better or For Worse” celebrates not only their life together, but their marked perseverance to their artistic practice. We all know how hard it is to make a living as an artist in Michigan, and like so many, they have stuck it out, thrown caution (and financial security) to the wind, and made art that transcends miles and memory.” – Michelle Perron

Michael Luchs, Untitled, mixed media on paper, 2008

“While Michael’s art does not look like Kathryn’s, nor hers like his, their art and this show is a testament to the sustaining complexities of an interwoven life, in the course of which they have lived together and apart, as individuals and as companions, over some forty years. Occasionally they collaborate on printmaking, a recent example of which was titled Moth Buckle, a title that links both their interests, her organic world and his fondness for devices like reels, light bulbs, and buckles. Although the favored creatures of their respective natural kingdoms vary, whether six-legged, four-legged, winged or finned, fauna predominate. Formally, his lacerated surfaces are no less harsh than the plywood boards she pummels, gouges, and stains, while her scaled up wings find a corollary in his outsize hands. Moreover, her expressionist drawings on glassine are as visceral as the interlocked hands and feet of his gnarly pink drawings. What the art of Kathryn Brackett Luchs and Michael Luchs also has in common is a grab-you-by-the-lapels immediacy coupled with a lingering and lasting resonance.” – Dennis Alan Nawrocki

Photographs of artwork by Robert Hensleigh copyright 2008
Photograph of artists by Warren Hecht copyright 2008

Gilda Snowden provides YouTube audiences with insightful digital video tours of Detroit area Galleries. Gilda is a curator, an art critic, and an art teacher. She has been teaching since 1979 and is currently Professor of Fine Art and Interim Chair of the Fine Arts department at the Center for Creative Studies, College of Art and Design in Detroit, Michigan. She also functions as the curator of the Detroit Repertory Theatre Gallery, where solo shows are given to Detroit-area artists in conjunction with the stage performances.

Part one

Part two