Love Never Dies Exhibition
This international group exhibition explores the themes of marriage, family, relationships, aging and generational change in the LGBTQ communities. The artworks were produced in a variety of media including collage, digital formats, film/video, photography,
printmaking, and sculpture.
Artists in the exhibition:
Laura Aguilar, Gaye Chan, Christopher Dibble, Dyke Action Machine, Diana
Eicher, Fan Popo and David Cheng, Catherine Fargher, Frank A. Gårdsø and Eirik
Tyrihjel, Cheri Gaulke and Sue Maberry, Alexandra Gelis, Erik Gernand, Barbara
Gilhooly, Domiziana Giordano, Terry Gydesen, Deborah Kelly and Tina Fiveash,
James Michael Lawrence, Raphael Perez, Chuck Smith.
Organized and presented by Form+Content Gallery and Traffic Zone Gallery of Minneapolis. Curated by Jim Dryden and Howard Oransky, with an additional curatorial contribution by Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.
Form + Content Gallery
May 20-June 27, 2010
Gallery hours:
Thursday-Saturday, 12-6 pm, free and open to the public
210 North 2nd
Street, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55401
612/436-1151, formandcontent@gmail.com, www.formandcontent.org
Traffic Zone Gallery
May 20-July 16, 2010
Gallery hours:
Monday-Friday, 9am-5 pm, free and open to the public
250 3rd Avenue
North, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55401
trafficzoneart@gmail.com, www.trafficzoneart.com
Opening Reception
Saturday, June 5, 2010 7-10 pm
Both galleries same night,
free and open to the public
Writers Reading
Form + Content Gallery
May 26, 2010 7 pm, free and
open to the public
Related Event
June 4-11, 2010
Queer Takes: Alt Families
Walker Art Center
1750 Hennepin Avenue,
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55403
In its fifth anniversary program, Queer Takes delves into the complexities of the topic of families within the LGBT community - in some cases those who have been rejected by their blood relatives and formed new families among tight kin they've chosen as well
of the challenges faced by those who seek legal and official recognition of
their relationships.
ARTWORKS IN THE EXHIBITION
LAURA AGUILAR
Plush Pony, 1992
Silver gelatin prints
"My artistic goal is to create photographic images that compassionately render the human experience, revealed through the lives of individuals in the lesbian/gay and/or persons of color communities. My work is a collaboration between the sitters and myself,
intended to be viewed by a cross-cultural audience. Hopefully the universal
elements in the work can be recognized by other individuals' communities and
can initiate the viewer to new experiences about gays, lesbians and people of color."
(artist's statement from Nueva Luz, Vol. 4, #2, 1993 and Gallerie: Women's Art,
Vol. 1, #1, 1988.)
GAYE CHAN
Brides - June, 2000
Found paper ephemera, silver
gelatin print, in wood frame
8 ¾" x 10 ¾" x 5"
Brides - July, 2000
Found paper ephemera, silver
gelatin print, in wood frame
10 ¾" x 8 ¾" x 5"
Brides - August, 2000
Found paper ephemera, silver
gelatin print, in wood frame
10 ¾" x 8 ¾" x 5"
Brides - September, 2000
Found paper ephemera, silver
gelatin print, in wood frame
8 ¾" x 10 ¾" x 5"
On loan from the Charles
Cohan Collection
"License to kill, license to marry . . . I had somehow thought that we would want something more . . .queer." (artist's statement)
CHRISTOPHER DIBBLE
Gina and Gail, 2010
Silver
gelatin print
11" x 14"
Marg and Elaine, 2010
Silver gelatin print
11" x 14"
Aging in the LGBTQ Community is an often-overlooked part of our world, while we are
bombarded with images of youth and its idea of perfection.Through this series, I explore and present the idea that aging is also beautiful.It is something to be cherished and while many of us fear aging, it is not something that should be feared, but something that should be celebrated.I use a 4x5 camera to bring a sense of formality in a
world where it has largely become unimportant. It harkens back to a time
when having your photograph taken was an event.
