Archive for July, 2009

A solo exhibition of new work, It’s All In The Fold, by Peter Weber will open at Charlotte Jackson Fine Art on July 3 for the First Friday West Palace Art District Gallery Walk from 5:00-7:30 p.m. and extends through July 31. A Reception for the Artist will be held on Friday, July 17 from 5-7 p.m.

Squares of dense felt fabric are folded, woven, pressed. A red piece begins in a braided pattern that opens out into the natural drape of fabric. A white piece is intricately folded so that each line, highlight, and shadow offers a new aspect that echoes yet augments the last. Blue felt makes a rhythmic pattern of squares and lines that insinuate movement.

German artist Peter Weber began as a painter in the Op Art movement, working primarily with pen and ink to create intricate patterned drawings. At that time he began to make small paper foldings as invitations to his exhibitions. He soon found that his experiments trying to create more and more elaborate foldings from one single sheet were more interesting than his painting.

Over the course of many years Weber has developed his technique, in which he uses a single piece of material to create intricate patterns and designs which often trick the eye into believing they must be made from multiple pieces. He uses a variety of materials, from paper to steel, but his favored material is felt.  As Weber says, “Felt is by far the most powerful for me, since this material is very repellent against my folding ideas. So it is a great challenge for me to ‘conquer’ the material.” Often described as structures, these felt works, hanging from the wall but with a sculptural, three-dimensional form have, as one spends time with them, a distinct and persistent presence.

Although some of Weber’s artistic influences may be easily referenced by a viewer, there are other influences which are more subtle, if not less profound. Weber is a talented jazz musician and has been playing double-bass for many years. Knowing this background the pattern and repetition of lines, shadows, and folds in his work, which form a visual rhythm across the piece, become clearly linked to music. One even less obvious relationship in Weber’s work is tied to his skill as a bee-keeper. As Weber says, “I am fascinated by [the bee's] complex structure, their incredible organization of their hives, their clearly structured systems. I admire their being an ‘entirety,’ a ‘wholeness.’” It is easy to feel the kinship between these small makers of delicate and mathematically precise constructions and Weber’s elaborate and complex structures.

Understanding Weber’s technique and that these pieces are made by hand, of one piece of material, after a careful process of planning and design based on mathematical ideas certainly adds a level of complexity. Although appreciation of contemporary art often seems to require a familiarity with art history, theory, and technique, what is so refreshing about the works of Peter Weber is that although they trace a lineage to Concrete Art, Op Art, Minimalism, and in fact to the very beginnings of abstraction with its links to music, they clearly have their own inherent weight. Knowing how they are executed only adds to their magic.

For more New Mexico information visit: www.new-mexico-visitor.com

Quiet and contemplative, the pieces in Peter Weber’s It’s All In The Fold, offer viewers an experience which deftly combines mastery of material with a magic that transcends technique.

The glamour and fascination of the Old West is brought to life in a new way in this interesting collection of facts and figures. Historic photographs tell stories of their own as the faces of such Old West characters as Geronimo, General Custer and the Unsinkable Molly Brown enliven the text. This book covers the who, what, where, and how in the often violent settling of the land west of the Mississippi. The scope and history of the Old West is highlighted in a way that is both factual and entertaining in this unique presentation that will appeal to anyone interested in the Old West and the people and places that made it happen. Author Don Bullis has spent his life covering the people and places of New Mexico as a small-town newspaper editor and as a deputy sheriff and town marshal. He has traveled extensively throughout the Western United States to gather the facts, figures, and photos that make up this collection.

CHECK OUT THIS BOOK HERE!

Signings/Presentations

Friday, June 19, 2009 — 5:30-7:30pm, Western Writers of America Booksigning, National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, Oklahoma City, OK (book signing)

Saturday, July 11, 2009 — 10am, Hispanic Geneaology Research Center, Albuquerque, NM (talk & signing)

Sunday, July 12, 2009 — 12noon, Lavender in the Village Festival, Los Ranchos, NM (book signing)

Sunday, July 26, 2009 — 12noon New Mexico History Museum, Santa Fe, NM (book signing)

The Old West Trivia Book was reviewed in the July 5 issue of the Albuquerque Journal.

“Old West trivia book revels in minutiae about the good, the bad and the ugly of life on the frontier. Bullis’ book covers hundreds of … famous and infamous individuals from the Old West in chapters on soldiers, Indians, cowboys, cattlemen, politicians, and literature. There’s a newly added chapter on “Movie and Television of the Old West.” — Albuquerque Journal, July 5, 2009

For more New Mexico information visit: www.new-mexico-visitor.com

Dr. Stephen Lekson will discuss and sign his new book, A History of the Ancient Southwest (SAR Press, 2009) at 2 pm on Sunday, July 19, in the New Mexico History Museum Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public with Museum admission, which is free to NM residents on Sundays.

Dr. Lekson, a curator and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado, has drawn a decade of controversy for his theory of “the Chaco meridian” – an ancient migration pattern connecting Casas Grandes, Mexico, to Chaco Canyon in New Mexico. First pursued 10 years ago in his book The Chaco Meridien: Centers of Political Power in the Ancient Southwest, the theory continues in his latest book, sure to have archaeologists and anthropologists arguing anew.

Dr. Lekson received his doctorate in anthropology from the University of New Mexico and has more than 25 years of experience in Southwestern archaeology, with field research in Chaco Canyon, the Mesa Verde region, the Rio Grande, the Mimbres area, and the Hohokam region of southern Arizona. He has worked for the National Park Service, Arizona State Museum and the Museum of New Mexico.

From 1992-95, he was president of the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center. Dr. Lekson’s books include Intrigue of the Past: Discovering Archaeology in New Mexico; Chaco Canyon: A Center and Its World; and Great Pueblo Architecture of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico.  He has been an invited speaker at many conferences and public lectures, including the Smithosnian Institution, the Archaeological Institute of AMerica, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Arts. He has been a featured speaker on several radio and television specials, including National Public Radio, the Discovery Channel and the History Channel.

For more information on the event, call (505) 476-5200.

For more New Mexico information visit: www.new-mexico-visitor.com