Thursday, November 8, 2007

Kleinformat/Small Format: October 26- November 12, 2007


(To enlarge, click on image above.)

Kleinformat/Small Format: The Columbia - Kaiserslautern Exchange is currently showing at if ART Gallery, 1223 Lincoln Street. This exhibition runs from Friday, October 26 until Tuesday, November 13, 2007 and included an opening reception on Friday, October 26 from 5 - 10 PM. Additional hours are: Weekdays from 11 AM until 7 PM and Saturdays from 11 AM until 5 PM. The exhibit features work by five South Carolinians (Mary Gilkerson, H. Brown Thornton, Stephen Chesley, Mike Williams, and Tonya Gregg) and five Germans from Columbia's sister city, Kaiserslautern (Silvia Rudolf, Roland Albert, Reiner Mahrlein, Ralph Gelbert and Klaus Hartmann).

Sunday, November 12, 2006

if ART Gallery Opening

Tier 221003/2 (Sich Unwended)(Animal 221003/2 (Turning Around)), 2002
Glue, sand mix on drawing board
11 x 8 in
$325

OPEN NOW: 


if ART Gallery

1223 Lincoln St.
Columbia, S.C.

Gallery Hours:
Most days, except Sunday, from 11:00 AM – 7:00 PM
& by appointment (call 803-238-2351)


For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART
(803) 238-2351 – wroefs@sc.rr.com


On Nov. 10, 2006, if ART, International Fine Art Services, opened if ART Gallery. The gallery is at 1223 Lincoln St., Columbia, S.C., in the Vista district, across from the Blue Marlin restaurant. For more information, contact if ART’s Wim Roefs at (803) 238-2351 or wroefs@sc.rr.com.

If ART Gallery carries the work of South Carolina artists Leo Twiggs, Mike Williams, Carl Blair, Tom Stanley, Virginia Scotchie, Tonya Gregg, Peter Lenzo, Jeff Donovan, David Yaghjian, Anna Redwine, John Monteith, Christine Tedesco, Brown Thornton, Paul Yanko, Laura Spong, Steven Chapp, Katie Walker, Edward Rice, Aaron Baldwin, Bill Jackson, Herb Parker, Dorothy Netherland, Eric Miller, Mary Gilkerson, Matt Overend, Kim Keats and Phil Garrett. The gallery also carries work by Dutch artist Kees Salentijn, German artists Reiner Mahrlein, Roland Albert and Klaus Hartmann, and Washington Color Field painter Paul Reed.

The gallery also carries a wide selection of unframed and lithographs, silkscreens, etchings and other limited edition prints by such nationally and even internationally prominent artists such as Karel Appel, Richard Hunt, Bram van Velde, John Hultberg, Sam Middleton, Benny Andrews, Hannes Postma, Corneille, Lucebert and Alvin Hollingsworth.

Since March 2005, if ART, International Fine Art Services, has organized commercial gallery exhibitions in Columbia, mostly at Vista Studios/Gallery 80808. In addition to presenting gallery artists and special exhibitions at if ART Gallery, if ART will continue to organize exhibitions at Vista Studios/Gallery 80808. The company also provides curatorial and exhibition design services. 

Most recently, in September, if ART was hired by the Technical College of the Lowcountry to install dozens of art works at the college’s new building in Bluffton, S.C. Earlier this year, if ART installed two exhibitions of work from the South Carolina state art collection at the Sumter (S.C.) Gallery of Art. The if ART production “South Carolina Birds: A Fine Art Exhibition,” curated by company owner Wim Roefs, is at the Pickens County Museum of Art & History until Nov. 11, 2006. The exhibition opened in 2004 at the Sumter Gallery of Art and traveled to the Burroughs & Chapin Museum in Myrtle Beach, S.C., and the City Gallery at Waterfront Park in Charleston, S.C. Roefs wrote the essay for the exhibition catalogue, which he also edited.

