Nard viewing JOEL S. ALLEN: work. Loveland Museum, Loveland, Colorado. June 6 – September 13, 2020
As a career artist with 30 years of pursuing the requisite technical skills to visually convey emotion and concept, I am always in search of artists whose work surprises and delights. Work that is not another version or a derivative of work I've viewed before.
Instagram is a platform I visit because it provides global access to creatives young and old. By examining and then exploring hashtags of images that I find compelling, I make discoveries of new-to-me artists. So it was that I first took note of the work of Joel S. Allen. Additional delight was mine when I read that he is a fellow-Coloradan residing in Steamboat Springs. And another dose of joy when I discovered that the artist has a current exhibition at Loveland Museum, on view through September 13th.
I've yet to meet Joel, but after viewing his vid's in which he speaks eloquently about his work, I felt a kinship of intention. The show itself is titled simply: “work.” He speaks of a passion for simply making things. This feeling is what I carried while spending a year working on the “I Never Played With Dolls” installation. It is the mental reminder I am holding while pursuing a new body of sculptural forms from fiber and encaustic. When I begin to stress over “what” I am making, I remind myself to return to a place of freedom from knowing what I'm making. Instead I think of just putting things together to create form.
And Joel has spent the good part of a year of his life creating a body of phantasmagorical forms out of precision, hand-wrapped fibers. With my current interest in textile as art material, I was immediately drawn to the strong textural aspects of his work. But what really knocked my socks off in this show is the way the artwork is suspended in space, making exquisite shadow shapes on the gallery walls, floor, and ceiling. This manner of site specific filling of space is an achievement to which I aspire.
After viewing the six short but poignant vid's he produced for this show, despite the knowledge that I'd have to brave the terrors of I-25 navigation, I knew I had to get up to Loveland to see the show in person. (Thank you, Nard, for doing the driving!). Here are some samples, but really, you need to see it in person.