DYKE ACTION MACHINE
Carrie Moyer and Sue Schaffner
Gay Marriage: You Might as Well Be Straight, 1997
4/color offset poster, 18" x 24"
5,000 pieces wheatpasted in
Lower Manhattan, New York City
"DAM rustles up some grassroots sentiment, expressing the ambivalence many lesbians have about the corporate gay movement's drive towards gay marriage and parenthood as the norm. It took the glossy fantasy presented by the Wedding Industry to its psychotic
limits by showing one bride dragging her unwilling mate through a landscape of
matrimonial booty." (DAM!)
Family Circle, 1992
Set of three Xerox diptych posters, 11" x 17"
500 pieces wheatpasted in
Lower Manhattan, New York City
"Riffing on advertisements produced by Family Circle Magazine, DAM's second project depicted the fluid configurations of lesbian families. DAM's campaign questioned the use of hip, urban nuclear families as a means of updating the otherwise reactionary Family
Values message." (DAM!)
DIANA EICHER
To Have and To Hold, 2004
Screenprint, 20" x 15"
The Madonna of the Lesbian
Wedding Cake, 2005
Screenprint and photopolymer
plate, 14" x 11"
Marry Me (version 1), 2005
Embossing and screenprint,
12" x 9"
"Several years ago, I began
looking through bridal magazines and became fascinated with the range of
wedding dresses and models that were portrayed. I thought about how lesbians
who decide to get married are never shown in any of these magazines or the media.
We rarely see two brides together. The "normal" image is of a bride and a
groom. I was interested in creating images of women as a couple (Marry Me or To
Have and To Hold) or in homage to the lesbian relationship (as in The Madonna
of the Lesbian Wedding Cake). I have drawn on my own personal life experiences
to portray a series of events, emotions, and situations in hopes that others
can find similarities with their own lives. My intent is to create imagery that
on the surface appears ‘beautiful' but up close, a hidden content becomes
unveiled." (artist's statement)
FAN POPO and DAVID CHENG
New Beijing, New Marriage,
2009
Video, 18 minutes, premier
U.S. gallery exhibition
"Located
south of Tian'anmen Square and among the centuries-old architecture, Qianmen
Street bears silent witness to the history of Beijing. In preparation for the
Beijing Olympics, Qianmen Street was renovated into a popular shopping and
tourist spot. Originally a Western holiday, Valentine's Day has become a huge
day for many Chinese young people. For the tens of millions of gays and
lesbians in China who do not have the right to make their voices heard, what
does this place and this day mean to them? On Valentine's Day February 14, 2009
a gay couple and a lesbian couple chose to have their wedding photos taken on
Qianmen Street. It was a beautiful Spring Day in Beijing. People who witnessed
the event included local residents and tourists from all over the country.
Would they understand what was going on? Did the branded ‘New Beijing' also
bring about ‘new concepts' about love and marriage? The event attracted wide
media coverage and public attention. It is an important milestone in the
history of China's LGBT movement." (artist's statement)
CATHERINE FARGHER
Lovely Mothers,
1993
Visibility Posters
Coordinated by
Catherine Fargher, Elisa Hall and Michelle Hargraeves.
WOM Lovely
MothersPoster group, part of Word of Mouth, a lesbian art collective,
produced the Lovely Mothers poster and billboard projects with funding provided
by the Community Cultural Development Board of the Australia Council for the
Arts in 1993. Photography by Marion Moore. Special thanks to Karmin Borg,
Heather Grace Jones, Judy Spokes and all participant mothers and kids.
FRANK A. GåRDSø and EIRIK
TYRIHJEL
Love Never Dies, 2003
16 mm film transferred to
DVD, 2 minutes, 56 seconds
In this film a man waits for
the arrival of his beloved visitor.
