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Visual Arts: Dance: Books:
UO
MFA Exhibit Here's one good reason to see the Masters of Fine Arts Exhibit at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art: the work of painter Marshall Roemen. Eight other good reasons are the work by painter Todd Griffith; photography by Amjad Faur and Angaleen Schroeder; metalsmithing and jewelry by Ukiko Honda; printmaking by Kristie A. Johnson and Chadwick Tolley; fibers by Sally Metcalf; and visual design by Joseph Stengel-Goetz.
Roemen is a Eugenean, raised by a supportive, privileged family, educated at Roosevelt and South Eugene, and encouraged in his career choice of fine art by his mother, also an abstract painter. He is a thoughtful, well-spoken man, looking forward to getting married in July and moving with his wife to L.A. or New York to pursue their careers. Roemen's large, mysterious, representational painting, Predicament (mixed media with silver leaf, 13'4" x 13'4"), is perfect for this space. I'm pleased Roemen took the risk of working on such a large scale for the museum's first MFA exhibit. He has created elegant, interesting work in both Predicament and an abstract diptych on the opposite wall entitled Ruach (mixed media with silver leaf on linen, 10'6" x 14'). The figure in Predicament seems to ask her image reflected in a silver platter a serious, introspective question, such as "Who am I?" I feel she is not looking back at her life, but pondering questions about the future. My daughter was 10 years old when we moved to Eugene, and I recalled how her dreams changed and deepened as she approached puberty. I ran some of these thoughts by Roemen, and he said the figure was inspired by his younger sister, Lyla, who is 11. "The figure dissolves into the space it inhabits," he said. "I was interested in obscuring the face, articulating the space around her in the room, and showing that it is a silver platter she's looking into." The platter relates to privilege he said. The predicament the artist expresses is one of reflection and self-reflection. The silver leaf in Predicament began with putting something of material worth in the work, Roemen said. But the way silver tarnishes, the way it reflects light and the way it makes the light in the room part of the painting are part of the process. "First you do, then you assess," he said, "rather than prescribe from the beginning." I hope viewers spend a few minutes with Predicament, sitting nearby or moving away to look from a distance. It's a very strong painting, but the emotions it carries are subtle and require time to emerge. I asked Roemen the most interesting comment anyone had made about his work. "Where are we?" he said. A person who had been looking at the two panels of Ruach was uncertain whether the painting depicted something that existed within an atom (the micro view) or was as expansive as the universe.
Roemen's goal in Ruach was to get "outside of easily recognized forms and outside myself," he said. He worked on his studio floor. He began with a large, sweep of paint across the width of the two pieces, like an under-painting of transparent gray or charcoal. This has led some people to see wings or butterflies there, rather like Rorschach inkblot patterns, he said. "Depending on where the painting is shown, different things emerge," the painter said, noting that the silver leaf in particular looked different in his studio than in the gallery. The surprise of what occurs in the act of painting — the dynamic of painting — is the process Roemen most enjoyed. "Forms and colors started to emerge," he said. "I thought of the painting as an environment into which I could put anything." Ruach is a Hebrew word that refers to "the animating force or breath of God," Roemen said, "or to the shared breath of people. I didn't want to depict the breath of God but rather the notion that you share somehow in this. Breath is imparted to you. In a sense, ruach is the understanding of yourself as a creator." At the UO, Roemen studied for three years with painting teachers Ron Graff, Laura Vandenburgh and Carla Bengtson. He has worked as a commercial artist, an illustrator and a muralist. One of his murals can be seen in the Gilbert Shopping Center on Highway 99. Catch the work of this creative painter now, at the beginning of his career, before he goes off to one of the big cities to make his mark. The show runs through June 26.
I've
Got Rhythm Tap dance: Maligned, misunderstood, it might seem like a creaky art form. When we think of tap, we might gag on an image of wee Shirley Temple mincing about with bobbing curls, or feel numbed by the repetition of dance cadets high-kicking with wanton abandon. But tap is cool, man, like jazz: an American tradition.
The roots of tap find their way to Africa, to the West Indies, commingling with the rhythms of French, English and Irish culture. Tap embodies the sultry south and the urban north. Tap is an original. And Musical Feet Director Jeanette Frame gets this: The work her school produces gleans its style from a deeper chord. They're emulating the greats. In their upcoming concert, Musical Feet tap students offer a range of new pieces. "The Way You Move" is a jazzy showcase that plays with the beat, gliding underneath it and hovering somewhere on top. Dancers with varying degrees of fluidity and expression still pull off a piece that demands clicking precision. "Sonar" is a ticklish nod to jazz standards, and the easy-breezy style that is so well suited to conversational duets or inventive soloing. The dancers slip through some clever combinations, but the overuse of unison makes the whole seem a little flat. In "Hot Chocolate," the company finds success in that powerful form, the chorus line. Playful and zesty, the piece wins with simple lines and enthusiastic execution. My only question is, where are the boys? Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Gregory Hines, Savion Glover – lots of talent there. But c'mon, fellas, dance is also a great way to meet girls. Musical Feet's 27th annual Student Concert, "Rhythm & Shoes," is offered at 7:30 pm on Friday and Saturday, June 17-18 at the Hult Center. Tickets are $15 adults, $13 ages12 and under.
