Anna Bliss
Thursday, August 27, 2009
We're always on the lookout for great locals who combine art and science. Those two disciplines inspire the art of local art matriarch Anna Campbell Bliss. Anna's first solo show in five years, showing at the Art Barn until Sept. 11, combines digital printing with traditional painting, all building on themes of science and mathematics.
Good news for local art fans, too: Black Opal Productions is putting together a documentary about this woman's fascinating life and storied career: "ARC of LIGHT: A Portrait of Anna Campbell Bliss." (We can't embed this particular link, but do watch -- Anna is brilliant.)
Octogenarian Bliss recently overcame a year-long period of blindness, following with cataract surgery, an experience that she compared to "coming out of solitary confinement." Her career in the state stretches back decades, though, and includes several public art pieces at major buildings around town, such as the University of Utah's Cowles Building on Presidents Circle and the State Capitol Building.
A detail from "Extended Vision" in the Cowles Building
A couple of us at The Leonardo had the pleasure of chatting with Anna recently and she reassured us that she has at least a good 10 years left in her -- she has a lot she wants to accomplish and intends to continue her role as a self-proclaimed "misfit locally" in the art scene. We're also looking forward to forging a partnership with her for The Leo building down the road.
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Round up
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
To combat our heat fatigue (and yours!), here are a couple of cool links to great stuff we've seen around the internet lately.
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First off is the SEED Magazine Mathematicians slideshow. I always imagined mathematicians toiling in relative obscurity in dusty corners of a campus' oldest building. But in this SEED slide show, the practitioners of the field get the high art treatment with intriguing portraits and audio narration describing the allure of the field. One person's inspiration was a dramatic pause in a conversation from her childhood, and another compares his work to a secret garden in which he grows beautiful theories. Creative minds find inspiration in and draw connections to everything. Please click through the link to the show, especially because I can't repost the entire show here.
The next highlight is this post from the Brooklyn Museum about sun bleaching an Arshile Gorky print from the museum's collection. The post shows the process step by step, including before photos, process photos and the "after" result. The museum has taken a routine conservator's task, brought it into the sun (literally and online, of course) and made it a fascinating glimpse into the behind-the-scenes work of a large institution.
The final entry in today's round up is the Indianapolis Museum of Art blog. The blog has a wide variety of voices from within the museum, some snarky, some hip, some straight-laced, but all entertaining and informative. They plug their local institutions and build links in their community and online. It's a great model and something to which The Leo aspires. Particular recent favorites include Look at all those Jiggawatts!, Echinacea Nation and Bicycles, Art and Robots (which served as inspiration for our recent Chalkbot post).
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