Friday, October 26, 2007

Leaving our shell behind

The world we live in, even where we have made a mess of it, is full of incredible sights. Tennessee artist Jennifer Adair believes that art should make us pause in our rush to wherever we are supposed to be. "Art should make us remember to be alive right here, right now," she says. "Art should help us see the world we live in."

Jennifer is fascinated by how hard people work in order to make things that look like they were made by something other than a human. "It takes a mollusk to make a nautilus shell. Humans use computers to create fractal images; wind does it with some sand. An agate, a sunset, a butterfly wing: our imperfect copies, whether of manmade stone or canvas and paint, require great effort on our part."

So her glass is about color and light, texture and pattern. And if she really gets it right, an explorer from some other world would wonder, when he looks at her work, what creature had left his shell behind.

Gallery Fifty carries her fused dichroic glass frames and triangle plates. Frames run $42 - $48; Plates are $75 - $95. Call for our current selection: 231-932-0775.