Celebrating the gallery

Las Manos Gallery's 18th Anniversary Show!

Las Manos Gallery party tonight!

Las Manos Gallery turns 18

Join us to celebrate the Chicago Artists that keep the

space alive!

Tonight 6-10pm

Part of Andersonville's Night of 100 pARTies

Wine, snacks, food, good music and people...

Work in foreground by Artist Lisa Whiting. "Synopse" is

made of wool filled with rice.

Chicago Artists Month at Las Manos Gallery

Opening - Friday, October 14th, 2011. 6-10pm

Andersonville’s Night of 100 Parties

Las Manos Gallery celebrates its 18^th Anniversary and Chicago Artists Month by featuring work by a variety of the city’s artists.

Featured artist Michelle Peterson-Albandoz, owner of Las Manos Gallery, grew up in the forests of both Connecticut and Puerto Rico. Her first-hand experience with the pristine quality and balance of the ecosystems made her hyper aware of the effect humans have on the environment. Living in a big city like Chicago alerted her to the constant construction and destruction. Planks and beams that would systematically be dumped into landfills instead make their way into Michelle’s studio, where she removes nails and cuts them down. She reassembles these shapes into reclaimed wood constructions, using rhythms and patterns as part of the process. By harvesting and reusing these discarded elements, Michelle not only devises an aesthetic object, but also creates a small but significant step away from the wasting of this incredible material.

Artists in this month’s show:

Michelle Peterson-Albandoz, Michael McGuire, Tricia Rumbolz, Ben Rosecrans, Robert Burnier, Steven Green, Lisa Whiting, Lindsey Greer, Ben Bauman, Doug Reyes and Nathan W. Vaughn.

Show runs October 14th – November, 2011.

Conceptual Artist Tricia Rumbolz

Tricia Rumbolz with her piece "Excerpts From Personal Inquiries"

- Archival Ink on tissue paper

(piece is still in process and will be on display at Las Manos Gallery in October)

Time and Being: Conceptual Artists

Roman Opalka and Tricia Rumbolz

By Susan Thomas

Purity of intention and physical, focused energy are components essential to great conceptual art. Without them, a concept is merely visual, with results that range from cold or no connection with the viewer to something so intellectualized the audience feels stupid not to “get” the message. Alienating indeed. Successful conceptual artists use art as a means to relate to the world and to experience existence rather than simply express themselves. And they invite us to join their exploration.

The death this past August of Polish conceptual great Roman Opalka sparked recognition of a kindred artistic spirit, Chicago artist Tricia Rumbolz. Like Opalka, Rumbolz seeks an experience of time as a point of transformation for her art; the results visually rhythmic, organic and often mesmerizing.

Opalka died at age 77, after spending the greater part of 46 years painting the succession of numbers on canvas. This effort to document one to infinity in order to express and define the meaning/passage of time became his life’s work. Rumbolz shares Opalka’s obsession with time, albeit reflected with more variety of process. Rumbolz (who exhibits at Las Manos Gallery in Andersonville, and the now closed David Weinberg Gallery) is a conceptual artist worthy of note; her work continually underscoring and exemplifying her chosen themes.

Opalka’s main body of work, 233 canvases of the same dimension, were paint-brushed numbers. Started in 1965, all of these works are titled the same, “Opalka 1965-Infinity,” (infinity represented by a sideways 8). His goal was to visualize the irreversible passage of time. Year after year the disciplined aesthetic stood at the canvas painting numerals in succession, in later years, photographing himself next the to canvas or “detail” at the end of each session (passing 1,000,000 in the early 1970’s). He would recite each number aloud as he painted it. The only variance in Opalka’s process was to lighten his background from black to gray, adding 1% more white to it every year. Ultimately, because his acrylic numbers were painted in white, the background and the subject meshed almost indistinguishably into approaching invisibility.

Opalka did not stray from his concept since its inception, pursuing a singular vision with awe-inspiring discipline. “A single thing, a single life,” he said. Rumbolz prefers differing her approaches to illustrate time, place, energy and physicality. In “187 Vertical Lines,” (acrylic paint, paint pen on wooden panel) Rumbolz describes the physicality and immediacy of her process: “My hand performs like a sensor, a point of convergence between time, space, energy and my body; the drawings are visual imprints/recordings of the activity itself.” She works with intense precision. “I do this to infuse the work with authenticity: This is what my individual body/mind is capable of producing at this given moment,” says Rumbolz. The line drawings are sequential, “the preceding line always and only informs the following line, therefore the drawing reveals itself slowly and methodically,” Rumbolz explains. A sensual scrim of undulating lines is the end result of her initial conceptual question: What is the simplest mark a hand can make?

"4,221 Lines"

"10 Color 60 Second Marker Bleed" - Marker ink on typing paper

Most of her works take hundreds upon hundreds of hours to complete, certainly less obsessionistic (and some would say less masochistic) than Opalka’s quest. And no less dramatic are Rumbolz’s work chronicling just seconds in time. In “1/4 Teaspoon of Powder, Blown with One Breath,” for example, particulate white powder’s time/space journey is captured starkly on black paper exactly where it lands: the powder’s movement documenting the energy and the time it takes to blow one breath. “10-Second Marker Bleed,” is just as scientific in execution and titled just as obviously. The process is fundamentally part of the art, the literal title also a form of purity of intention.

