A public memorial to aquatic life

A new art exhibit could be likened to a traveling fish funeral.


The show features the works of 90 artists from the Pittsburgh and Morgantown, W.Va., regions who each painted one species of aquatic life killed in a widespread 2009 fish kill along a stream that straddles the Pennsylvania and West Virginia border.


And the exhibit, "Reflections: Homage to Dunkard Creek" is arriving next week at California University of Pennsylvania.


The portraits also feature crayfish, mussels and insects that were placed on the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources list of populations that dropped significantly during the pollution.


I'm not going to get into the debate here over to which environmental catastrophe caused the fish kill.


Cal U. is among nine sites that will exhibit the show sponsored by the Mountain Institute's Appalachia Program.


The university's office of academic affairs will host an opening reception from 5-8 p.m. Nov. 10 in Frich Hall. It will begin with a gallery talk by Ann Payne, of Morgantown, a member of the Guild of Natural Science Illustrators and the artist who conceived and organized the project.

Curator for the exhibition on campus is Maggy Aston, assistant professor of art and design at Cal U. A work by Jordan Wong, a student of Aston’s, is included in the exhibition. His piece depicts the johnny darter, Etheostoma nigrum, a bottom-feeding freshwater fish.

Through a collaboration with the university’s departments of art and design, biological and environmental sciences, and music, the paintings will be viewed in an aquarium-like environment that includes glass display cases holding specimens with a sound track of bird, frog and cricket calls. A large, collaborative mural depicts water, nature and industry in the Mon Valley.

The opening reception is free to the public. The exhibit will be on view from 8 a.m.-9 p.m., Mondays through Fridays through Dec. 8 in the lobby of Frich Hall.

Dark alley, Pittsburgh

So tonight I wandered around Pittsburgh and noticed these mod places:

A highschooler's Obama art captured my imagination

By Scott Beveridge

NEW EAGLE, Pa. – Let's be frank. I 'm bored with all of the silly anti-President Barack Obama rhetoric comparing him to a socialist bound to ruin the United States with his policies.

But, this colored pencil drawing of Obama caught my eye today while touring a rather cool high school fine arts exhibit in southwestern Pennsylvania.

I'm not sure if the senior at Ringgold High School who drew it was attempting to suggest that our first black president should be surrounded by armed goons to protect him from angry racists or if Obama would support sending such an Army into society to enforce his agenda.

It doesn't really matter, though, what message the artist, David Petrosky, was trying to send in the piece, "Change?" He made me think. I liked his art. His work was done.

The biggest picture involved his teacher, Jocelyn M. Robison, who has been inspiring her students at the Carroll Township, Pa., school to pull off some incredible works of art.

What's more surprising was that her students have been selling their stuff at prices many professional artists would envy, especially in the Mon Valley, whose economy collapsed long before Obama took office.

The exhibit, which ranged from batiks to clay sculptures, was  scheduled to be on display this week, from 7 to 9 p.m., at the district's administration building off Route 88 in New Eagle, Pa.

King Tut's coffin in Bendaroos with apple mummies

By Kenzie Hart Beveridge, winner of first place for her mummy project in the fourth-grade division at her school's annual science project competition

The reason I chose the mummy model is because I was Googling projects and saw the mummification processes and thought it was interesting.

So, I looked through "millions" of things about mummies and especially liked how in the oldin times they preserved bodies.

I found the apple mummies. The Egyptian thing fit because it was kind of how it all started.

How to make your own APPLE MUMMY ...

1. You will need the following ingredients: 
    1 apple
    Popsicle stick or craft stick
    1 med. sized plastic bag that seals
    Natron solution - 1/2 cup table salt
                                1/2 cup sodium carbonate (powder bleach)
                                1/2 cup baking soda
2. Stir together Nation ingredients in plastic bag
3. Carve your apple head into a face. You can leave some skin on or take it off. You can take out the cor or leave it in.
4. Put the Popsicle stick through the apple and dip into Natron solution making sure the whole apple is covered.
5. Leave apple in solution until it is dried out. This will take about a month or so.

INFO: The Natron solution dries the apple just as it would dry out the human body for the mummifying process

(Kenzie is the extraordinary niece of the publisher of this blog)

Shepard Fairey is a perfect misfit at The Warhol

Controversial artist Shepard Fairey, right, discusses his style with Thomas Sokolowski, director of The Warhol, at the opening reception of Fairey's exhibit at the Pittsburgh museum.

By Scott Beveridge

PITTSBURGH, Pa. – Shepard Fairey wears his politics on his art and nowhere is that more evident than in his portrait of President George W. Bush as a vampire.

