The opening reception of the Summer Landscape Show at Olson-Larsen Galleries was well attended on May 30, 2008. There was not time for me to take my turn looking at all of the pieces before I had to leave. Regardless of the time I had to see any particular piece, the entire show left me uninspired.
The scenes were of images I have come to find ordinary and the artists did not offer me any new perspectives. A group of hay bales by Gary Bowling brought the same reaction as a similar scene by Bobbie McKibbin, although up close the different brush strokes and other individual techniques could be seen. Barbara Fedeler’s charcoal on paper pieces were sketches that brought to mind maps and land documentation before the age of photography. For these pieces I found that having the titles connecting the scenes with specific geographical locations complemented the art. However, for most of the show I became less enchanted with the work when the title put the scene in a specific location instead of letting it stand as a generic, yet mystical, example.
John Preston’s scenes of roads on rolling hills, when painted on linen, attracted my interest. The texture of the linen added a suggestion of reality and made it seem as though I could be driving (or riding a bicycle) down that road. Preston also painted similar scenes in watercolor on paper. The shapes of the clouds and the path of the road did not change but the images flattened and the colors washed out.
Eugenie Torgerson had several pieces in the show with a variety of mediums and mixed results. Her three-dimensional mixed-media pieces were my favorite of the show and I would liked to have had time to look at them more closely. The easiest to describe is a piece called “Map Room Box and Journals.” It had bound booklets inside it, suggestive of notes an explorer might take. The outside reminded me both of an at-home craft project and an expensive art-inspired container, such as a person who is wealthy enough to spend time exploring unknown places might have.
People were also finding their way to the Hentschel Art Gallery‘s opening of Larry Roots’s “New Places” show on May 30th. For Roots, new places are not geographical. They are the places where art can take a person, mentally and emotionally.
His choice of titles can flummox somebody who takes them too literally. His “Minerology” evokes thoughts of rocks that time intertwined and left veined with a multitude of colors. Roots chose the title because the paints used in the piece gained their color from dyes created from minerals. Two of his pieces incorporate large circles, dabs, of color, in a faux marble effect. I was trying to interpret “Florencia” in terms of ancient Italy, flaking mosaics, and peeling paint. Roots said he choose the title “Manchurin” because the image reminded him of cherry blossoms with which he associated Asia.
Most of the pieces in the “New Places” exhibit are pigment on lexan. This creates an intense image. Add in the size of the paintings and the simple process of moving from one shade of a color to another creates a dynamic, powerful map. It is up to the viewer to interpret and to understand the map. Roots also has works that are monochromatic but again the use of black’s numerous shades creates depth and structure in his paintings. The inclusion of monochromatic paintings in the exhibit allow the viewer to see repetition of brush strokes and shading techniques in the paintings that use color.
M.R. Field writes reviews for AroundDesMoines.com. 
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