National Geographic photographer’s new book makes the past present
By Jeannie Ralston

Book Signing
Still: Cowboys at the Start of the 21st Century 
Robb Kendrick
Tue, Mar 4, 6–8pm
Berlin Restaurant
Umarán 19

Even before he moved to San Miguel with his family in January 2006, Robb Kendrick was used to straddling two different worlds.

Originally from Texas, Kendrick is best known for his work as a National Geographic photographer. He has shot 17 feature stories for the magazine that have taken him from Antarctica to the slopes of Mount Everest and 47 countries around the world. The documentary photos he shoots for Geographic are color digital. 

But Kendrick, 45, has a photographic passion that is from another time, another speed. For eight years, squeezed in with his Geographic work, he has been making tintype portraits that have a timeless, haunting beauty. Tintypes were popular 150 years ago. The process is labor-intensive and very low-tech, resulting in one-of-a-kind images on metal plates.

To produce his tintypes, Kendrick has had special cameras made, found antique lenses from the 1800s and has designed a portable darkroom because he must develop the images on location.

His two disparate photographic specialties came together in December 2007 when National Geographic published his tintype portraits of modern cowboys living in Mexico, the American West and Canada.

Now the portraits he took for that story—over two years and 41,000 miles—are collected in a new book called Still: Cowboys at the Start of the 21st Century, published in February by the University of Texas Press. 

The photographs in the book reveal the rich variety of people who are drawn to the cowboy life—women as well as men, Native Americans, Mexican-Americans and African-Americans as well as Anglos. The images also show regional variations in dress and gear, from the “taco” rolled-brim hats of Texas cowpunchers to the braided rawhide reatas of Oregon buckaroos. Marianne Wiggins, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated author of a recent novel about Edward S. Curtis, introduces the volume, and Jay Dusard, a photographer renowned for his cowboy images, provides the afterword. Kendrick tells the backstory of the project in his photographer’s notes, while interweaving stories from the cowboys themselves among the images.

Both an evocative work of art and a masterful documentary record, Still honors the resilience of modern cowboys as they bring traditional ways of living on the land into the 21st century.

Kendrick will sign copies at the reception. Wine and hors d’oeuvres will be served. Part of the proceeds from book sales will be donated to the local bilingual school, Naciones Unidas. Kendrick also will sell prints of his work and copies of his first book of tintypes called Revealing Character. A portion of these sales also will be donated to Naciones Unidas. 

Robb is currently working on another tintype project based in Mexico.

Jeannie Ralston may be reached at jralston@moment.net. 

Center stage: The found object assemblages of Mathey and Mahan
By Melanie Harris de Maycotte

Art Opening
Claude Mathey and Patricia Mahan
Sat, Mar 1, 5–8pm
Galería/Atelier
Fábrica la Aurora

In 2006, French artist Claude Mathey thrilled San Miguel with her theatrical matchbox and bottle cap miniature stages, inspired by her vivid imagination and the “trash” of the streets and bars of her new life in Guanajuato. Her notable and almost disconcerting ability to make beauty out of the everyday things most of us are happy to throw out caught the eye and heart of almost every person in the gallery.

This March, Mathey is back with a whole new medium, an equally spurned material that I will decline to mention to pique your curiosity. And this year to complement Mathey’s found object wall art is the assemblage sculptural work of the talented Patricia Mahan. Two talented women, true to their instinct to make the most out of “nothing” have created a fascinating show of such high intellectual and creative standards as to compete with their European contemporaries and pioneers of the Found Object Assemblage movement.

For those who missed Mathey’s 2006 show or just haven’t had the opportunity yet to know her work, you will instantly see the influence of her 15 years of set designing for the Paris Opera. Most notably, you will see her fine arts background reflected in her sophisticated use of space and color.

A graduate of the Victor Hugo School and the Académie des Beaux-Artes in Paris and through her studies with Parisian sculptor, René Coutelle at his Paris studio, Mathey is a true Atelier artist. Her cheeky interpretations of the humor and joie de vivre of Mexico is found in her most recent collection of assemblage work presented at Galería/Atelier, titled “La Tribu” which has the refreshing musical quality of a night in a cantina, strolling on a beach in Veracruz during Carnaval or waiting for the bus near the Mercado. A lot of cliché French terms, such as je ne sais quoi, come out of the mouths of observers, right after a big smile and giggle. It is perhaps the most happy, contagious art on the planet.

Patricia Mahan opens her first show at the gallery under the title “Women of Mettle,” which could summarize the participation of both artists, for “mettle,” as vigor and strength of spirit or temperament, is very apropos. Mahan’s assemblage is a carefully crafted composition art form from the refuse of the many metal dumps of Celaya. Mahan’s debut as a professional assemblage artist is a relatively recent one. She also has a theatrical background as a professional flamenco dancer who formed her own touring Spanish dance company that graced the stages of many countries. For her talent she was awarded the National Endowment for the Arts choreographer’s fellowship in 1991 and only after a debilitating car accident did Mahan, who always loved working with her hands, turn her talents to visual art. She began painting and enjoyed ceramics but it was in assemblage that she found her true medium. She explains, “I love finding a new use for discarded objects. I found I could assemble and change objects to create a new story for them that was cohesive and fun.”