Bush, shown with evil eyes and blood dripping from his lower lip, is stark contrast to Fairey’s controversial poster of a pensive Barack Obamba above the word, “HOPE.” The phrase, “One Hell of a Leader,” is spelled under that of Bush.

“I’d much rather have a Democrat in office,” Fairey, 39, said tonight at a reception to open his exhibit, "Supply and Demand," at The Warhol in Pittsburgh, Pa.

The opening came the same day The New York Times reported Fairey changed his mind about which photo he used to created the “Hope” poster as he battles in court with the Associated Press, which claims a copyright to the photograph. The photographer who shot the image in dispute also is suing the artist. Fairey’s legal maneuver prompted his attorneys to petition the court to withdraw from the case that appears to have crumbled, the newspaper reported.

“In short-sighted pride I made some poor decisions,” Fairey said at the museum while being interviewed before a packed audience by its director, Thomas Sokolowski.

“I’m very disappointed with myself. I made some poor decisions," said the Charleston, N.C.-born man raised in private schools who later took to the streets as a skateboarder and street-poster artist.

The red, white and blue pop art Obama poster done in the style of the Russian Constructivism period of the early 1900s fueled claims that he is a Socialist.

But, Fairey said, he never took payment from the Obama campaign for the poster that ended up being reprinted into the millions, often via the Internet.

To his defense, he said he didn’t “bootleg” the original photograph or add to its value.

He likened his work to that Andy Warhol created from pre-existing images of Campbell’s soup cans.

“The reference is crucial to what I do,” he said.

There is no denying all the publicity over this controversy has greatly elevated Fairey’s status in the art world, or that he is inspired by Warhol’s silkscreen posters of controversial figures, movie stars and politicians. Nowhere is a museum such as this Pittsburgh landmark better suited for Fairey to take his bows.

The line stretched out the door for at least two hour as his admirers waited for a glimpse of him and his art, which also includes beautiful images of demure Muslim women. Fairey said he makes art about the Arab world to dispel Bush-era fear politics that led some American to believe all Muslims are fundamentalists bent on causing havoc in the West.

Fairey said it’s much easier today with the Internet to spread messages, and urged those in the audience to also use the Web and his art to empower people.

“Now you can be famous not only for 15 minutes, but in 15 minutes,” he said, embellishing on an overused phrase coined by Warhol about fleeting fame.

The early nad mysterious posters Fairey created of Andre the Giant promoting the wrestler's fake posse gave rise to the artist's street credentials. Andre and his a low-brow career created a mystique among Fairey's friends who believed they were at the forefront of the hipster crowd at the Rhode Island School of Design. He said he used that college experience to build upon his style of attempting to awaken people from the dullness of their routines.

While Fairey is wearing a well-tailored three-piece suit rather than a bizarre white wig and pink girdle to his premier at The Warhol, he arrives there with enough camera flashes that surely would have thrilled Andy.

Sorry, I slow for art

By Scott Beveridge

PITTSBURGH, Pa. – It happened again today, this time at a busy intersection beside a construction zone in Downtown.

A motorist blared the horn of his car horn while zipping around mine because I didn’t move fast enough when the traffic signal switched from red to green.

“Sorry,” I would have said if it was possible to that aggressive driver, but there were some pretty cool things to take in there along Fifth Avenue in Pittsburgh, where a new Penguins hockey arena is under construction.

An ordinary orange plastic construction fence lining that side of the building site has been turned into temporary, public art.

Upside-down orange construction cones lining the fence have been turned into planters sprouting shrubbery. The barrier also holds colorful flowers and random woven designs, some of which were created with ordinary green garden hoses. Who wouldn’t be intrigued by such creativity?

The initiative, “Construction as Canvas,” was developed as a way to connect the community to the $321-million arena that should open next summer.

The nasty motorist today wasn’t connecting. At least he didn’t show me a raised middle finger, an expression that I often witness on the road.

Artist gaining perspecitve

WASHINGTON, Pa. – Shelbie Jones studies the large portrait she is sketching from a magazine photo of a popular female rapper, stands back and notices a problem with the proportion.

“Something doesn’t look right here. I think it’s the eyes,” the 16-year-old Washington, Pa., girl says while working in a studio above an Italian restaurant in her hometown.

Her teacher at Washington Community Cultural and Arts Center, Jeffrey Katrencik, agrees and uses his hand and fingers to measure off the facial proportions in her sketch.

“You have the eyebrow down too tight to the eye,” said Katrencik, who is mentoring a half-dozen young students at WashArts in downtown Washington.

“I think it’s OK,” he said before encouraging her to draw in the hair and shadows to round out the features of the beautiful British singer and songwriter known as M.I.A.

Shelbie follows his instruction, saying she doesn’t get this kind of careful observation at Washington High School, where her art classes usually involve craft projects.