"1/4 Teaspoon of Powder, Blown with One Breath" - Flour on velvet Paper

(detail of piece at right)

Rumbolz, 42, grew up in the steel-mill town of Sterling, Illinois, with very limited exposure to contemporary art. She credits the BFA program at UIC for instilling in her a strong conceptual foundation. “The faculty really pushed us to take accountability for every choice we made,” she says. She shares the ideology of other great conceptual artists such as On Kawara, Hanne Darboven and Lee Ufon in their quests to find the meaning in simply “being.”

Lee Ufon sought interrelationships between material space and viewer, acutely aware of the immediacy of the body’s role in the act of creation, which is central to how Rumbolz physically approaches her work. Darboven used texts from authors exploring “being.” Rumbolz also utilizes words and their symbolism in her art. Kawara’s work indicates specificity of time and place, though with more graphic toughness than Rumbolz. Central to all of these artists is their search for the deeper meaning of consciousness through creative process.

The intensity and purity of process also unites these artists in their quest. “Before I begin the physical work, I distill a mental concept down to its basic aesthetic components,” Rumbolz explains. “My style is straightforward and systematic so the steps involved in making the work are apparent to the viewer. I reveal the structure of the act which shows how beauty can be achieved through the simplest of means.”

Like the aforementioned artists, Rumbolz is a minimalist with her self-expression and has no desire to create “agreeable” art. These artists rebel against society’s endless manufacturing, production and consumption. “I do feel tribe-less at times,” Rumbolz says. “The hours and intensity involved in my art can definitely be isolating and I have to make an effort to compensate for that. We live in such fast-paced society that craves consumerism and instant gratification. My work is antithetical to that.” In a case of life imitating art, Rumbolz is simplifying her life now as well, downsizing her space and possessions considerably. Her next path of artistic exploration will incorporate data and technology into her process.

Opalka almost lost consciousness when he embarked on his journey, painting the number 1, then uttering it verbally. The enormity of the task he set before himself, like infinity, too great to comprehend. The final digit he painted on his canvas before he died was eight: Ironically, it is the symbol for infinity when turned on its side. His work of time and timelessness shared experientially on canvas is finished. As he said, “It is creation that inhabits the space between experience and understanding.” Now reminding us to continue such inner journeys is Tricia Rumbolz. Her work makes us pause deeply with thought and wonder, an offering of time accepted by contemplating the focus and energy of her work.

--Susan Thomas is a freelance writer .

"Excerpts from 'Clay, the History and Evolution of Humankind's Relationships with Earth's Most Primal Element' " -Ink on painted wooden panel (details at right)

Featured Artist Wendy Kawabata

Las Manos Gallery Presents Wendy Kawabata

Wendy Kawabata is an Associate Professor of Art at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Her work engages in acts of the hand, using repetitive acts such as stacking, folding, hooking and wrapping. Her end result serves as a metaphor for the endless line of small but productive tasks that become the framework of communities in the face of larger, more powerful undoings.

For more images and information please check out

Wendy's website HERE.

The Paper Exhibition: Coffee with the Artists

Las Manos Gallery hosted "Coffee with the Artists" as part of October's Paper Exhibition.

This month's show features artists Benjamin Bauman, Doug Stapleton, Eric Garcia, Wendy Kawabata, John Mosher, C. Ben Rosecrans, Jonas Criscoe, Lindsey Clark-Ryan, Mark Pease, Matthew Best, John McCaughey, Michael McGuire, Nathan Torrence, Robert Burnier, Tricia Rumbolz.

Show runs September 17 - October 9th, 2011

"When the Coyotes Come Home" by Jonas Criscoe

The "Constellating" Series by Wendy Kawabata.

A close-up of one of Wendy Kawabata's Constellating pieces.

Pencil on paper.

Benjamin Bauman's Untitled series.

Graphite on paper by Bauman.

Michael McGuire stands with his "Untitled" piece of india ink on cardboard.

Doug Stapleton with a few of his collages at the Paper Exhibition.

Tricia Rumbolz holds Pablo the gallery pooch while standing in front of her piece titled "Primary and Secondary Colored Lines on 364 colors"

Robert Burnier sits with his piece titled "Fractorial 3" on yupo paper and conservation tape. The piece is bellow the pencil on paper drawings by Wendy Kawabata.

Nathan Torrence stands with his Untitled series of pen on tracing paper.

Torrence's piece of pen on tracing paper.

John McCaughey's "Translation" consisting of latex paint, acrylic, newspaper & silkscreen on paper.

C. Ben Rosecrans's "Untitled SL 1.50-SL 4.50," mixed media on paper.

Eric Garcia's "Tamale Man #4," a silk screen.

The Paper Exhibition at Las Manos Gallery

Las Manos Gallery Presents

The Paper Exhibition!

Join us for Coffee with the Artists

Saturday, September 17th 1-3pm!

Artists:

Wendy Kawabata, Jonas Criscoe, Doug Stapleton,

Benjamin Bauman, John McCaughey, Matthew Best,

Tricia Rumbolz, Michael McGuire, John Mosher,

Robert Burnier, Nathan Torrence, Eric Garcia,

Lindsey Clark-Ryan and Mark Pease.