Desy Magic is an Italian artist and photographer who is marking the opening of her new gallery on Wednesday, September 14th with an exhibition of her own work entitled Soul of Avatar, which Desy defines as, “a reflection of our dreams and fantasies, as realised through our avatar.”
Housed within a gallery space designed by Desy, the exhibition features nineteen avatar studies presented in a number of different styles, from relatively straightforward posed portraits through to very stylised and post-processed works – hopefully the pictures in. All intended to highlight the rich diversity of vision and fantasy we can embody within our avatar.
While they may be of different styles and presentation, it is in their celebration of the avatar that they are united as a cohesive set. Whether an image shows a “normal” human avatar, naked or clothed, or whether it reveals a more fantasy or science fiction look; whether it is processed in colour or rendered as a monochrome image, all of them make Soul of Avatar a deceptively engaging exhibition; one ideally suited to the interior styling of the gallery space.
Each of the pieces in the exhibit is available for purchase, and the opening at 13:30 SLT on Wednesday, September 14th will feature the music of artist (and friend) Morlita Quan – my congratulations to Desy on the opening!
Update, October 10th: JayJay Zifanwe has announced that the four core UWA regions will remain open through until July 2017. You can read more here.
I received a nudge about the University of Western Australia, which has enjoyed a long presence here in Second Life, operating multiple regions and becoming a stalwart supporter of virtual arts through its grand challenges and other competitions and opportunities offered to artists to present their work, as well a through support of machinima in physical world film challenges, such as those run by Screen My Shorts.
The news was actually broken over the weekend by Jayjay Zifanwe, who has spearheaded the UWA’s presence in Second Life since it started, and who has worked exceptionally hard with FreeWee Ling to promote and support artistic creativity within the broad cross-section of second life users and talent. In the post, Jayay states:
Everything on all [the] sims will remain as is for the next 2 weeks… do come back for a visit as many of the artworks going back 7 years are still at various locations. Once those 2 weeks are up, our curator, Freewee Ling will start to rationalise what is on the UWA sims, so that some items from all sims are brought onto the one remaining sim.
UWA: UWA Winthrop and the gallery displaying some of the smaller art pieces on display within the UWA regions
FreeWee adds to the blog post with a note to those artists who have works on display in the UWA regions. So if you are one of those artists, do please make sure you read the post in full. Of the four regions which the UWA is closing, three will be shutting down completely, and one will be changing hands.
The reasons for the region closures appear to be internal to the UWA, and not anything specifically directed towards virtual worlds and Second Life. At the end of 2015, the UWA did cut back on its direct support of artistic endeavours in SL through its patronage of the Grand 2D and 3D art challenges, again spearheaded by Jayjay and FreeWee. Since that time, arts have continued to be supported at the UWA through smaller, but no less attractive activities, such as a the current Immaterial contest, which I’ve been covering in this pages, and the entries for which can be seen at the UWA gallery.
If you have not visited the UWA regions, I urge you to do so before the four scheduled to be removed vanish. There is a stunning amount of art to see, much of it standing as a historic look back over artistic expression in Second Life, including the Grand Final winners from the various challenges, including Nish Mip’s Last Ocean, which forms a poignant opening to Jayjay’s post, As well as the art, there are campus facilities to explore.
Tutsy Navarathna’s “The Residents“, overall winner in the machinima category of the 2013 Project Sci-Fi challenge, sponsored by the UWA
For my part, I’d like to thank Jayjay and FreeWee for all of their hard work over the years in building the UWA environment in-world, and to those at the UWA itself, for their support of virtual spaces and digital arts.
Now open at the Windlight Art Gallery is the September-October 2016 Fellowship exhibition, which features the work of artists Jesse Boren (Tatjab Resident), Cadence Caine (heathermknopp Resident), Kaijah Chrome, MIlly Patton (MillyWH Resident), Bluesrocker Resident, ChloeElectra Resident, KodyMeyers Resident, Pacesoftly Resident, Tisephone Resident, and Inquisitor Titanium, together with Windlight Gallery artists in residence Pam Astonia, Honey Bender and Warm Clarity, Windlight Gallery’s Select Artist, Wicca Merlin, and – yours truly 🙂 .
On offer once again is a rich mix of styles and subject matter – landscapes, avatar studies, some abstract work and some images from the physical world. It is this mix of styles and subject which makes the Windlight Exhibitions more than worth the visit; the Gallery design encourages the visitor to focus attention on each artist in turn whilst at the same time allowing individual styles and approaches to be compared and contrasted, helping one to appreciate further the skills evidence by each artist in creating their work.
I’m particularly proud to be a part of this exhibition: showing my work is not entirely my strong suit, so being offered the opportunity to do so is gratifying. So much so, that if there are artists who are shy about showing their work in public, or find they’re uncertain about how to go about presenting their work in-world, I thoroughly recommend the Fellowship as offering an excellent starting point. Find out more below.
In promoting and supporting artists and photographers, the Windlight Art Gallery operates the Windlight Artist Fellowship Programme. This allows artists to apply for free exhibition space at the Windlight gallery for a period of 30 days. Applications are open to artists from across Second Life, and the criteria for acceptance can be found in the Artist Fellowship Programme application form.
Now open at the White Canvas Gallery (formerly the Good Days Gallery), curated by Goodcross is Submerged, a selection of aquatic-themed images by Elizabeth (ElizabethNantes), which she calls “an immersive experience” – a description which highlights the unique approach taken in presenting this collection.
