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REA BALDRIDGE & JOSEPH MILLS |
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 18, 2009
Contact: Joy Reed Belt 405/842-6336
jreedbelt@joyreedbelt.com
JRB ART AT THE ELMS FEATURES REA BALDRIDGE & JOSEPH MILLS IN JULY
OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. – An exhibition featuring a variety of works by Rea Baldridge and Joseph Mills will open with an artist’s reception on Friday, July 3, 2009, from 6:00 to 10:00 p.m., at JRB Art at The Elms during the monthly Gallery Walk in Oklahoma City’s Paseo Arts District. The exhibit runs through July 25th.
Rea Baldridge and Joseph Mills, both well known members of the Oklahoma City Art Community, have produced individual work as well as collaborative works that have been exhibited in numerous shows locally and nationally. Mills works in both film and digital imagery - and on occasion, mixed media and word/image explorations "addressing problematical aesthetics." More recently, the artistic sensibility of Baldridge has been focused toward oil on canvas, as well as mixed media paintings and installations.
Christopher Youngs, Director of the Freedman Gallery at the Albright College for the Arts, says about Joseph Mills,
"...his (Mills), images are stripped of extraneous imagery and left with an almost dreamlike environment. There is a definite element of mystery in these depictions. The representations appear almost as recordings of phantoms, more like elusive landscapes of the mind than like documents of an external surrounding. There is a mastery of techniques captured in these works; an inspired sense of composition combined with contrasts of light not dissimilar with the Film Noir tradition of cinema..."
All of Mills’ multi-exposure panoramas, including those that are sequenced and overlapping, are created “in camera”. All exposures are un-cropped, unedited, and created without the employment of any photoshop “tricks”. The series of photographic images featured in this exhibition were captured with the little plastic toy DIANA camera, which was first produced during the early 1960s in Kowloon, Hong Kong, by the "Great Wall Plastic Factory" priced at one dollar. They were usually given away as novelties or prizes at fairs, carnivals, or other public events and were discontinued in the 1970's.
For those familiar with the artistic sensibility of Rea Baldridge, one can usually expect to be amused, challenged, or simply perplexed when viewing one of her creations. A cat playing with its prey comes to mind, in surmising the mental gymnastics she exhibits in her work.
Baldridge is an Oklahoma artist who has worked in a variety of disciplines, and her work is not easy to categorize. She is a painter, but some of her most interesting work has been rendered without a stroke. Fascinated with the "process" of culture, she has made artworks by drawing together (replicating Imperfectly), "corporations", that don't pay dividends; "products" that are not for sale; and even an a-political "political party". In concrete form, her works resemble "artifacts" left in the wake of an idea. For the last several years, her work has been focused towards, in her own words, "having a conversation with the canvas and discovering images that appear, and change, and vanish even while looking".
JRB Art at The Elms presents a diverse roster of emerging, established, and internationally exhibited artists who create in a wide range of media including: paintings, drawings, sculpture, ceramics, glass, fine crafts, functional objects, fiber art and photographs. This award winning gallery in Oklahoma City’s Paseo Arts District with its historic 4,500 square foot exhibition space, changes its exhibits monthly in a gracious environment that fosters a dialogue between the arts and the larger community while providing quality art for first time buyers as well as individual, corporate and museum collections.
JRB Art at The Elms, the former home of Nan Sheets which was built in 1920, is located at 2810 North Walker and is open Monday through Saturday, 10-6, and Sunday 1-5. Phone: (405) 528-6336, website: www.jrbartgallery.com, e-mail: jrb@coxinet.net.
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© Joy Reed Belt 2010
All prices subject to change without notice - not responsible for errors. Availability, price and shipping charges can be confirmed by e-mail or phone prior to purchase. |
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