In 2005, Roefs curated exhibitions of work by Leo Twiggs and Carl Blair for the Fine Arts Center of Kershaw County in Camden, S.C. He also curated an exhibition of paintings by Marcelo Novo for HoFP Gallery in Columbia, S.C., and wrote the essay for the exhibition catalogue. Earlier this year, Roefs curated an exhibition with work by Dutch artist Kees Salentijn for the Center of the Arts in Rock Hill, S.C. In May, he curated an indoors/outdoors sculpture exhibition for the city of Dillon, S.C. 

Roefs contributed an essay to the catalogue for the exhibition “A Collection for Margaret: The Personal and Private Art of Carl Blair.” The exhibition is on view at Hampton III Gallery in Greenville until Nov. 11. Roefs teaches a course in African-American art at the University of South Carolina.

Since March 2005, if ART has published eight small exhibition catalogues. The catalogues featured short essays by Roefs about Aaron Baldwin, Mike Williams, Anna Redwine, Tom Stanley, Carl Blair, Janet Orselli, Matt Overend, Laura Spong, Leo Twiggs, Jeff Donovan, John Monteith, Dorothy Netherland, Herb Parker and Phil Garrett and Mary Gilkerson and the process of making monotypes.

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

SOLD WORKS OF ART

Stuhl Nach Rechts, 2008
Wood, sand glue, acrylic paint
25 x 15 1/4 x 2 1/4 in., $ 650
Funnfrucht (Fivefruit), 2009, cardboard, 
6 1/2 x 7 1/2 x 7 1/2 in., $390
Urtier (Ancient Animal), 2010, cardboard,
3 x 10 x 5 1/2 in., $260

Fragment 221006 (Fragment 221006), 2006
Sand and glue on cardboard
12 x 8 in.
$ 275
Tier 221003/2 (Sich Unwended)
(Animal 221003/2 (Turning Around))
, 2002
Shellac on drawing board
11 x 8 in., $325

Friday, April 30, 2004

Essay: Roland Albert

ROLAND ALBERT (German, b. 1944)
STICKY STUFF
By Wim Roefs

Roland Albert is a widely respected painter and sculptor in Germany. “Sticky Stuff” is his first solo show in the United States. The work at Lewis and Clark fits Albert’s often material-driven art that hovers between abstraction and figuration, between the natural and arranged worlds, between representing something and being something, and between material and psychological existence. For the work here, Albert used shellac to draw stick animals and a glue-and-soil mix to make quick, thick marks that suggest torsos. 

Albert is part of the artists’ exchange between Columbia and its German sister city of Kaiserslautern. As part of the exchange, he has participated in group exhibitions in Columbia, including the 2001-03 Art Garage Project. Albert studied with the famous Greek-American sculptor Kosta Alex in Paris in 1964. In 1970, he graduated from the prestigious Munich Academy of Fine Arts.

Albert molds paint and marks on surface, he says, rather than trying to depict things. He often blurs the boundaries between drawing and painting and painting and sculpting. Heavy application of dirt, plaster and stucco-like materials on his two-dimensional work can make it in effect three-dimensional. And sculpting to Albert is merely painting and drawing in space. 

Albert’s work overall fits European post-World War II contemporary traditions. He shares Joseph Beuys’ love for rough and unfinished materials. Like Art Informel artists such as Spaniard Antoni Tapies and fellow German Emil Schumacher, Albert considers not just forms and shapes important but also the tactility and physical quality of his materials. He shares Paul Klee’s playfulness and back-and-forth between figuration and abstraction. His spontaneous impulse and some imagery relate to Jean Dubuffet and CoBrA painters such as Dutchmen Karel Appel and Corneille. Combining the architectural with the natural in his sculpture links him to the 1960s German art group Zero. Among American influences on Albert’s work are Robert Motherwell and Adolph Gottlieb. 

“I can’t really analyze my own work very well,” Albert says. “I don’t work very systematically but instead mostly follow my spontaneous inner drive.”