Swinging On A High Note, January/February 2013

How Long Before The Green Turns Blue, 2012, 

oil on canvas, 48 x60 in., $7000.

As Long As the Wind Blows, 2012, oil on canvas, 

16 x 20 in, $900

At The Edge Of Nowhere, 2012, oil on canvas, 

40 x 90 in., $9000

Blue Mule, 2012, 16 x 20 in., $900 .

Enter The Unknown, 2012, oil on canvas, 

48 x 60 in., $7000

The Pursuit I Dependent on Solitude, 

2012, 36 x 48 in.

The Day Pauses Between What Is & What Was, 

2012, 36 x 48 in.

The Facination Of A Path That Never Ends, 2013, 

oil on canvas, 36 x 36 in, $3350.

 Revelry, 2012, 20 x 20 in.

Here Is Where You Are, 2012, oil on canvas, 

48 x 60 in., $7,000

8 Square, 2008-12, oil on canvas, 30 x 30 in., $2,350

I Have Come As Far As Here, 2007-12

Oil on canvas, 30 x 24 in., $ 1,900

Don't Eat That Persimmon Yet, 2012, oil on canvas,
24 x 30 in., $1,900

Swinging On a High Note, 2012, oil on canvas,
 36 x 36 in., $3,350

Re-focus, 2011-12, oil on canvas,
40 x 30 in., $3,100

Red Squares, 2010-12, oil on canvas,
24 x 30 in., $1,900

Folly, 2012, oil on canvas, 20 x 20 in., $1,100

Discussions Are Better, 2010-12, oil on canvas,
18 x 18 in., $900

A Gray Celebration, 2012, oil on canvas, 14 x 14 in.
$625

Overwhelmed, 2012, oil on canvas, 14 x 14 in., $625

So What, 2012, oil on canvas, 14 x 14 in., $625

Untitled, 2012, oil on canvas, 12 x 12 in., $500

Along The Way, 2008-12, oil on canvas
24 x 24 in., $1,600

Ho, Ho, Ho, and a Bottle of Rum, 2012, oil on canvas
30 x 30 in., $2,350

Ride The Ferris Wheel, 2012, oil on canvas, 30 x 30 in.
$2,350

LAURA SPONG GOES HOLLYWOOD in Lifetime's DROP DEAD DIVA

if ART Gallery artist Laura Spong is part of the Lifetime cable network's new series Drop Dead Diva, but she's feeling fine, thank you very much. Spong's paintings are on view prominently on the show, for instance in the law offices where the series' main character works. The show's producers have rented several paintings by Spong for the series' sets.

For more information, CLICK HERE.

Laura Spong on ETV

To see Laura Spong on ETV click here. Then click on "Click here to watch." The segment on Laura begins at approximately the 2 minute and 20 seconds mark.

Essay: Laura Spong: It Was A Good Year

LAURA SPONG
It Was A Good Year, 2008
Oil on canvas, 80 x 60 inches
presented by if ART Gallery, Columbia, S.C.,
is on view at
Gallery 80808/Vista Studios
808 Lady Street, Columbia, S.C.
February 5 – 17, 2009

It Was A Good Year refers to 2008, when Laura Spong painted the 12 square canvases that make up this new composite painting of 80” x 60”. She painted them in similar fashion as 2007’s Good Report, Bad Report, No Report, a 100” x 80” work consisting of 25 rectangular pieces. In both cases, Spong created the individual canvases independently of each other, not considering any of the completed parts while painting the next one.

Spong didn’t decide on either painting’s final size, form and composition until all the individual canvases were completed. For both paintings, she painted more canvases than ultimately the composition required, given her extra choices as she put together the whole.

It Was A Good Year, consisting of 20” x 20” squares, turned out smaller than Good Report, which is a five-by-five grid of 20” x 16” rectangular verticals. This was not by design but the result of Spong searching for the painting in the parts. The work’s square individual canvases created a rather different dynamic than the rectangular parts of Good Report had a year ago. After exploring a five-by-four and five-by-three grid of 20 and 15 canvases respectively, Spong decided on the smaller grid of four-by-three.

Both It Was and Good Report came about because of Spong’s desire to create larger compositions than she typically does. The diminutive artist, 82 years old, comfortably handles canvases up to about 60” x 50” but wanted to go beyond that. The composite form offers that possibility.

Laura Spong (b. 1926) is among South Carolina’s most prominent non-objective painters. Among her many solo exhibitions in the past three years was a retrospective at the University of South Carolina’s McMaster Gallery. In addition to South Carolina’s State Art Collection, Spong’s work was purchased recently by the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art and the South Carolina State Museum.

by Wim Roefs
February 2009

Laura Spong: Still Screaming & Leo Twiggs: Targeted Man, February 5-17, 2009

For exhibition installation images, click here.

For essay on Leo Twiggs, click here.

For preview of Leo Twiggs: Targeted Man, click here.

For essay on Laura Spong, click here.