CHERI GAULKE and SUE MABERRY
Marriage Matters, 2005
Artists Book
"In a year of intensifying
public debate about the freedom to marry, Cheri Gaulke and Sue Maberry invited
10 lesbian and gay couples to go to Sears and have their portraits taken. The
portraits were accompanied by personal stories and the story of Maberry and
Gaulke's own 26-year relationship in an artists' book, Marriage Matters. The
book raises the question "when your relationship is not legally recognized,
what does marriage matter?" Ten lesbian and gay families reflect upon this
question and the matter of their lives together. The Sears portraits give a glimpse
of these queer (not strange) families. (This was Gaulke and Maberry's third
Sears portrait project, in which they invert this middle-American tradition to
question what and who defines family. The previous projects were installations
that have been exhibited widely.) Marriage Matters was written by Cheri Gaulke
and designed by Gaulke and Sue Maberry. It was color laser printed on
iridescent Stardream paper in shades of purple, lavender, white and peach with
a silk ribbon closure. The accordion spine allows the book's covers to open
back and be held with the silk ribbon. With the alternating vertical and
horizontal pages splayed open, the book's shape resembles a two-tiered wedding
cake. This book was made possible in part by a grant from the City of Los
Angeles, Cultural Affairs Department." (Vamp & Tramp, distributor)
ALEXANDRA GELIS
Borders, 2009
Video, 3 minutes
Provided by Walker Art
Center
"Borders is an intimate
photographic exploration of the bodies belonging to six queer individuals. This
animation, made up of hundreds of high-resolution photographs, unabashedly
examines the evidence of physical change and transformation: surgery scars,
tattoos, and other traces. The bodies are fragmented, as are the stories
affiliated with these traces, and identities remain delightfully elusive."
(Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Center)
ERIK GERNAND
Crafty, 2008
Video, 9 minutes
Distributed by Frameline
Co-written by Erik Gernand
and Jenny Hagel, directed by Gernand and starring Hagel. Crafty premiered at the
San Francisco LGBT Film Festival and went on to play Palm Springs International
Shortfest. In this equal-opportunity character spoof, a super-political lesbian
collecting signatures for a gay marriage petition encounters a conservative,
craft-loving housewife who refuses to sign her name. Determined to obtain her
signature, the activist follows the housewife on her daily errands, berating
her with pro-marriage rhetoric and, ultimately, employing a little craftiness
of her own.
BARBARA GILHOOLY
Industrial Heart
Metal parts from vintage
Erector Sets, hardware
18" x 14" w x 7" d
"I use found objects, wire,
wood and many recycled or re-purposed materials. I am known for my wire
sculptural work and one of the forms I create in wire are three-dimensional hearts.
I am interested in the industrial and the natural world. I like to combine the
two aesthetics. It's why the ‘Erector Set Hearts' interest me. I enjoy the
interaction and contrast of building a precious heart form out of industrial
metal girders and nuts and bolts. The erector set hearts began as a small
experiment in my studio using the long girder pieces from an old erector set I
formed a three dimensional heart about 10 inches long. What interests me is
combining the industrial material and hardware with a very organic or soft
form. This contrast appeals to me as an emotional metaphor, as well - "the
unbreakable heart!" I use mostly vintage Erector Sets with the original
hardware and some pop rivets. I bend the girders and shape with my hands and rubber
mallet to form the curves. I work intuitively, completing the overall contour
form and then fill in with cross bracing." (artist's statement)
DOMIZIANA GIORDANO
Waiting, 2002
Digital format, 2 minutes,
premier U.S. gallery exhibition
Secret treasure held tight
in my heart
I will wait
for you
Forever
Until you come back for me
Forever
Your name stays still
On the sill
of my mouth
Let me
drink some life
from the iris
of your eyes
Excerpts from Waiting
TERRY GYDESEN
Rally Against Gay Marriage
(God Bless), 2006
Photograph, 18" x 12" (24" x
20", framed)
