FindArtNola

<a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/SsDaor1Sa3I/AAAAAAAAAVM/VmaFAbU3eX0/s1600-h/Cook-Stout-web.jpg”><img id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5386545546830965618” style=“WIDTH: 320px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 289px” alt=”“ src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/SsDaor1Sa3I/AAAAAAAAAVM/VmaFAbU3eX0/s320/Cook-Stout-web.jpg” border=“0” /></a><br /><span><em>The Collaboration</em> by Jeffrey Cook and Renee Stout, 1993</span><br /><span>Collection of Renee Stout</span><br /><br />Washington DC based artist, Renee Stout, has loaned the Ogden Museum this wonderful collaborative work by herself and the late Jeffrey Cook. The following letter (printed in its entirety) accompanied the work, and gives great insight into the piece, the process, the friendship and the artists.<br /><br /><br /><div align=“center”><span>The Collaboration<br /><br />Jeffrey and I shared an admiration for the work of Joseph Cornell. Each of Cornell’s pieces evokes the mystery and melancholy of an abandoned toy that still retains the energy of the child that once played with it. It was that sense of playfulness in Cornell’s work that resonated most with us, because it mirrored the way we both approached our own work. It was important to both of us, when It came to our individual bodies of work, that each finished piece reflect the joy, spontaneity and discovery that we experienced during the process of creating it. Jeffrey and I were close friends because we recognized in each other, the ability to still allow the child within to come out and play, and it was in that spirit that we decided to create this piece.<br /><br />On a visit to New Orleans in 1993, I decided to bring along some tubes of acrylic paint, and a few brushes and pencils, with the hope that I would create something while I was there. I was staying at the apartment of Regina Perry, who lived in the French Quarter on Burgundy Street at the time. Jeffrey lived literally around the corner on St. Louis. He would come around every morning to get me. We’d pick a place to have coffee and then proceed to hang out in the streets all day, looking for “good junk” we could use in our work. One day we came across a piece of plywood and took it back to Regina’s apartment where we placed it on her dining room table, and decided that we would collaborate on something. I laid out the paints, pencils and the brushes. We had no preconceived ideas about what we were going to do. Approaching it like a doodle, we each just picked up a brush and started making marks.<br /><br />We used anything we came across. The two strange heads, one painted by Jeffrey and one painted by me, were clay chunks we pulled out of Regina’s fireplace. We used cardboard, nails, brown paper bag, twigs from the yard, broken Mardi Gras beads and rusty objects we’d picked up on the street. At one point I told him I’d be right back, but didn’t tell him where I was going. I headed up through the French Quarter to a dusty old antique store, called Judy’s Collage, where we used to find miscellaneous objects. Among the things I nabbed were an old medicine bottle, a cowry shell wrapped in leather and a sweet little bird that I knew Jeffrey would love. I came back with the objects to find that he had wired my favorite paintbrush into the piece. An argument ensued. Sometimes Jeffrey could be like the mischievous little brother who’s a pain in the neck, and I suspect that he’d wired my paintbrush there to get a rise out of me and create a little tension while we were working. I softened a bit when I saw how happy he was with the little bird. I allowed the paintbrush to remain, and we continued to work for hours.<br /><br />However, another argument arose when we agreed that the piece was finished and Jeffrey suddenly took a paintbrush loaded with chartreuse paint and made a swath down one side of it. For some unknown reason I hated that stroke of green, but he ignored me and, with a sly grin, he lifted the piece from the table and propped it up on the counter next to the stove. We stood side by side in the middle of the kitchen floor looking at it. “I hate that green!” I repeated. He just stood there smiling.<br /><br />I brought the piece home with me where it has hung for the past fifteen years and each time I looked at it over the years, I had to laugh to myself, because I was too stubborn to tell him that I eventually came to love that green stroke of paint.<br /><br />Renee Stout, Washington DC, 2009</span></div><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/3601211757000210971-7580828634528016742?l=omsablog.blogspot.com” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr682wgDcoI/AAAAAAAAA5Q/jVtrDT_8DbM/s1600-h/~ranger-clark.s.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 277px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr682wgDcoI/AAAAAAAAA5Q/jVtrDT_8DbM/s400/~ranger-clark.s.