The word “fun” is exactly the refreshing aspect of this show of found object assemblage art. The ability to take a serious tin can or car U-joint and make us see a figure that inspires us to laugh and rejoice in its painted-on human-likeness is a talent these two artists have mastered. No one can take themselves too seriously at this exhibit, so those who are ready to feel the lightness of being a found object art admirer are welcome to meet the artists and see the show, which will be on display until April 10.

Melanie Harris de Maycotte is the director and curator at Galería/Atelier. She grew up in San Miguel, attended the University of Texas in Austin and studied sculpture in Florence, Italy.

A father and son art opening

Art Opening
Steven & Noah Mendelson
Fri, Feb 29, 5:30–8:30pm
The Bordello Galería
Casa de la Turca
Órganos 19

Steven and Noah Leaf Mendelson have each ventured down his own artistic path, yet the father and son have also succeeded in inspiring one other. They have painted side-by-side, critiqued each other’s work, and, on occasion, have even completed each other’s paintings.

A self-taught photographer and artist born in New York City, Steven loved taking pictures as a teenager and in later years traveled throughout Mexico and Europe with his camera. He found Mexico so interesting that he spent part of almost every year there until 2000 when he discovered San Miguel, where he has lived ever since.

After exploring a range of visual art media, Noah Leaf Mendelson has found himself happily at home with oils and a palette knife on canvas. Since receiving a studio art degree from Kentucky’s Berea College in 1998, Noah has engaged himself in varying lifestyles, ranging from social worker to monastic life. For the last four years he has shown his work regularly throughout the US in prestigious galleries as well as alternative venues.

In San Miguel, where Noah has resided for the last eight months, he has experienced noticeable strides in his painting process. He feels some of these changes are directly related to the Mexican culture and the unique composure of the town. “I’ve observed a development of extended patience for finishing a painting.

There is a new allowance of re-working paintings, changing directions, and entirely painting over some works. I am reminded of the many coats of paint on the walls of San Miguel, and the way the Mexican people has of letting things happen in their own time.”

A portion of the proceeds from art sales will be donated to Jovenes Adelante.

Steven’s art can be seen on the web at www.smendelsongallery.com  or he can be reached at sm22903@yahoo.com. 

Noah Leaf’s art is at www.leafgallery.com  and he can be reached at art@leafgallery.com.
 

Birthday celebration for Ros Farbush

Art Opening
Ros Farbush
Sat, Mar 15, 6:30pm
Galería San Miguel
Plaza Principal 14

Please join us to celebrate Ros’s birthday with cake, drinks and a year’s worth of new work from one of San Miguel’s premier on-site painters.

Ros is a graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where she taught for more than 30 years. She holds the title of master painter with the Copley Society the oldest art association in the US and was given the prestigious “Special Award” by the Northshore Art Association in Gloucester, MA.

Cocktails, cake and fine art at Galería San Miguel, Plaza Principal 14 located across from the Jardin.

“San Kyu” to all my friends
By Akiko Yasuda

In Japan one artist has started the “Day of Thank You Art.” Why March 9? In Japanese “3” is “san” and “9” is “kyu.” That sounds like “thank you” in English. That artist has made a relationship between “thank you” and March 9 (third month, ninth day), and he wants to spread art and the appreciation of art to everyone in the world. Last year there were more than 150 special art activities around the world, but none in Mexico. That is what I would like to change for this March 9.

The activity’s name is “Muchas gracias de mucha gente” and everyone can participate in making the collage. Each person will pick a piece of colored Chinese paper that I will have available for free and they can create whatever form they wish. They can write anything, cut, create a shape, and through that example, they will be expressing thank you. Of course, it is not important whether any writing is in Spanish, English, Japanese or any other language. Everybody will make a small form and then they will put it on my board. Naturally somebody will put their creation on top of another person’s creation. I don’t know how many people will participate, but everyone who does will be an artist.

With your ideas and feedback, I hope to announce in the March 7 Atención exactly what has been decided based on your input, what locations the event will have and the exact schedule. Please contact me at MartesArtes@gmail.com  with your comments and ideas.

Insightful juxtapositions
By Carmen Gutierrez

Art Opening
Rob Schouten, Alan Clark, Carmen Gutierrez
Sat, Mar 1, 6–9pm 
Galería Casa Diana
Recreo 48

Rob Schouten’s paintings, finely elaborated oils on canvas, reflect his strong commitment to personal and global transformation, and his profound interest in surrealism and symbolism.