Death Penalty for
Homosexuals, 2006
Photograph, 18" x 12" (24" x
20", framed)
Protester at Gay Marriage
Rights Rally, 2006
Photograph, 18" x 12" (24" x
20", framed)
"The joy and unconditional
love of a dog is a good reminder of how to live life." (artist's blog)
DEBORAH KELLY and TINA
FIVEASH
Hey Hetero! 2001
Photomedia artworks
"Hey Hetero! is a public art
collaboration between artist Deborah Kelly and photographer Tina Fiveash. The
project's six pieces have been seen in illuminated public advertising spaces,
city billboards, magazines, books, newspapers, bus ads, postcards, galleries,
and online. Hey Hetero! has appeared in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, New Delhi
and Wellington since 2001, when it won the major award of the Sydney Gay &
Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival. It headlined the Glasgay festival, Glasgow, in
2006. Now the works are taught in university courses from Dallas to Hong Kong. Hey
Hetero! returns the gaze at heterosexuality: the privileged sexuality which
makes gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender movements both possible and
necessary. In the form of simulated mainstream 'advertisements,' the artwork
invites heterosexuality into public discourse. Note: No heterosexuals were
harmed in the creation of this project." (artists' statement)
JAMES MICHAEL LAWRENCE
Peter and James, 2009
18" x 24"
(framed), Altered Photograph
Love - Peter and James (with
Great Uncles Krieger), 2004
13 3/4" X 13 3/4"
(Framed), Altered Photograph
Married - A Definition of
Love, 2009
18 1/2" X 16"
(Framed), Altered Photograph
"Because our marriage
is very much an example of the flow of yin/yang and constantly shifting and
taking on a multitude of glimmers and nuances - we continue to discover much
about each other and ourselves as it continues to unfold. This is not so unusual for two persons
(gay or straight) in a committed relationship. What is unusual is the art and writing that springs forth
from our living it." (artist's statement)
RAPHAEL PEREZ
Hadar and Adam
Photographs
Love has matured with wisdom
and grace in these lush, shimmering images.
CHUCK SMITH
Untitled; # 11706, 1994
Toned Silver Gelatin Print
27.5 x 32.25" (exterior frame)
Untitled; # 18802, 1995
Toned Silver Gelatin Print
Dimensions: 15.125 x 18.875" (exterior frame)
Untitled; # 6802, 1993
Toned Silver Gelatin Print
15.125 x 18.875" (exterior frame)
"As an artist, I view my
role as one to interpret personal insights and perspectives for a greater
social awareness. As a
photographer, I have long loved the ability of this medium to convey thoughts
and feelings beyond the surface image.
My work with the male nude expresses a sincere and unabashed admiration
of the male form, but emerged through deeper explorations of personal identity. It is my intent through this work to
create a more emotionally honest and socially compassionate view of the
homosexual spirit as I have come to experience through my own life." (artist's
statement)
ARTISTS' BIOGRAPHIES
LAURA AGUILAR
Rosemead, CA
Laura Aguilar is among the
most talented photographers to emerge in the United States in the 1980s. She
was born in San Gabriel, California in 1959. One-person exhibitions include New
Bodies of Work, Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, San Antonio, Texas (2003);
Center, Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Los Angeles, California
(2001); Stillness & Motion, Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Los
Angeles, California (2000); Stillness, ArtPace, San Antonio, Texas; El jo
divers (The Diverse Self), Fundacio "la Caixa," Barcelona, Spain. Recent group
exhibitions include normal love - precarious life, precarious sex, Kunstlerhaus
Bethanien, Berlin, Germany, curated by Renate Lorenz (2007); Mangnan Emrich
Contemporary, New York, NY, with Delilah Montoya (2006). Public collections
include Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los
Angeles; the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; Stanford University,
California. Awards include Anonymous Was a Woman Award, NY; COLA Los Angeles
Cultural Affairs Department; ArtPace Residency, San Antonion, Texas; California
Community Foundation's J. Paul Getty Grant for the Visual Arts.
