Savannahians and tourists alike will enjoy July’s First Friday in Starland, celebrating our coolest neighborhood’s local businesses, art, and food (find all the details on Instagram, @starlandfirstfridays). On Friday, July 5, be sure to visit the Ellis Gallery, inside nonprofit ARTS Southeast at 2301 Bull St., for the opening of a six-week exhibition Glued to The Horse by John Paul Kesling.
Kesling (b. 1980) was raised in Northeastern Kentucky, received a B.F.A. in Arts from Morehead State University, and his M.F.A. in Painting from SCAD in 2010. He spent six years in Brooklyn, NY before relocating to Madison, just outside of Nashville, Tennesee. He is a member of the artist collective at Ground Floor Contemporary (Birmingham, Alabama), and is represented by The Red Arrow Gallery in Nashville and Wheelhouse Art in Louisville, Kentucky. The recipient of several prestigious residencies, Kesling was most recently ARTS Southeast’s ON::View Artist-in-Residence during May of this year and is featured in the nonprofit’s most recent issue of IMPACT Arts & Culture Magazine.
With sweeping brush strokes and bold colors, Kesling’s collection of paintings visualizes the passion and tenderness of human connection. He says, “Thinking about the lack of intimacy during the height of the pandemic, the “kissing” paintings were born. With nostalgia in mind, the early paintings of this series were visual dissections of that first kiss with somebody new. The thrill and fear, hope and trauma that normally connect in that moment, amplified by a potentially deadly virus. As these works have continued developing over the years, the daily news, both globally and personally, has sent them in new directions. Still rooted in the relationships we form, this work pieces together the excitement and vulnerability we feel with those we allow into our hearts and homes.”
He continues, “In the ‘Pietà’ paintings of shaped and engraved plywood, I reinterpret the iconic religious imagery of the Madonna and Child through a contemporary retreatment of the surface. Reminiscent of headstones, they become places of quiet reflection, compassion, and remembrance. Using current conversations, tragedies, news, local histories, and local materials in real-time during the making of these pieces, they become process-based time-capsules of contemporary moments.”
While checking out Kesling’s show at ARTS Southeast, be sure to see the Good Vibrations show in the Supporter Gallery. Included in the group exhibition are works by some of the nonprofit’s artist supporters: Bede van Dyke, Joy Dunigan, Lisa D. Watson, Nathaniel Thompson, Heather L. Young, Maxx Feist, and many others. It truly is a cornucopia of fun, vibrant, summertime work.
Savannah, and Telfair Museums in particular, will miss the intelligent, warm and vivacious assistant curator, Anne-Solene Bayan who soon embarks on her doctoral program at Cornell. Come out to the Jepson Center, 207 W. York St., on Thursday, July 18 from 6–8 p.m. to experience Of One Mind, an exhibition curated by Bayan as part of the Museums’ #art912 initiative, a platform dedicated to raising the visibility and vitality of artists living and working in Savannah.
Of One Mind is a collaboration between local artists Autumn Gary (b. 1975), an American/First Nations painter, sculptor, and art instructor from Portland, Oregon whose practice revolves around therapeutic art outreach, public art, and intertribal collaboration with indigenous/native arts communities, and Alexis Javier (b. 1982), an American mixed-media artist with Puerto Rican roots, who earned his B.F.A. from SCAD in 2006 and is a founding member of ARTS Southeast’s Sulfur Studios and the Latin/Native American art collective SOY X SOY (pronounced “soy como soy”).
Their show is based on the theme of “oneness;’ Gary and Javier’s July 18 will explain the inspiration they drew from the Haudenosaunee (also known as the Iroquois Confederacy or Six Nations) Thanksgiving Address. In this invocation, participants express gratitude for life-sustaining forces and elements, with each verse concluding with the refrain: “Now our minds are one.” Gary and Javier’s series of abstract sculptures demonstrates humanity’s symbiotic relationship to the cosmos and the recurring myths that connect the ancient past, our present moment, and the future.
Continuing its run during the first part of this month is the group show Sugar Sugar at Location Gallery, inside Corcoran Austin Hill Realty at 251 Bull St. Many beloved Savannah artists, including Stacie Jean Albano, Michelle Perez, Charissa Murray, and highly acclaimed, super-realist painter June Stratton, have depicted low-cal, high-impact sweet treats, food, and desserts in a variety of mediums.
Peter E. Roberts
Robert’s “Amity Island.” A papercut assemblage referencing the fictional beach community in the 1975 movie “Jaws”
On Saturday, July 20, all Savannah art lovers should flock to Location Gallery from 4–7 p.m. to wish artist and gallery director Peter E. Roberts a happy 60th birthday, and view his Mental Properties show! Roberts has almost single-handedly promoted and championed local artists since the gallery’s inception in early 2016. As an artist himself, he is known for his witty, clever, and “punny” sense of humor displayed in affordable, impeccably executed, papercut art pieces.
Peters tells me, “1972 started this strange pathway of being seen through artwork. My second grader’s rendition of a book cover for ‘The Wizard of Oz’ was selected as part of the Fairfield Children’s Library annual art show … 43 years later was my first solo art show, Elsewhere, marking my 50th trip around the sun. To mark my 60th on July 20, I was inspired to re-visit that very first show and reinterpret as Mental Properties—a series of multi-dimensional papercuts depicting travel posters from fictional places found in book, film, music, comics and television.”
Prepare to be delighted! Gallery profits from the Mental Properties show will be donated to nonprofit ARTS Southeast. Also, I encourage you to visit the Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum to view a summer installation entitled Waves of Wonder. Featuring works funded by UGA Marine Extension and Georgia Sea Grant’s Artists, it includes paintings by Savannah artists Kip Bradley and Jennifer Nolan.
I attended last month’s opening and was impressed by the quality of the work which encompasses a diverse range of disciplines—painting, sculpture, photography, illustration, sound, film, and even dance from 11 former and current AWS grant recipients. Each project was created to offer a fresh perspective on the intricate relationships that define coastal life, from the interconnectedness of animal communities to the profound connections between humans and the natural world.
Finally, I must mention my sadness and distress that two more downtown galleries closed last month: The Savannah Gallery of Art, and the artist collective, Kobo Gallery (still with an online presence). The latter was winner of several Best of Savannah awards over its 17 years in Savannah (on Barnard Street). Many factors were in play which led to the closings, but I implore anyone reading this to seek out shows and locations highlighted here this month. Help us keep Savannah creative by supporting the local artists here!