“For two hours here I’m getting individual attention from a serious artist,” she said. “It helps.”

Katrencik laughs at the thought of being called serious, although he has built an impressive resumé in the Pittsburgh art scene.

The Houston man was born into a family of artists, a son of a coal miner named Joe whose wife convinced him to enter art school. Joe Katrencik, whose parents were Slavic immigrants, then began a second career painting murals in local bars and hunting scenes on campers.

Jeffrey Katrencik earned his bachelor’s degree in drawing in 1985 from Carnegie Mellon University before obtaining a master’s in multimedia technology at Duquesne University four years ago. He earned a teaching certificate at Carlow University and also studied at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. He also teaches digital design online for the Art Institute.

He dabbled as a substitute teacher for a stretch, but found himself uncomfortable “bossing kids around.”

While hesitating to “pigeon hole” himself by labeling his art style, Katrencik said he considers himself a modernist.

“I like to twist things around,” he said.

Some of his work involves portraits of nude women, and in one piece he grossly over-exaggerated the woman’s muscles. It’s done in pen and ink, and swaths of silver glitter.

To put it mildly, he doesn’t produce hunting scenes or those featuring Indians, art that he says would find a market in Washington County.

“That’s the dilemma with some of (my) stuff. It limits where I can exhibit. I don’t want to cater to this area too much.”

He also dabbles in political art, painting a couple colorful portraits of former President George W. Bush. One was drawn of Bush with hot pink outlines and walking in a blaze of yellow flames. It has an empty cartoon “balloon” pointing to his mouth.

It’s mocking Bush’s “unclear agenda,” Katrencik said.

He also has a book cover illustration featuring Bush and two other politicians being hounded by an angry mob. A public school is burning in the background in the cover of “No Bad Schools,” a critique of American education policy by Ron Sofo and Bill Renko.

One of his more visible works can be found on a large wall at the East Parkway Bus & Ride lot in Wilkinsburg. It features a colorful montage inspired by his painting of Joe Magarac, Pittsburgh’s mythical “Man of Steel.”

Legend has it Magarac was made of steel to protect steelworkers and eventually melted himself down for products to build a new mill.

Katrencik painted the folk hero on a lark in shades of blue, green and black, assuming Joe would be a popular subject among artists competing for the public murals. Turns out, Katrencik was the only competitor with such an entry.

“I’m very much a free spirit,” he said.

(Caption: It would have been much better had Shelbie been on the other end of my camera lense, but, that is Katrencik teaching drawing at WashARTS)

Breathing new life into Pittsburgh

Asian Valley, originally uploaded by Scott Beveridge.

PITTSBURGH, Pa. – Artist Ian Thomas applies the final strokes Friday to his eye-catching large public mural, one of many that have appeared in recent years on buildings in the Pittsburgh area over the past few years.

His is titled “Urban Lung,” and it can be found on the side of an Asian market along Penn Avenue in the city’s Strip District, a Mecca for bargain prices on fresh produce and gourmet foods. Thomas, of Butler, Pa., said he came up with the idea for his interpretation of an Asian river valley by talking with the building owner and people who work or live in the area.

The murals are the brainchild of a nonprofit corporation, The Sprout Fund, which formed in 2001 to bring communities together to develop innovative projects in hopes of finding solutions to the problems that face the region.

I think the murals work great to add some beauty to areas of the city with blight and give folks something to think about while stuck in traffic on the many outdated roads in the region.

Click here to check out the six other new murals that went up this year.

Click here to take a look at those from previous years.

Here is one from a previous year by Lucas Stock further up Penn Avenue at The Midwife Center for Birth and Women's Health:

Not your MOMA

The art of James Turrell at Pittsburgh’s peculiar Mattress Factory doesn’t contribute much to global warming. Save for a few purple and red lights, the permanent exhibit has visitors feeling their way around several pitch-black rooms to experience “a blurring of the boundary between what is seen outside oneself and what is seen in the mind’s eye,” the museum's brochure guarantees about the installation.

Personally, I would rather gaze at the bold brushstrokes of a Monet or Van Gogh in a well-lit gallery than bump into complete strangers and black walls to experience the Los Angeles-born Turrell’s vision of spiritual awakening. But you have to give the Mattress Factory high marks for creating this brand of hip museum space for a contemporary artist to express himself.

Located in the city’s historic Mexican War Streets district since 1977, the museum in an old Stearns and Foster warehouse was developed as an experiment by a group of rebellious artists. Over the years, the place has earned the respect of art critics from around the world. The latest issue of GQ magazine even included the Factory as a must-see destination along the “Great American Art Drive” through such unlikely rust belt cities as Detroit and Toledo, Ohio.