GAYE CHAN
Honolulu, HI
Gaye Chan is a visual and
media artist recognized equally for her individual and collaborative work. Her
ongoing interest in examining history through found materials has culminated in
solo exhibitions at Honolulu Academy of Art (Honolulu), Art in General (New
York City), YYZ (Toronto), Artspeak (Vancouver), Gallery 4A (Sydney), SF
Camerawork (San Francisco), YYZ (Toronto) and The Contemporary Museum
(Honolulu). Chan's collaborative projects include being a part of Eating in
Public and DownWind Productions, and has been supported by the Creative Capital
Foundation. Chan was born in Hong Kong and immigrated to the United States in
1969. She received her MFA from San Francisco Art Institute. More information
can be found at www.gayechan.com.
CHRISTOPHER DIBBLE
Los Angeles, CA
Christopher Dibble received his BFA in Photography at Art
Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. He currently works out of
his studio in Los Angeles, California. His work has been included in several
group and solo shows in Los Angeles. His commercial clients include
various national publications including The Advocate and Paper Magazine as well
as Los Angeles area fashion designers.
DYKE ACTION MACHINE
New York, NY
Dyke Action Machine! (DAM!)
is a two-person public art project founded in 1991 by artist Carrie Moyer and
photographer Sue Schaffner. Between 1991 and 2004 DAM! blitzed the streets of
New York City with public art projects that combined Madison Avenue savvy with
Situationist tactics. The campaigns dissected mainstream media by inserting
lesbian images into recognizably commercial contexts, revealing how lesbians
are and are not depicted in American popular culture. While questioning the
basic assumption that one cannot be "present" in a capitalist society unless
one exists as a consumer group, DAM! performed the role of the advertiser,
promising the lesbian viewer all the things she'd been denied by the
mainstream: power, inclusion, and the public recognition of identity. DAM!
began as a working group of Queer Nation and quickly evolved into a stand-alone
agitprop unit whose exact membership remained anonymous for many years. Dyke
Action Machine! campaigns presented a hybrid form of public address where civic
issues such were packaged to fit seamlessly into the commercialized
streetscape. A typical DAM! campaign was comprised of 5,000 posters wheatpasted
over the course of one month. Neighborhoods were targeted for both the volume
and diversity of pedestrian traffic as well as their long histories as sites
for graphic intervention and public discourse. As corporations and activists
battled for the ever-dwindling public space in New York City, DAM! turned to
other modes of propaganda (lightboxes, catalogs, matchbooks, buttons and
stickers to name but a few) and distribution (the US Postal Service, the
Internet and by hand).
DIANA EICHER
Minneapolis, MN
Diana
Eicher received her MFA in printmaking from the University of Hawaii, and her
BA in painting from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She spent a year
studying in Venice, Italy, and has also studied at Tamarind Institute,
Albuquerque, NM. She coordinates the Printmaking and Paper Studios at the
Minneapolis College of Art and Design. She has taught at the University of
Hawaii, the Honolulu Printmaking Workshop, the Minneapolis College of Art and
Design, Minnesota Center for Book Arts, Bloomington Art Center, Honolulu
Academy of Arts. Permanent collections include:
Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, Target
Corporation, University of North Florida, Special Collections Library,
University of Arizona, University of Colorado Special Collections, Boulder,
Colorado, University of California-Davis, Gorman Museum, Purdue University
Print Teaching Archive, Westmont College Print Collection, Santa Barbara,
California, Richard F. Brush Art Gallery, St. Lawrence University, Canton, New
York, Cornerstone, Bloomington, MN, Domestic Abuse Project, Minneapolis, MN, North
Dakota State University, Printmaking Education and Research Studio, Fargo, ND, Proyecto' Ace Print Collection, Buenos Aires,
Argentina.
FAN POPO and DAVID CHENG
Beijing, Peoples' Republic
of China
Fan
Popo is a member of the Beijing queer film festival committee and coordinator
of Chinese queer independent films. He is Chief Editor of Gayspot magazine.