He has long been an admirer of René Magritte, M.C. Escher and Paul Delvaux, all of whom masterfully tapped into the collective unconscious with strange and insightful juxtapositions of seemingly incongruous elements in their paintings. 

Alan Clark is a multidisciplinary artist—painter, sculptor, printmaker, writer. Clark’s works in this show are small format, mostly watercolors and ink drawings.

While the size is intimate and invites a viewer in close, the paintings are wild even at a distance. They are bristling shards and shoots of saturated color, fractured space and a barely contained energy. This simultaneous intimacy gives each work a very active inner life.

Gallery director Carmen Gutierrez presents sculptures and multimedia paintings, mostly in large format.

Her colors are vibrant with a great emphasis on textured detail. Her work reflects her interest in Indian philosophies: animals appear as symbols of the divine and recurrent spirals are a personal means of concentration.

Two collaborating spirits
By Bill Pearlman and Roland Salazar Rose

Art Opening
If Only: Salazar & Pearlman
Fri, Mar 7, 5pm
Sala Quetzal
Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25

“It’s not a question of understanding the paintings,” Creeley says, “but of picking up their vibes—more like playing in a band.” (From an article on Robert Creeley’s collaborations with painters.)

When Roland Salazar Rose and Bill Pearlman collaborated on “If Only,” Salazar handed Pearlman the images from his 16 small oils and Pearlman went to work, improvising quatrains that, like jazz riffs, accompanied the image. The first image, Salazar’s bright field of dazzling reds and yellows

(title: If Only You Could See Me), was accompanied by this:

I’d shine like the midday sun!
I’d slide from light to more light, 
Charismatic as the brightest star
Appearing in sudden dream!

Collaboration in this case becomes a kind of investigation of the emotional possibilities between the two forms. The brevity of the quatrains and the electricity of the small but potent images make up a sort of forcefield where the two forms are replenishing each other, as in good conversation, or between bass and piano in a jazz duet. As Bob Creeley says regarding his own collaborations with painters, the response to image is not necessarily about conscious understanding, but of “picking up the vibes” that the image generates. As in all powerful art, the unconscious enters in, and we get an intuitive play that perhaps startles or gathers responsive momentum or dances between the two forms. There is a mystery involved that partakes of light and sound, image and response, rhythm and joy, word and visual idea. 

In this case, the deepening relationship between painter Salazar and poet Pearlman sources a depth of understanding about loss and divorce, and about the depth of response. An important dialogue ensues, beyond therapeutic understanding, toward something like a conversation that lives at a level that can be revisited and reconstrued as an internal event with external evidence and creative force. Friendship goes further than casual conversation and into the actual power of art as link between individuals and their relation to the world. Something shifts in these collaborations, so that what was solitary becomes shared and a bridge from one form to another is built and the connection becomes a grand celebration of possibility. 

We invite the San Miguel community to partake of this celebration, which will be not only the first showing and reading of our just-published edition of the collaboration, but a chance to see the book enacted and projected. It will be available for purchase in a signed limited edition.

Wabi-Sabi Collective exhibits new works
By Cati Demme

Art Opening
Wabi-Sabi Collective
Sat, Mar 1, 5–8pm
Generator Gallery
Fábrica la Aurora

The Wabi-Sabi Art Collective is comprised of Shirli Macantel and Gregory Ellis. This collaborative venture was conceived in 2001 under the guiding philosophical tents of “Wabi Sabi.”

Their collaboration has produced complex, evocative ceramic sculpture and outstanding works on canvas.

According to wikipedia.org, “Wabi-Sabi” represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic. It is difficult to explain Wabi-Sabi in Western terms, but the aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is imperfect, impermanent, or incomplete. Wabi-Sabi occupies roughly the same position in the Japanese pantheon of aesthetic values as do the Greek ideals of beauty and perfection in the West. Wabi-Sabi nurtures all that is authentic by acknowledging three simple realities: nothing lasts, nothing is finished and nothing is perfect.

For Marcantel and Ellis, Wabi-Sabi is an artistic extension of the botanical world, reflected in the designs, motifs and expression of this unique and striking art.

Each Wabi-Sabi ceramic sculpture is handcrafted and fired one at a time in the Raku tradition, a complex 16th century, Japanese ceramic firing and smoking technique. The Wabi-Sabi collaborators beautifully and gracefully combine a demand for great skill with a conscious submission to chance.

The works on canvas and photographs also reflect the designs and motifs of natural plant forms, along with complex constructions that are contemplative in nature.

The exhibit of new works, “Florabunda,” will be on exhibit at the Generator Gallery at the Fábrica la Aurora, March 1–March 14. The Gallery Talk is Sunday, March 2, 11–12. Gallery hours are Monday–Saturday 11am–6pm, Sunday 11am–3pm. For more information call 154-9588 or email: generatorgallery@hotmail.com. 

Cati Demme is the owner and director of the Generator Gallery in Fábrica La Aurora. She has a Masters in Studio Art Education from New York University.