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385949853299995266” border=“0” /></a> Stuff happens. Sometimes it’s big stuff and sometimes it’s not, but stuff always happens. As jarring as stuff can be, the tricky part may not even be what happened, but how we deal with it. In the art world, as in the rest of the city, recent history is divided into pre-K and post-K, and artists, like most folks, are still dealing with it. Sometimes we wonder if there will ever be an end to all the Katrina-related art exhibitions, but this may not really be the most pertinent question. The real issue, for artists and others alike is: where are we now, and how are we dealing with it?<br /><br /><a href=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr69DrlpWrI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/7q0l3ItqYeI/s1600-h/~SammiDoll-Clark.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px;” src=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr69DrlpWrI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/7q0l3ItqYeI/s320/~SammiDoll-Clark.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385950075319573170” border=“0” /></a>Sandra Russell Clark has for ages been a photographer of trees and landscapes, sensually ethereal views of misty gardens and windswept Gulf Coast vistas that reflect her own impressionistic, neo-romantic approach. A New Orleans native and longtime Bay St. Louis resident, Clark endured the ultimate photographic nightmare when Katrina’s tidal surge claimed the negatives that were a large part of her life’s work. Her new digital photographs on view at Loyola are very different from anything she has done in the past. A colorful series of portraits of little dolls and figurines rescued from the storm rubble, there is little that suggests hurricanes—at first. Look again, and we see that while a Shoney’s BIG BOY figurine came through unscathed, a LONELY RANGER’s uniform, top, looks like he got into a fight with Smokey the Bear. And a SAMMI DOLL, above, in a blue chiffon gown appears to suffer the ravages of PTSD as she reclines in an unkempt daze. She looks like she might have benefited from the mental health services of that Adolescent Hospital the Jindal administration is moving to Mandeville. But maybe she should receive counseling from the pudgy good luck BUDDHA figurine dispensing advice over a telephone. When the state pulls the plug, a hot line to enlightenment may be just what the doctor ordered. ~Eric Bookhardt<br /><a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr69n9e_RDI/AAAAAAAAA5g/vhZNNmwfQGg/s1600-h/~buddha-clark.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 277px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sr69n9e_RDI/AAAAAAAAA5g/vhZNNmwfQGg/s400/~buddha-clark.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385950698598777906” border=“0” /></a><span>JUJU: Recent Photographs by Sandra Russell Clark<br />Through Oct. 23<br />Collins Diboll Gallery, Loyola U., 6363 St. Charles Ave., 865-2186; www.loyno.edu/dibollgallery<br />Email:</span><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-4719558070462304265?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW1exxzpOI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/BaaBJ3La8gw/s1600-h/~MotherOfSwords.s.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 357px; height: 400px;” src=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW1exxzpOI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/BaaBJ3La8gw/s400/~MotherOfSwords.s.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383408469954241762” border=“0” /></a> <a href=“http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW2MT_0B2I/AAAAAAAAA4o/gnl3DZa6_Zw/s1600-h/~Virgin%27.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 117px; height: 200px;” src=“http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW2MT_0B2I/AAAAAAAAA4o/gnl3DZa6_Zw/s200/~Virgin%27.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383409252233906018” border=“0” /></a>There are places, and not just in the Bible Belt regions of the Deep South and Midwest, where Jessica Goldfinch might be considered over the top. And it is also true that works like her statue of a visibly pregnant Virgin Mary are not likely to grace any local shrines anytime soon. Still, in a city where events like the Krewe du Vieux parade and Southern Decadence festival were hailed as proof that New Orleans had returned to “normal” after the floods of 2005, not much is considered shocking. And that’s a good thing, because it allows us to contemplate the deeper implications of her work rather than obsessing over superficialities.<br /><br /><a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW3Jf2mKeI/AAAAAAAAA4w/ESo9cLBsOpc/s1600-h/~Immaculate-Open-Heart.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 154px; height: 261px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SrW3Jf2mKeI/AAAAAAAAA4w/ESo9cLBsOpc/s320/~Immaculate-Open-Heart.