Will Van Dyke's Ode to a Chicago Water Tower at the Quad City Arts International Airport Gallery -- through August 30.

Through Monday, August 30

Quad City Arts International Airport Gallery, 2200 69th Avenue, Moline IL

At the Quad City Arts International Airport Gallery, the second half of 2021 is being jump-started with vibrant explosions of color and varied artistic mediums that can be found in a trio of new exhibitions on display through August 30: exhibits of ceramic works by Will Van Dyke, paintings by Anne Kauf, and textiles by Kara Fedje.

Will Van Dyke is both a painter and ceramic artist who has an abiding interest and delight in the visual, whether it is wooden barns, corn cribs, steel bridges, ceramic bowls, concrete silos, or a rusted piece of metal in the street that catches his eye as he walks to work. As he states, “I am constantly drawn to forms, shapes and images, both urban and rural.  Toshiko Takaezu and Warren Mackenzie have heavily influenced my ceramic art. Toshiko’s wonderful shapes and forms, especially her bottle forms, with their mysterious openings and vibrant colors and glazing gave me much to emulate and admire. Warren’s work I admire for its simplicity and human centered approach with pots made for everyday use and enjoyment, and I have used these two artists as touchstones for my own work."

Van Dyke continues, "Most recently I have incorporated water tower, corn crib and silo sculptures into my ceramic work, echoing my delight in these urban and rural structures, many of which are being lost forever, as corn cribs collapse under their own weight after years of neglect, and water towers, especially in Chicago, which are eliminated as the buildings they stood on are demolished to make way for new, taller buildings."

Anne Kauf's Brown Cow

Painter Kauf states, "My love of farms and open spaces reflects a longing for solitude and quiet in a noisy culture. I veered from my roots as a plein air painter to explore barn imagery after attending the Fields Project, a residency in Oregon IL that embedded artists in the everyday life of farm families. This residency deeply impacted my work. I was drawn to the simple shapes of barns, and how firmly they were rooted in their environment. I returned to the Fields Project for five consecutive years, taking photographs and painting on location. Out of this came a series I call Barnscapes, which focuses on the relationship between land, sky, and the structures associated with farm life."

She continues, "With the advent of the pandemic my subject matter broadened. I set about taking long walks in my neighborhood as a way of dealing with stress. As I walked, I noticed a similar sense of rootedness in the small ranch houses and bungalows that I passed. People had made them their own in very idiosyncratic ways. The streets were eerily empty at the start of the pandemic, and I began photographing things that caught my eye- a shadow on the side of a garage, a jumble of roof lines. These too become paintings that express a sense of place.

"My process has evolved over the years," says Kauf. "Out of the dozens of photographs I may take at any given time, one will draw my attention and become a springboard for painting. Formal concerns and problem solving initially drive the work, but at some point, I recognize that a narrative is taking hold. A mood or an emotional state has asserted itself, and when this happens, I try to step back and let the painting go where it will. The paintings that succeed allow the viewer to step into a place that is both particular, and at the same time universal."

Kara Fedje's Maclay Gardens

Describing new new textile exhibition, Fedje says, "The inspiration for these handwoven tapestries is colorful environmental landscapes. After seven months pass, I will have seven framed tapestries. Each tapestry range in size but generally are about 18"" x 24"" (unframed.) With the custom frames, each work of art totals about 22" x 28."

"In the past three years," Fedje continues, "I have had the opportunity to travel north to the Great Lakes of Superior and Michigan, the Upper Peninsula, Northern Wisconsin and the north shore of Minnesota. The exoticness of this landscape full of rivers, bogs, preserves, fens, falls and lakes. These diverse waterways have been a large source of inspiration for my most recent work. The driftless landscapes, endless floating other-worldly spaces, waterfalls with phosphorescent mists have entered my paintings and have become metaphors for our current pandemic era. The knotted, painted combinations force a continual shift of attention among the many levels. I compare this to a single moment in landscape and the competing levels of activity. It's the density of this kind of experience that continues to raise questions and excite me as a painter."

The Quad City International Airport Gallery is located opposite the airport's gift shop and restaurant, there is a $1 fee for parking, and works from the Will Van Dyke, Anne Kauf, and Kara Fedje exhibitions are also currently viewable through Quad City Arts' Web site. For more information on the exhibits on display through August 30, call (309)793-1213 and visit QuadCityArts.com.

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