Popo published Happy Together: Complete Record of a Hundred Queer Films
(Beifang Wenyi Press, 2007). Awarded Third Prize in the LGBT Research Paper
Prize, Chi-Heng Foundation; Second Prize in the sina.com's parize for online
video. Fan Popo is co-director of the China Queer Film Festival Tour in over
ten major cities in China since 2008. Filmography as director:
2008
The Good Days, 96mins, the 5th China Documentary Film Festival;
From
Tsinghua to Qinghai, 28mins, the World Urban Forum IV; Taipei: City of Rainbow,
10mins, the 1st China Queer Film Festival Tour; 2009 New Beijing, New Marriage,
18mins, the 4th Beijing Queer Film Festival, the 29th Vancouver International
Film Festival; Chinese Closet, 88mins, the 2nd China Queer Film Festival Tour. Paper
House, 20mins.
David
Cheng was born in Heilongjiang Province, China in 1968. In 2000 he immigrated
to New Zealand and co-founded the 20:20 media company. From 2000-04 he produced
the Trade New Zealand series. In 2006 he wrote the screenplay Police and
Prisoner. In 2009 he was producer and co-director of documentary New Beijing,
New Marriage.
CATHERINE FARGHER
Sydney, Australia
Catherine Fargher is a
performer, writer and teacher working in radio, contemporary performance, new
media/hybrid arts, puppetry, film and theatre. As a writer, Catherine has had
over twenty scripts produced for companies including the Sydney Opera House,
Sidetrack Theatre, Vitalstatistix, Terrapin Puppet Theatre, the Jessica Wilson
Company and the Australian National Broadcasting Corporation. Catherine has
performed widely in cabaret and contemporary performance in Australia. In 1998
she toured with other Australian, UK and New York artists for ‘It's Queer up
North' in Manchester, Glasgow, Warwick and London as well as WOW Café New York.
In 2002 she was funded by the Australia Council New Media Fund for the
Motherload project, exploring genetic science and human reproductive futures.
She has recently completed a Doctorate of Creative Arts at Wollongong
University, developing performance texts from bioethical fables. Her bioethical
fable Dr Egg and The Man with No Ear was adapted for new a media/puppetry
production at the Sydney Opera House in July 2007 and toured to Chicago
(REDMOON) in 2008, with proposed tours of Canada, Cyprus and New York in 2010.
She is currently working as a lecturer in screen and stage writing at
Wollongong University and writing a graphic novel.
FRANK A. GåRDSø and EIRIK
TYRIHJEL
Oslo, Norway
Frank A Gårdsø was born in
1969 and Eirik Tyrihjel was born in 1973. They have been working together as a director
team since 1999. They have made more than ten music videos, several commercials
and four short films: Too Much 2000, Coffee 2002, Monica, 2002, Love Never Dies,
2003.
CHERI GAULKE
Los Angeles, CA
Cheri Gaulke has a Bachelor
of Fine Arts degree from Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD) and a
Master of Arts degree (in Feminist Art/Education) from Goddard College. She has
presented her work at the Museum of Modern Art (NY), the Museum of Contemporary
Art (LA), in a Smithsonian-touring exhibition, and in settings all over the
world including buses, churches, and prehistoric temples. She has received
grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council,
the City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, and the Brody Arts Fund.
Her work has been written about in numerous books and publications. She was
recently inducted into the UCLA Oral History Program and in 2004 received a
mid-career COLA (City of Los Angeles) fellowship.
In 1975, she moved to Los
Angeles to be involved with the Feminist Studio Workshop at the Woman's
Building. There she embraced the notion that feminist art could raise
consciousness, invite dialogue, and transform culture. She worked primarily in
performance art from 1974-1992, addressing themes such as religion, sexual
identity, and the environment. In addition to her solo work, she cofounded
collaborative performance groups Feminist Art Workers (1976-81), which merged
feminist art and education techniques into interactive performances; and Sisters
Of Survival (1981-85), who wore nun's habits in the spectrum of the rainbow and
presented their anti-nuclear performances in Europe and the U.S.
