3rd Annual Sculpture Garden Exhibit...at Tucson Jewish Community Center (13 Nov 2011)

A view of the sculpture garden at the Tucson Jewish Community Center

In conjunction with the "Open Studios" event, currently happening in Tucson this weekend, The Tucson Jewish Community Center hosted their 3rd Annual Sculpture Garden Exhibit. I caught it, with about 1/2 hr to spare, and with a light rain just starting... Here's how I saw  it!

This is a really nice exhibit. The JCC created a full-color explanatory booklet to go with the show, with an introduction written by Elaine King, who is a professor of Art Theory at Carnegie Mellon University. In her essay, she explains her selection criteria: work must be creative, and well-made: 

When I first entered, I was greeted by jazz music, by some cool cats. Here they art, jamming away...

Live jazz on sculpture garden patio. Coffee's inside...

Before looking at individual sculptures, I walked around the whole exhibit to get the lay of the land. I met sculptor Keven Burnett, who was still installing his sculpture called "Capricious Tongues". It looked like five weather vanes, but instead of arrows, they had tongues on a stick to point in the direction of the prevailing political winds....

Keven Burnett installing "Capricious Tongues"

cast iron wagging tongue on the end of a stick

Keven Burnett also created one of my favorite works in this show: sculpture of two men crawling up the side of the JCC, like Spiderman, each push a wire-frame boulder. The work is called "Sisyphus":

Keven Burnett's "Sisyphus"

Underneatch "Sisyphus", at ground level, is a sculpture by Lori Anderson  called "The Veteran". This piece looking like there's figure (presumably a soldier or a vet), wrapped up in what looks like are dragonfly wings.

Lori Anderson's "The Veteran"

Next to Lori Anderson's piece, is a very creative sculpture by Martha Dunham.  It is called "Forged Identity: Yitzak Rabin".  The sculpture depicts a large fingerprint.  The exhibit book has the artist stating that the human fingerprint represents life.

I wonder if that's HER fingerprint??

On the green grassy lawn, there is some art that is is definitly mimicing Nature: bent wire birds nests, created created by artists (or by some pretty strong birds) The nests are made of rusted coathanger wire and blue stone eggs.

Blue stone eggs in the center of a rusted wire cluster

One sculpture I really enjoyed was called "Agree to Disagree". It shows two abstract forms looking like two beached whales, hanging out under a swing set:

"Agree to Disagree"...giant figs having fun at the swingset

 Artist Tidi Ozeri has a sculpture here called "Tree of Knowledge". Here it is...

Tidi Ozeri's "Tree of Knowlege"

At the exhibit, I bumped into two local artists, Ben Oreck, and Vallerie Galloway! Ben is one of the sculptors in this show.

Valerie Galloway and Ben Oreck: making the sculpture scene!

...And that's my ever-so-brief art scene report...