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383410303388494306” border=“0” /></a>Goldfinch’s HOLY CARD series is an exploration of religious, especially Roman Catholic, iconography rendered in Shrinky Dink media. Beyond saintly wonders, she also invokes modern scientific miracles in works like IMMACULATE OPEN HEART, a synthesis of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and a modern surgical procedure. MOTHER OF SWORDS, above, is more Byzantine, a veiled Madonna with a Sacred Heart replete with connecting veins and arteries as well as six swords pressed to her breast all rendered like a colorful holy card, and it’s a tribute to the power of imagery that this looks more like an actual historical artifact than the speculative imaginings of a New Orleans artist. The hits keep on coming in another series that melds vintage fashion with anatomical infirmities. Here figures from a 1950s Vogue pattern book appear modified with leg or neck braces, even amputated limbs as seen in ENVY, and lest this be taken for some campy schadenfreude, it should be noted that Goldfinch herself endured a cardiac birth defect that went undiagnosed for 34 years despite frequent trips to the emergency room. Like the saints of yore, she relates to the suffering of others. Whether salvation is finally experienced in the form of divine or man-made miracles is ultimately a matter best left to the metaphysical proclivities of the beholder.<br /><br /><span>Jessica Goldfinch: HOLY CARDS AND OTHER VERSIONS OF MORTALITY<br />Through Sept. 27<br />CoLAB Projects, 527 St. Joseph St., 566-8999; www.colabprojects.com </span><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-361282316308113212?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sq_e4aEJt-I/AAAAAAAAA3w/AlJKXVTZlgg/s1600-h/NOLA+on+Rainy+Day.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 267px;” src=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/Sq_e4aEJt-I/AAAAAAAAA3w/AlJKXVTZlgg/s400/NOLA+on+Rainy+Day.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381765140381808610” border=“0” /></a>David Byrne says his “perfect” city is a lot like New Orleans “minus its poverty, corruption and crime.” Click: <a href=“http://www.hello.flavorpill.com/tlzdglmzwtjkvbwfkbfsmkjfvdkpztmtjrdfgrhmhbhbcv_qssgdhgpmdfp.html” target=”_blank”>David Byrne deconstructs the perfect city » </a><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-7194427028473770371?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/Sq_1eAU07dI/AAAAAAAAAU8/uiOOMZ_Emu8/s1600-h/DeliverancePosterFrance.jpg”><img id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381789975563267538” style=“WIDTH: 238px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px” alt=”“ src=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/Sq_1eAU07dI/AAAAAAAAAU8/uiOOMZ_Emu8/s320/DeliverancePosterFrance.jpg” border=“0” /></a><br /><div><span>French poster for <em>Deliverance</em></span></div><div><em><span></span></em></div><div>On Saturday, September 26, 2009, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art will present “Delivering <em>Deliverance </em>with <a href=“http://www.clintmaedgen.com/”>Clint <span>Maedgen</span> </a>and Helen <span>Gillet</span>.” As part of our ongoing series, <em>The Art of Southern Film: Established Masters &amp; Emerging Makers</em> produced by<em> </em>Madeleine <span>Molyneaux</span>, the Ogden has commissioned a new original score composed and to be performed live by <span>Maedgen</span> and <span>Gillet</span>.</div><div></div><div></div><div><a href=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/Sq_1oGLweuI/AAAAAAAAAVE/hI8CCOITukI/s1600-h/Maedgen.Gillet..jpg”><img id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381790148934531810” style=“WIDTH: 320px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 240px” alt=”“ src=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_E_DdpBVIO8E/Sq_1oGLweuI/AAAAAAAAAVE/hI8CCOITukI/s320/Maedgen.Gillet..jpg” border=“0” /></a><br /></div><div>Clint <span>Maedgen</span> is a multi-instrument singer, songwriter, composer and arranger born in Lafayette, LA. He started his career in New Orleans twelve years ago as a bicycle delivery boy in the French Quarter, and over the past twelve years, has risen to the top of the New Orleans music scene, winning the 2009 Big Easy Award for Best Male Performer. Most widely known for his work as leader of the cabaret game-show circus, <a href=“http://www.neworleansbingoshow.com/”>The New Orleans Bingo! Show</a>, <span>Maedgen</span> also plays for the <a href=“http://www.preservationhall.com/home.php”>Preservation Hall </a>Jazz Band, and leads <span>Liquidrone</span>, Clint <span>Maedgen</span> with Strings and Clint <span>Maedgen</span> +9. He sang the <a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iP4E7RglzEo”>National Anthem </a>with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band for the <span>BCS</span> National Championship at the <span>Superdome</span> last year. He has also performed at Radio City Music Hall, the White House and <a href=“http://www.ogdenmuseum.org/education/ogden_after_hours.html”>Ogden After Hours</a>.</div><div><br /><br /><br /></div><div></div><div>As you can see from the short film below (blending archival film with his own photographs), his talents do not stop with sound.