Into
the Dark Gifts, fiction by Ursula K. Le Guin. Harcourt Books, 2004. Hardcover, $17. When I first encountered Ursula K. Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea, I had no idea it was written for, or at least published for, a young audience. It came from my mother's overstocked fantasy bookshelves, and I thought it was no different from the books it sat next to. It didn't sound like a kids' book, when my mother read it to me, and it didn't look like one either (this edition's cover featured a young man with a nasty beast on his shoulders). It wasn't until I was in college that I saw the Newbery Honor medal on The Tombs of Atuan, the second Earthsea book, and realized the series was aimed at Newbery-age readers (14 and under).
What gives Le Guin's children's books (though it seems too narrow a term) such broad appeal is the graceful, straightforward way she writes about, rather than to, children and young adults. It's the same reason Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" series is found in the fantasy section as well as the young adult room; these are books written in a frank, poetic language that speaks to all readers, transcending the age of the characters. Gifts is Le Guin's first book for teens in 14 years. It's the story of Orrec and Gry, two young people living in the Uplands, desolate farmlands far from any cities. The people of the Uplands live in tenuous peace, guarding their families, lands and livelihood from other clans. The lives of the Uplands residents are outlined by the gifts, strange powers that run in each hereditary line and often require little more than a look to use. The powers vary, from the gift of calling (Gry's family power and a way to train animals or call them to be hunted) to the rein (the ability to take a person's will) to the undoing, Orrec's clan's power and one of which he will not speak. Orrec will tell stories, though, and Gifts is ultimately a lovely, spooky history of the stories Orrec knows, lives and learns. It begins at the end and makes its way back around, through the tales Orrec heard as a child of Blind Caddard, a man whose gift of undoing was so strong he chose to blind himself rather than use it, and into the stories Orrec learns from his mother, who came from the Lowlands. Orrec is slow to come into his gift, reluctant to use it, and with good cause: The undoing leaves a sack of meat instead of a living creature. Driven too hard by his father, Orrec burns with fury in a clearing, unwilling to use his gift and thus unable to control it. Nothing remains but dead animals, dry grass and a split, charred tree. And so Orrec retreats to the dark, living with a blindfold tied around his head. Everyone fears his wild gift, but fear begets hatred, none so strong as that of the neighboring Drummant clan. As Orrec comes to terms with his gift, so does gentle, reticent Gry with hers, and the two of them begin to doubt that the gifts are being used as they were intended. Orrec's voice is clear and simple, the narration of a practical young man finding the strength to shape his life without using a dangerous power or being who anyone else expects him to be. It's a timely story and a lovely one, even when the darker uses of the gifts make a reader's skin crawl. Le Guin's talent for telling a tale for all ears and eyes is as strong as ever; don't write off this remarkable book simply because you'd have to look in a different section to find it.
BOOK NOTES William L. Sullivan discusses and shows slides for 100 Hikes in the Central Oregon Cascades, 7 pm 6/16 at Barnes & Noble … David McCullough (1776) reads, 7:30 pm 6/17 at First Congregational Church, Portland. $12, $8 stu., sr. … Dorothy Morrison (Everyday Sun Magic) reads, 7 pm 6/18 at Mother Kali's … Adam Fawer (Improbable) and James Rollins (Map of Bones) read, 7:30 pm 6/20 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland … 6th Biennial Conference of the Associaton for the study of Literature and the Environment (ASLE) at the UO, June 21-26. Speakers include Ursula K. Le Guin, David Suzuki, Elizabeth Woody, Kathleen Dean Moore and John Daniel. 346-3938 for information … Michael Cunningham (Specimen Days) reads, 7:30 pm 6/21 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland … John Seed (co-author of Thinking Like a Mountain: Towards a Council of All Beings) appears at 7 pm 6/23 at the EMU, UO … Andrew Carroll (Behind the Lines) reads, 7:30 pm 6/23 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland … Roberta Price (Huerfano) reads, 7:30 pm 6/23 at Powell's on Hawthorne, Portland … Norm Stamper (Breaking Rank) reads, 7:30 pm 6/24 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland … Oregon Writers Colony presents Jay Lake, 7 pm 6/27 at Powell's in Beaverton … Martin Sherwin (American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of Robert J. Oppenheimer) reads, 7:30 pm 6/28 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland … Shannon Applegate (Living Among Headstones) reads, 7:30 pm 6/30 at Powell's on Hawthorne, Portland … Sam Brumbaugh (Goodbye, Goodness) with musician Stephen Malkmus, 7:30 pm 6/30 at Powell's on Burnside, Portland.
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