Though Gaulke has moved away
from performance, the feminist art strategies that she helped to innovate in the
1970s in southern California continue in her work. Her art continues to be a
vehicle for social commentary and as a way to tell the stories of individuals
and groups under-represented in society. She works in a variety of media, but
mostly video, installation, artist's books, and public art. Such projects have
included a video in collaboration with lesbian and gay teens, a photographic
wall installation about lesbian and gay families, a video installation with
Latino teenagers about the L.A. River, and a video installation about kids'
perspectives on a river in North Carolina. Gaulke has completed three public
art projects - a Metro-Rail Station in Los Angeles that tells stories about an
oft-ignored urban river, an outdoor sculptural piece for a library in Lake View
Terrace, and three stainless steel and glass glowing "Pillars of Community" for
the City of Lakewood. A black granite memorial honoring the service of Filipino
WWII veterans was dedicated on November 11, 2006 in a park in Historic Filipino
Town, Los Angeles.
ALEXANDRA GELIS
Toronto, Canada
Alexandra
Gelis is a visual artist who is based in Toronto. She works in
photography, video, web-based and installation pieces. She studied in Bogota,
Columbia and is current working on her Master's in Visual Arts/Time Based
Program at York University. She has also taught at PNUMA (Programa
Ambiental de las Naciones Unidas) in Panama City.
ERIK GERNAND
Chicago, IL
Erik Gernand was born in
Hineseville, GA and currently resides in Chicago, IL. He attended Northwestern
University Film School. His first project was Dancing With Indiana, short film,
2001 and most recent projects are Non-Love-Song, premiered March 2009 at SXSW
Girl Parts and at the Florida Film festival.
BARBARA GILHOOLY
St. Paul, MN
Barbara Gilhooly was born in
North Dakota in 1963. She attended the University of North Dakota and
received her BFA in 1986. Concentrating on printmaking and
sculpture, Gilhooly earned her MFA from Colorado State University in
1989. She then moved to Minnesota where she continues to live and work as
a full-time artist.
DOMIZIANA GIORDANO
Milano, Italy
Domiziana Giordano is an
artist and actress, with interests in language, communication and sociology.
Combining visual art, semiotics, cinema and new technology she seeks a fusion
of interactive content, structure and a new method of narration. Giordano grew
up in a family of artists and architects. She studied architecture but decided
to dedicate herself to the visual arts and film. After completing her studies at
the Academy of Dramatic Art in Rome, she enrolled at the Stella Adler Studio in
acting and at the New York Film Academy in directing. Giordano played leading
roles in films directed by, Mauro Bolognini, Jean-Luc Godard, Neil Jordan,
Nicholas Roeg, Andrej Tarkovskij and others. Her exhibition record includes the
Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie de Arles in 2002 and an
installazione permanente al MACRO (Museo d'arte Contemporanea di Roma). Besides
her visual artworks, she has also written poetry, articles on the history of
art criticism for an Italian literary journal, and she currently writes for the
magazine Nova of the Italian newspaper IlSole24Ore.
TERRY GYDESEN
Minneapolis, MN
Terry Gydesen has been working as a
documentary photographer since 1984. Her passion for documenting political
campaigns began in 1988 when she was commissioned as Jesse Jackson's staff
photographer during his Presidential Campaign. She has gone on to document
political campaigns at both the local and national levels since that time. Besides
politics she has worked on a variety of projects including refugees in El
Salvador, women and children living in homeless shelters, women in recovery
from drug and alcohol abuse. In 1993 she was commissioned by Prince to document
his European tour. Never before or since has any photographer had the behind
the scenes access that she was privy to during that tour. The book Prince
presents the Sacrifice of Victor is from that time. She has photographed for
various publications including the New York Times, Newsweek, Ms Magazine and in
Minneapolis from 1993 to 1995 she had a weekly photo column in City Pages Terry
Gydesen's Daybook. Terry was one of twelve photographers included in the
Minnesota 2000 project documenting life in Minnesota at the turn of the 21st
century. Her snowbird project
included retired Minnesotans spending their winters in the snowbelt states of
Florida and Arizona. Terry is a three time recipient of the McKnight Photography
fellowship. She has also received grants from the Minnesota State Arts board,
Jerome Travel Study grant, and the NEA/Arts Midwest fellowship. Terry's work in
included in the collections of the Minnesota Historical Society, General Mills
and the Schomberg Center For Research In Black Culture.