For preview of Laura Spong: Still Screaming, click here.

if ART Gallery

presents at

GALLERY 80808/VISTA STUDIOS

808 Lady St., Columbia, SC

LAURA SPONG: Still Screaming

&

LEO TWIGGS: Targeted Man

Reception: Friday, February 6, 5 – 9 p.m.

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 255-0068/ (803) 238-2351 – if-art-gallery@sc.twcbc.com

For its February 2009 exhibition, if ART presents Gallery 80808/Vista Studios in Columbia, S.C., two solo exhibitions by some of South Carolina most prominent veteran artists, Columbia’s Laura Spong and Orangeburg’s Leo Twiggs.

Both artists will present new work. Spong will show her trademark Abstract Expressionist oil paintings. Twiggs will exhibit a new series of batik paintings around the theme of “targeted man,” featuring figures adorned with a bull’s eye or target.

Laura Spong (b. 1926) is among South Carolina’s most prominent non-objective painters. In the past three years, Spong has further increased her reputation with several solo exhibitions, including a retrospective at the University of South Carolina’s McMaster Gallery. For her 2006 exhibition, Laura Spong at 80, Columbia’s if ART published a 32-page catalogue. In addition to the S.C. State Art Collection, Spong’s work was purchased recently by the Greenville (S.C.) County Museum of Art and the S.C. State Museum. Three of her paintings also are in the Contemporary Carolina Collection, which was established in 2008 at the Medical University of South Carolina’s Ashley River Tower in Charleston. Spong maintains a studio at Vista Studios in Columbia.

Leo Twiggs (b. 1934) is a native of St. Stephen, S.C., who lives in Orangeburg, S.C., where he taught art at South Carolina State University from 1964 until 1998 and established a museum. Twiggs is widely seen as one of the most important South Carolina artists since the 1960s. His career retrospective, Myths and Metaphors: The Art Of Leo Twiggs, organized by the Georgia Museum of Art and accompanied by a catalogue, completed a two-year tour at the South Carolina State Museum in Columbia in April 2006. Twiggs has had dozens of solo exhibitions in museums and galleries in the Southeast and beyond, including the Studio Museum in Harlem. In 1964, he received a graduate degree in art from New York University and in 1970 was the first African American to receive an Ed.D. in art education from the University of Georgia. In 1981, he was the first to receive as an individual South Carolina’s highest art award, the Elizabeth O’Neil Verner Governor’s Award for the Arts.

Salon III: January 15- February 4, 2009

For exhibition preview, click here.

For installation images, click here.

For printmaking demonstration schedule, click here.

if ART Gallery

presents

SALON III: The Print Exhibition

January 15 – February 4, 2009

if ART Gallery

1223 Lincoln St., Columbia, S.C. 29205

Reception: Thursday, Jan. 15, 5 – 10 p.m.

Printmaking Demonstrations:

Sunday, Jan. 18, 3 – 5 p.m., Marcelo Novo, Print Gocco

Sunday, Jan. 25, 3 – 5 p.m., Phil Garrett, Monotype

Saturday, Jan. 31, 3 – 5 p.m., H. Brown Thornton, Photo Transfer

Sunday, Feb. 1, 3 – 5 p.m., Steven Chapp, Linocut & Photopolymer Prints

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 255-0068/ (803) 238-2351 – if-art-gallery@sc.twcbc.com

For its January 2009 exhibition, if ART Gallery presents Salon III, an exhibition of prints by gallery artists at if ART Gallery, 1223 Lincoln St., Columbia, S.C. The opening reception will be Thursday, January 15, 2009, 5 – 10 p.m. The exhibition will be installed salon-style at the gallery’s first floor and continues if ART’s salon-style exhibitions; in December 2008, Salon I & II took place simultaneously at the gallery and Gallery 80808/Vista Studios in Columbia.

Among the printmaking techniques represented in the exhibition are etchings, dry points, lithographs, woodcuts, linocuts, photopolymer prints, embossings, monotypes, silkscreens and photo transfers.

During the exhibition, gallery artists Steven Chapp of Easley, S.C., Phil Garrett of Greenville, S.C., Brown Thornton of Aiken, S.C., and Marcelo Novo of Columbia will give demonstrations of various printmaking techniques. For times and demonstrated techniques, see above.

Artists in the exhibition include Karel Appel, Jeri Burdick, Carl Blair, Lynn Chadwick, Steven Chapp, Corneille, Jeff Donovan, Jacques Doucet, Phil Garrett, Herbert Gentry, Tonya Gregg, John Hultberg, Richard Hunt, Sjaak Korsten, Lucebert, Reiner Mährlein, Sam Middleton, Eric Miller, Joan Mitchell, Dorothy Netherland, Marcelo Novo, Hannes Postma, Edward Rice, Anton Rooskens, Kees Salentijn, Laura Spong, Brown Thornton, Bram van Velde, Katie Walker, David Yaghjian and Paul Yanko.