There are 14 more months to breathe in The Tom Museum in Pittsburgh before it becomes an altogether different hybrid house for a new visiting artist. Pittsburgh puppeteer Tom Sarver, at times, guides people through the colorful and cluttered spaces where he cooks dinner, beds down at night and hangs thought-provoking art that speaks to everyday living. He might even play with miniature boats in an ornamental pond in his basement. And the best part – there is enough light to take in his weird show.

(Caption: The Tom House entrance at Pittsbugh's Mattress Factory)

Writing on the wall

As a journalist with an art degree, I can fully appreciate freedom of speech and expression.
But, I have never understood the logic of graffiti artists who have no problem with expressing themselves on someone else’s private property. Most of this stuff around Pittsburgh, Pa., with its big, bold, colorful letters, appears to be repetitive nonsense. From what I see, it doesn’t confront the viewer or seek some important political change. The photograph above is one of many examples of this vandalism that can be found throughout Pittsburgh’s South Side.
Some graffiti art, however, is cool enough to qualify for display in a nice gallery. Avone is once such artist in New York who comes up with some amazing images while also landing himself in quite a bit of trouble with the law. Tomorrow’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette promises a story on a local spray-paint artist who was nabbed and faces fines of more than $500,000. At that rate, the artist will never be able to afford a real canvas.

Vietnamese businesswomen

Several months ago, Montreal artist Anne Ramsden requested permission to reproduce one of my photographs taken in 2004 in Vietnam. She’s an accomplished artist and professor of visual arts at the University of Quebec. Her work has been exhibited across the globe, from Japan to the United States.

Ramsden is putting together a new exhibit of posters called, “The Museum of the Everyday,” including one of the above photo. She has begun to post the exhibit online at Flickr. So far, however, the images are just available to her list of contacts. It looks like she is putting together an amazing collection of images. Additional information on the exhibit is forthcoming.

The women shown in this photo pedal their way to the villages, trading new kitchenware for old, for a small fee. They call themselves businesswomen. I happened to snap the shot from inside a moving van while in Vietnam as a 2004 World Affairs Journalism Fellow.

My assignment then was to tell the story of the Friends of Danang of McMurray, Washington County, Pa., a group of Vietnam Veterans whose members have been doing amazing humanitarian work on their former battlefields. Follow this link to a story about what would become some of my most fond memories of the country.

Warhol at home

Friday, February 23, 2007

Warhol is always famous here

By Scott Beveridge

PITTSBURGH – Whether they like his art or not, it’s no wonder people in Pittsburgh still talk about their most-famous homegrown artist, who died 20 years ago Thursday.

If nothing else, Andy Warhol left them an outstanding museum on the city’s North Side, which always attracts crowds of people, many of whom could or did qualify as his chums. They range from blue-haired American Carpatho-Rusyn women who come to celebrate their heritage to the likes of avant-garde filmmaker John Waters, who put out an exhibit of Andy’s porn.

Both of those events took place at the same time 2006. Some visitors sneaked behind black curtains to watch graphic sex scenes while others dined in the basement on ethnic foods Warhol surely would have eaten when he was a boy. Traditional Carpatho-Rusyn versions of Donny and Marie Osmond performed lovely music on one stage while Ska musicians wearing animal masks clanged out much different sounds in a gallery. Both worlds collided to create something remarkably Warhol.

Mick Jagger was given a private tour of the place a couple years back while he was in town for a Rolling Stones concert. This year, while in an elevator to the top floor, I bumped into what appeared to be a man in drag, dolled up like the cool, sexy 1980s rocker Debbie Harry. Last week, I couldn’t help but smile while standing over a display of one of Warhol’s wardrobes, noticing that the pencil-thin celebrity wore a pale, yellow girdle and pink body suit under his black jeans.

The traveling exhibits always bring me back to this museum to fascinate over how well its curators juxtapose other people’s things beside those belonging to the artist to offer a glimpse into what made Warhol Warhol. On one occasion, the museum displayed expensive floral pattern china with bright blue, pink and orange flowers, embellishments that looked strikingly similar to the posies in Warhol’s well-known silkscreens.

Through March 18, 2007, the seven-story museum houses a creepy but captivating exhibit: “Deadly Medicine: Creating the Master Race.” It chronicles Darwinism and its focus on natural selection, the Nazi persecution of Jews and other attempts through science and medicine to justify eugenics as a means to select who lives and dies.

The museum also is showing the contents of Warhol’s medicine chest, the size of which could stock a shelf or two at Wal-Mart. It should be no surprise that he had boxes of blonde women's hair coloring, an assortment of unidentified pills and an array of creams, lotions and solutions.