When Little Rock architectural photographer Tim Hursley won the Grand Award at this year's 58th annual "Delta Exhibition" at the Arkansas Arts Center, he made history.
Hursley's photograph, Pocahontas, AR, is "the first stand-alone photo to win Grand Award," says Arts Center communications manager Kelly Crow.
Photos have been part of mixed media works that have won previous Grand Awards.
"In the 44th Delta, Brad Cushman won for a photography and relief-print installation, and in the 38th Delta, Shannon Fagan won for a quilt made out of black-and-white photographs," Crow says. Cushman's Film/Strip/Tease won in 2001; Fagan's AIDS Quilt Reverse was honored in 1995.
The "Delta Exhibition" juror, Elizabeth K. Garvey, director of Garvey/Simon Art Access in New York, does not have a photographer in her gallery. "That might change," she says. Garvey also singled out two other photographic works for honorable mentions -- an archival digital print by Julie Brook Alexander of Houston and a digital infrared photograph by Michael Elliott-Smith of Alexandria, La.
Little Rock's David Bailin has been a formidable presence in the "Delta" since his first work was accepted in 1986, an oil on canvas work titled Jonah. He won an honorable mention the next year and the first of his three Grand Awards in 1988 for a charcoal and oil on canvas work, Anticipated Exile. He won the Grand Award in 1998 for Cain, charcoal on paper, and in 2014 for a charcoal, oil, pastel and coffee on prepared paper work titled Slippage.
Bailin, who won a Delta Award this year for his charcoal, pastel and coffee on prepared paper work LAMP, also won Delta Awards in 1994, 1996 and 2012.
KRANNICHFELD, 'UNWRAPPED'
Lisa Krannichfeld's distinctive paintings of women have a magnetic presence; they project psychological and emotional complexity.
Krannichfeld, who won a Delta Award at last year's "Delta Exhibition," didn't make the cut this year.
"It was a disappointment," she says. "The 'Delta' is the show you love to hate and hate to love. It's awesome when you get in, heartbreaking when you don't. I'm very thankful I got in last year and won a Delta; I'll keep at it."
And Krannichfeld is keeping at it. A number of her new works -- mixes of watercolor, ink, acrylic and other elements -- are hanging as part of M2 Gallery's current group show, "Unwrapped." She also is represented by M2.
Krannichfeld has a self-portrait hanging in the "Delta des Refuses" exhibit at the Thea Foundation in North Little Rock.
The Little Rock resident also has been exhibited in group shows in Singapore and Hong Kong.
"That opportunity came through a gallery in Australia that found me on Instagram," she says. "They started following me and contacted me about showing in their gallery and participating in some international shows. I sold five pieces in Singapore, and I'm waiting to hear how it went in Hong Kong."
What sets Krannichfeld apart is her approach to painting women. Growing up in a Chinese family, the Little Rock-born artist uses traditional Chinese art elements -- cranes, flowers, calligraphy, etc. -- for a very contemporary presentation.
"I want to redefine how women have been painted," she says. "Traditionally, women are objects to be enjoyed, not entities of their own will and choosing. The mystery of the face ... almost half of it has an emotion, the other half a different emotion. You get two different feelings, which I like.
"Human emotions aren't neat and tidy. Sometimes it is not pleasant or pretty, but it is real."
Krannichfeld sees similarities in the traditional views of women in Southern and Chinese cultures -- "women are expected to be passive," she says.
"I have kind of rebelled against that," she says.
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Also showing at M2 is another Delta Award winner, Robin Tucker, and abstract painter Bryan Frazier.
Tucker's photorealistic paintings are a tribute to the late Swedish artist Yrjo Edelmann, a hyper realist and trompe-l'oeil (trick the eye) painter whose subjects included roughly wrapped packages. Tucker's approach to optical illusion mimics Edelmann, but with a twist. Tucker offers a glimpse inside those packages.
"Unwrapped," with Lisa Krannichfeld, Robin Tucker, Bryan Frazier and others, through July 6, M2 Gallery, 11525 Cantrell Road, Suite 918, Little Rock. Hours: noon-5 p.m. Monday; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, Info: (501) 944-7155
"DELTA DES REFUSES"
Artist Rachel Trusty's second "Delta des Refuses" exhibit, this time hosted by the Thea Foundation, represents an inspired idea rooted in art history.
Open to artists who were turned down by the "Delta Exhibition" at the Arkansas Arts Center, it is modeled after the famed "Salon des Refuses" in 1863, which presented now revered painters such Edouard Manet and Camille Pissarro who had been "refused" entry into the Salon de Paris.
It's an interesting mix of work worth your time to visit, especially if you're curious what the "Delta" juror did not choose.
Some highlights:
• Erin Lorenzen's large and vivid Pick Your Poison, embroidery and acrylic on fabric that tells us everything is available and relays that message with an array of images -- the Hindu elephant deity Ganesh, a burger and fries, ice cream, yoga and so on. A little fun at consumerism's expense.
• Hank Kaminsky's Spirit Wind Series, a cast zinc sculpture.
• Lisa Krannichfeld's luminous The Sitter (self-portrait). By painting a second image on the reverse of the watercolor paper, which shows through on the main image, Krannichfeld gives her portrait movement and a haunting sense of mystery.
• Beverly Buys' superb cyanotype of an abandoned cemetery, Angel in a Thorn Patch (After Carroll Cloar). Inspired.
• Two Democrat-Gazette photographers offer contrasting approaches. Cary Jenkins' fine black-and-white photograph Just Relax was taken inside the Fordyce Bathhouse in Hot Springs; John Sykes Jr.'s The Waif, a digital collage, carries the intensity of fantasy and hyper-realism.
• Steve Rockwell shows impressive graphite skills in Sentinel (Melissa), which depicts a woman in profile, a crow perched on her shoulder. Celtic inspired, perhaps.
• Seth Bailey's The Secret is a beautifully realized romantic oil painting of a mother listening to her child whisper a secret. Bailey's technique is superb.
• R.F. Walker's retro-hued oil Pagan Innocence depicts two young women and a girl dancing in a circle in a pasture with three head of cattle.
• Virmarie DePoyster's Ignorance, a pastel with image transfers, shows rose stems and thorns across newspaper stories. It's a strong statement on the danger and impact of willful ignorance.
"Delta Des Refuses," through July 17, Thea Foundation, 401 Main St., North Little Rock. Hours: 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday. Info: (501) 379-9512.
Style on 06/28/2016