Visitors arrive on the edge of a glass-sided pool of water, spray breaking against the rocky edge, the art displayed under the rippling surface. To view the art properly requires jumping into the tank, and then exploring it from beneath the “surface”, where bubbles drift upwards, fish and jellyfish swim and drift by, and a platypus floats gently, watching the ducks swimming above.
Eight of the images – all of which present figures at play on and under the water – are displayed around the inner walls of the tank, and are offered for sale; they face an additional four images arranged on the faces of a cube. The entire impression is that you are fully immersed in the environment – not just by being “underwater”, but very much a part of some of the scenes as those in them look towards you through the water.
This feeling of being immersed is further heightened by the careful placement of transparencies carrying the animated ebb and flow of foamy waves. These give the impression of the water’s surface (see in the centre image and the one above as a dark shade across the upper portions of the images), positioned so that some of those featured in the pictures do indeed have their heads above water. Only one – the image seen on first arrival (and heading this review)- is effectively “out” of the “water”; and even this is positioned to suggest the subject is rising from the surrounding pool.
I opted to photograph the collection against a night backdrop, as that was the local estate time when Caitlyn and I visited. However, tweaking Phototools also suggested that early morning or late afternoon windlight settings with the Sun low in the sky worked particularly well if a background of sky is required.
An imaginative collection presentation creatively presented.
Open at the Serena Image Arts Centre, from September 10th 2016, is Eleseren Brianna’s The Curio, a mixed 2D and 3D art installation centred on a gigantic figure and a tale written in the style of a Victorian gentleman’s personal journal.
The gentleman in question is Joseph C.R. Pomfret, who is travelling through Finland as a part of an unspecified group of English families. Whilst lodging in a hotel in Savonlinna, they are invited to spend time at a private fishing lodge owned by one Doctor Koskinen. It is whilst staying there that the group encounters the Enkeli (“the Angel”).
This narrative is presented at the start of the installation, as a large intellibook which offers easy reading of the entries. Beside it, nine images arranged in an arc of easels, stand as a visual tableau of the encounter with the Enkeli. Rendered in a manner suggestive of skilled penmanship, they might be taken as drawings taken from the journal as offered by Mr. Pomfret as illustrations of the remarkable find. In turn, the nine images point the visitor towards the giant angel itself – not that it is hard to miss!
The Enkeli is an imposing figure set upon s sand bar surrounded by a landscape of rugged island in keeping with the journal’s description. Helmeted, with spread wings ruffled and in disarray, his is collapsed on hand and knees, as if exhausted. A great lance is held tightly in his right hand, blunt end thrust into the ground, tip pointing skyward, gripped as if he might be about to lean on it for support to regain his feet. Wooden chairs and a ladder invite visitors to explore the figure after the manner of Pomfret and his companions, while a rowing boat is moored alongside offers a further indication of scale.
The Curio is an interesting three-way piece, balancing storytelling with images and sculpture to present a unique narrative. It remains open through until September 16th, 2016, and a Gatcha / Gacha machine at the start of the exhibit offers all nine of the images and a copy of the journal in an equally unique way of offering art to visitors.
Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
These opening words from Desiderata by Max Ehrmann, a prose poem possessed of a mythical history of its own, are the thematic foundation upon which Joslyn Benson (Jolivea Tyran) for her exhibition at Dathúil Gallery, which is open now, and runs through until the end of September 2016.
All Is Quiet Now presents eighteen avatar studies, all but one of which are monochrome in nature. Many of these are nude, so may not be suitable for viewing at work. All are finely nuanced pieces, subtle in form and tone, powerful in emotional expression.
“Silence: the absence of sound; silence: the placidity of mind; silence: the sense of being,” Joslyn says of the collection, “Moments of stillness where all that’s left is our own thoughts … and to find comfort in unspoken words.” it’s a beautiful summation of a series of pieces which perfectly frame the power of silence and expression to convey so much, whether we are with a loved one or friend, or caught in a moment of personal reflection or thought.
I frequently refer to narratives and stories when reviewing art; it is something I tend to seek, as it often has as much influence on my response it a piece as either my admiration of the artist’s skill (which, particularly in reference to the artists invited to display at Dathúil, tends to be considerable), or the initial emotional response I feel towards it. With All Is Now Quiet, I found this idea of narrative given additional depth in some of the studies offered.
On the one hand, there is the story we immediately perceive in looking on them for the first time. But on returning to these particular images, a second narrative is so often suggested. Take Once Was, for example, or The Way We Were. Each is suggestive, by title and pose, of regret or sadness; the apparent loss of something between two people. But look away, spend time with the other studies and then return. You many find each of these pieces now suggests something else: rather than regret or sadness, they represent a moment of pause as those depicted within them reflect on their love for one another and what the other person means to them.
Suddenly, we are witnessing not the recognition of something lost, but of something which still very much alive between the subjects of these pieces; with comes the suggestion that. shortly after the image was captured it is acknowledged as figures come together once more in a kiss or a warm embrace. With other images, the shift in narrative comes when we alter our own perspective from that of observer of an image in a gallery, to that of participant in the scene depicted. All of which make these studies, as noted, marvellously nuanced in tone and subject.
Once again, Lucy and Max have brought another extraordinary talent to Dathúil. All Is Quiet Now is an exquisite collection of images, which are individually compelling as well as perfectly evoking the emotional power of silence. Stunning.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 