<br /><br /><br /><b><a href=“http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/xahyc5_maedgen”><span>Maedgen</span></a></b><br /><i>by <a href=“http://www.dailymotion.com/wadesumrall”><span>wadesumrall</span></a></i> </div><div></div><div>Helen <span>Gillet</span> is no stranger to the New Orleans music scene, herself. Growing up in Belgium, Chicago and Singapore, <span>Gillet</span> moved to New Orleans in 2002. Trained as a classical cellist, she has performed and recorded with a wide range of projects, including <a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG24U8ZFcfI”>Happy Talk Band</a>, James Singleton, Leroy Jones, <span>Mafouz</span>, <a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNyk8PWH2rs”>Moose Jackson</a>, the <span><a href=“http://www.zydepunks.com/”>Zydepunks</a></span> and <span>Yippie</span> poet <a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Sanders”>Ed Sanders.</a> According to her bio, she “uses electromagnetic effects, looping and vocal percussion to explore sound as well as the wide range of natural sounds possibly drawn, knocked, rubbed, sensed, bounced, scraped, plucked, and sung out through the acoustic cello.” </div><div></div><div><br /><br /></div><div></div><div>The 1972 film, produced and directed by John <span>Boorman</span>, is based on the 1970 novel of the same name by Georgia-born poet and novelist, <a href=“http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/363”>James Dickey</a>, who performed the role of the sheriff. The film is set on the <span>Cahulawassee</span> River, in a valley soon to be destroyed by a dam built to supply Atlanta with water. The allegorical theme of man against nature is set up when the character of Lewis (played by Burt Reynolds) lectures his friends on why they should brave the river:</div><div align=“center”>”…because they’re <span>buildin</span>’ a dam across the <span>Cahulawassee</span> River. They’re gonna flood a whole valley, Bobby, that’s why. Dammit, they’re <span>drownin</span>’ the river…Just about the last wild, untamed, unpolluted, <span>unf</span>—<span>ked</span> up river in the South.”</div><div align=“left”>The themes of man vs. nature, city vs. country, and man vs. adversity all find their focus with the River. It becomes both setting and player. Through my conversations with <span>Maedgen</span> and <span>Gillet</span>, it is clear that the River will play a major role in their composition and performance, as well, perhaps leaving the audience with a musical memory of iconic film beyond the <span>enduring</span> Dueling Banjos scene. </div><div align=“left”></div><div align=“left”></div><div align=“left”>Doors open at 7:30. The film screens at 8. A whiskey reception will follow.</div><div align=“left”></div><div align=“left”></div><div align=“left”></div><div align=“left”><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><div></div><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/3601211757000210971-9222541851799554804?l=omsablog.blogspot.com” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqySbRFj1eI/AAAAAAAAA3I/aPc_-e_f6-k/s1600-h/~Hippoid.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 250px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqySbRFj1eI/AAAAAAAAA3I/aPc_-e_f6-k/s400/~Hippoid.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380836651941746146” border=“0” /></a> <a href=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqySo_8mFcI/AAAAAAAAA3Q/lDoq8yrkkCs/s1600-h/~Rue.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 132px;” src=“http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqySo_8mFcI/AAAAAAAAA3Q/lDoq8yrkkCs/s200/~Rue.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380836887858910658” border=“0” /></a>Despite all the art world talk about movements, ideas and themes, sense of place has remained one of the most consistent influences on personal creativity for at least a century or so. How much of Edward Hopper’s sense of “isolation,” that art historians say permeates most his work, is really a result of his accurate rendition of the cold looking light that suffuses so much of New York state? And how much of Matisse’s “warmth” was influenced by his long stays in the sunny south of France? While painter Michael Kessler was growing up on a farm in Pennsylvania, he gravitated to Andrew Wyeth’s spare Keystone-state landscapes with their stoic sense of repressed drama. But after he moved to New Mexico, his work became much more geometric and panoramic. Which is probably as it should be: if Louisiana is arguably America’s most sensual state, New Mexico is surely its most graphically stratified and abstract. Both are very surreal, but for utterly opposite reasons related to one place’s flatness and humidity contrasted with the other’s contours and aridity. From atop a New Mexico mesa you can seemingly see forever into the distance, while Louisiana, by comparison, is one big steamy mirage.