Women in the Arts
Past Forward, at the Target Gallery in the Torpedo Factory (105 Union St., Alexandria). The exhibit runs through March 28. The gallery is open daily from 10 a.m. – 6 p.m., with Thursday evenings open until 9 p.m. For more details, call 703-838-4565 ext. 4, or visit http://www.torpedofactory.org/galleries/target.htm.
Women in the Arts
Past Forward, at the Target Gallery in the Torpedo Factory (105 Union St., Alexandria). The exhibit runs through March 28. The gallery is open daily from 10 a.m. – 6 p.m., with Thursday evenings open until 9 p.m. For more details, call 703-838-4565 ext. 4, or visit http://www.torpedofactory.org/galleries/target.htm.
Four former Torpedo Factory artists return to show in this Target Gallery exhibition. This exhibit also doubles as the initial wave of the statewide Women in the Arts events. The DelRay Artisans opens their women in the arts show this weekend. Entries into the juried Woman Made show here at the Target Gallery are still being accepted until March 16. The Female Short Film festival entries are due by March 26. See the Web site above, under “Exhibition Opportunities,” for complete details and downloadable entry forms.
The work of Barbara Rachko, Kathleen Dustin, Anne Laddon and Joyce Zipperer fill the current exhibition.
Rachko has a series of five pastel drawings of puppets, or dolls, at rest, quietly waiting for their owner to pick them up and give them life.
Dustin has what surely must be the most time consuming work of all. Her large-scale botanical sculptures are almost unbelievably made from clay. Well-crafted is an understatement. The attention to detail here is at the extreme end of the spectrum.
Laddon shows three entertaining abstract landscapes that play with color and form in a near cubist fashion. Her fourth painting offers a rather impressionistic view of a cow at rest in a field of grass.
Zipperer, best known for her intricately knitted metal undergarments, shows her series of metal shoes once again. The best of the lot are her whimsical “In the Grass” shoe made from copper and wood, and the fantasy creation titled “Water Wheel.”
The reception, with an artist talk as well, is today, March 11, from 6 – 8 p.m. The artist talk is scheduled for 7 p.m.
Feminine Focus
Women in Art: Body of Work, at The Del Ray Artisans (2704 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria). The exhibit runs through March 21. The gallery is open noon – 4 p.m. Thursday, noon – 9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m. – 9 p.m. Saturday and noon – 6 p.m. Sunday. For more details, call 703-838-4827, or visit www.TheDelRayArtisans.org. Over 30 area artists contributed the 97 works making up this wide-ranging, non-juried show thematically centered on women.
Unlike the upcoming Torpedo Factory shows, this Women’s show did accept work by men – as long as the works in someway interpreted women’s roles in life and art.
Painting, photography and sculpture make up this show.
With some exceptions, the sculpture are the most interesting, including the likes of decoupaged female mannequin torsos, whimsically decorated cigar boxes, bird sculptures made from a folding knife.
Your Author’s Show
Drawings by Kevin Mellema, at the Lee Arts Center (5722 Lee Highway, Arlington). For more details, call 703-228-0560. The exhibit runs through March 29. The exhibit opens at 9:30 a.m. everyday, Monday through Saturday. Closing times vary as follows: Monday, 6 p.m.; Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, 9 p.m.; Friday, 6 p.m. and Saturday, 5 p.m. This solo show is comprised of large-scale conté and graphite figure drawings. Sizes vary, but for the most part they’re roughly 6-feet-tall on 42-inch-wide paper.
These are vigorously drawn, high-energy renderings of women in various physical and/or emotional states of being. The closing reception will be Wednesday, March 24, from 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.
Local Highlight
Falls Church resident Shaun Van Steyn will be showing his work in the juried ninth Annual International Photography Competition at the Fraser Gallery (7700 Wisconsin Ave., Suite E, Bethesda). The gallery is open 11:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. Tuesday – Saturday. For more details, call 301-718-9651, or visit www.thefrasergallery.com.
The opening reception is part of the Bethesda Gallery walk this Friday, March 12, from 8 – 9 p.m. Show dates run from this Friday evening, March 12 – April 3.
The Northern Virginia Art Beat is compiled by Kevin Mellema. To e-mail submissions, e-mail them to kevinmellema@gmail.com