DEBORAH
KELLY and TINA FIVEASH
Sydney,
Australia
Deborah Kelly is a
Sydney-based artist whose works have been shown in streets, skies and galleries
around Australia, in the Singapore and Venice Biennales, and elsewhere. Her
award-winning collaborative artwork with Tina Fiveash, Hey, hetero! was shown
in public sites from Sydney to Glasgow. Her cross-media work considering the
rise of religiosity in the public sphere, commissioned by the Museum of
Contemporary Art, included public announcements in train stations and
projections onto clouds. In 2009 she won the Fisher's Ghost Award, the
Screengrab International New Media Art Award, and was shortlisted for the
Sadler's Wells Global Dance Contest.
Tina Fiveash is an
Australian photo artist, filmmaker and designer, internationally recognized for
her unique, highly stylized, cinematic photo works, in addition to her high
profile, collaborative public art projects. Tina has been exhibiting since 1992
and her work has appeared in a multitude of public and private spaces around
the world including billboards, illuminated public advertising spaces,
festivals and galleries. Moving between many forms of still and moving image
media - stills, stop-motion animation, 3-D and animated lenticular photography,
Tina's work engages with the intersections of photography and cinema. In 2009,
Tina's work was represented in two international exhibitions in Germany - Terra
Nullius: Contemporary Art from Australia at Halle 14/ Leipziger
Baumwollspinnerei and Die Ideale Ausstellung at the ACC
Galerie in Weimar. In 2008, Tina was commissioned by internationally renowned
artist, Deborah Kelly, to photograph Big Butch Billboard - a bold public art
project showing at the Australian Centre for Photography and touring Sydney as
a giant mobile billboard for the 2009 Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras
Festival.
JAMES MICHAEL LAWRENCE
Minneapolis, MN
James Michael Lawrence began
his exhibition career at the age of 17 when he was included the 1962 Biennial
of Painting and Sculpture at Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. In 1999 Lawrence
had his first important exhibition of altered photographs at Flatland Gallery
in Minneapolis. In 2009 Susan Hensel Gallery, also of Minneapolis, presented a
15-year retrospective of his digital art - an installation that left the
gallery literally wallpapered from floor to ceiling with over 700 works.
Lawrence has created approximately 3,000 artworks using a computer. In early
2009 - Lawrence was both honored and humbled at being invited to archive his art
and writings (created solely by himself or in collaboration with his husband
Peter Wilson) at The Jean Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and
Transgender Studies - within the special collections sector of The Elmer L.
Andersen Library at The University of Minnesota. The first group of materials was delivered to The Tretter
Collection late in the Fall of 2009 - and consisted of disk and hard copies of
artworks representing the breadth of genres Lawrence has worked with in the
past - including works that specifically deal with GLBT subjects, politics, and
the personal history of Lawrence/Wilson's relationship and political
activities.
RAPHAEL PEREZ
Tel Aviv, Israel
Raphael Perez, was born in
1965 and was raised in Jerusalem. He currently resides and works in Tel-Aviv.
He is a graduate of the Beer Sheva school of Visual Arts where he studied from
1988 through 1992. During his youth, Raphael taught visual art to children.
Exhibitions include: Haifa Forum, 2002; Tel Aviv Museum, 2003; Aizenberg-Dizingof
Center and Rimon Gallery, 2004.
CHUCK SMITH
Minneapolis, MN
Chuck Smith has been a
professional commercial photographer and artist in Minneapolis for over 25
years. His commercial career has
spanned product and fashion photography, motion film and video, graphic design,
self-published works and stock photography. He has long maintained a strong passion for personal
artistic works and is currently focusing entirely on his fine art photography. Smith's works, both commercial and
artistic, have received recognition and publication worldwide.