<br /><br />Maybe that is why so much of Kessler’s work looks geological, with a subtle interweaving of the impact of man and nature. Much of this stems from his methodology of adding and subtracting in a way that mimics the processes of sedimentation and erosion in the natural world. For instance, in CURRENT, below, a broad band of sandstone red is flanked by pale seas of gypsum white and meandering traceries of ambiguous origin, and the net effect suggests facets of man and nature built up over time in contrast to the more spontaneous gestures of artists such as Pollock or DeKooning. Related strategies appear in HIPPOID, top, and RUE, above. Like the landscapes that inspired them, Kessler’s paintings reflect an organic cycle of building up and tearing down in what amounts to a modern art equivalent of timeless natural processes recreated on a more intimate scale.<br />~Eric Bookhardt<br /><a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqyRI0KhWHI/AAAAAAAAA24/mi-F0DfC2MQ/s1600-h/~Current.s.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 264px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqyRI0KhWHI/AAAAAAAAA24/mi-F0DfC2MQ/s400/~Current.s.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380835235428653170” border=“0” /></a><span>Michael Kessler: RECENT PAINTINGS<br />Through Sept. 28<br />Gallery Bienvenu, 518 Julia St., 525-0518; www.gallerybienvenu.com<br />Email:</span><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-2073371729982560800?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqiDdPUf0NI/AAAAAAAAA2Y/GLoolUVpjzU/s1600-h/Hubble.JPG”><img style=“margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 330px;” src=“http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqiDdPUf0NI/AAAAAAAAA2Y/GLoolUVpjzU/s400/Hubble.JPG” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379694293246005458” border=“0” /></a><span>Click: <a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/09/09/science/0909HUBBLE_index.html”><span>The Universe, in High Definition </span></a></span><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-2823484094123145558?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>

<a href=“http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqNG5DqbrKI/AAAAAAAAA1o/ruGLOJdv058/s1600-h/~Schwerd.s.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 283px;” src=“http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqNG5DqbrKI/AAAAAAAAA1o/ruGLOJdv058/s320/~Schwerd.s.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5378220326060272802” border=“0” /></a>What is it about hair? Imbued with a mystical aura since the days of Samson and Delilah, it can almost define certain people, for instance, Elvis or Dolly Parton’s iconic coifs, or Sarah Palin’s famous hair extenders. Loren Schwerd’s show at Ammo touches on all of the above. The title, MOURNING PORTRAIT, harks to the long lost 18th and 19th century funerary “hairwork” tradition in which the locks of the deceased would be fashioned into intricate jewelry or mementos. But contemporary coiffeur culture also plays a role in Schwerd’s sculptural interpretations of storm-blasted, flood-ravaged New Orleans homes. Her memorial portraits of the sorts of collapsing abodes that were the first to be demolished following the flood are woven from a mother lode of wigs and human hair extenders found outside a St. Claude Avenue beauty parlor after Katrina.<br />These somehow recall both Pennsylvania Dutch hexes and African fetishes all rolled into one. 1317 CHARBONNET ST. (pictured) is emblematic, a woven hair portrait of a shotgun house in an oval frame. Strands at the base are woven into cornrow braids, on which the house seems to rest. Others are even more surreal, with landscaping touches like braided trees topped with a bushy bouffant of curly locks. Setting it all off is a woven shed-size shotgun house rising like a shrine in the center of the gallery. All in all, it’s an eerie show where a thread of subtle voodoo contributes to the surreal mojo.<br /><br /><a href=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqNIdu4vhUI/AAAAAAAAA14/GQ013pHG7iA/s1600-h/~Primal+Light.jpg”><img style=“margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 198px;” src=“http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_4zZfvwTP028/SqNIdu4vhUI/AAAAAAAAA14/GQ013pHG7iA/s200/~Primal+Light.jpg” alt=”“ id=“BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5378222055649936706” border=“0” /></a>There are no loose ends in Karina Wisniewska’s SILENT DYNAMISM expo at the Octavia Gallery, yet the Swiss artist’s abstract, minimal extrapolations of line and form in quartz sand and acrylic are sometimes so linear as to suggest strands of hair if not sine waves or other oscillations. A former concert pianist turned painter, she now records her own visual music on canvas, following her inner harmonic flow wherever it takes her. ~Eric Bookhardt<br /><span>MOURNING PORTRAIT: Human Hair Architectural Memorials by Loren Schwerd<br />Through Sept. 16<br />AMMO, 938 Royal St., 301-2584; www.ammoarts.com<br />SILENT DYNAMISM: Works by Karina Wisniewska<br />Through Oct. 2<br />Octavia Gallery, 4532 Magazine Street, 504-309-4249; www.octaviaartgallery.com<br />Email: </span><div><img width=“1” height=“1” src=“https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2692635212517024217-3648250283965136400?l=www.insidenola.org” alt=”“ /></div>