-Residents of northern Utah don't have to travel to the other end of the state to enjoy the spectacular, panoramic landscapes of southern Utah. All they have to do is jump in their cars and drive to the Springville Museum of Art, where the "Utah Grandeur" exhibition fills all of the downstairs galleries and halls.
This overpowering show contains 99 works by contemporary landscape painters and 31 historical works. Many of the works visually record arches, monoliths and canyons that exist only in this part of the world. Other grand-scale paintings focus on the Wasatch range, particularly Mount Timpanogos."This exhibition doesn't just hit the mountain peaks," said Vern Swanson, director of the museum. "It shows the depth and breadth of Utah landscape." It also shows the depth and breadth of the painters, who, for the most part, have effectively captured Utah's grandeur on paper or canvas.
To some painters, "grandeur" means "grandiose." And some paintings are huge - such as those by Stephen Mark Bartholomew, Carol Harding, David Keough, Pete Plastow, Anton Rasmussen, Al Rounds, Dennis Smith, Doug Snow and Earl C. Stansfield.
Other painters are able to transfer the grandeur of these overpowering landscapes into smaller-sized works, such as paintings of Linda Kohler Barnes, Gary Collins, Glen Edwards, Frank Huff Jr., Alfonso J. Flores and Edith Roberson.
Any preconception that the show contains only representational works by traditional artists is quickly dismissed when the viewer confronts stylized works by J. Roman Andrus, Norma Forsberg, Donal C. Jolley and Ed Taggart; and abstractions by Stephen Mark Bartholomew, Gary Collins, Fred Hunger, Woodie Renzetti and Doug Snow.
One of the show's many surprises is David Ahrnsbrak's "Evening View of Merkley Park." His spontaneous style seen here contrasts markedly with his usual classical realist style. The artist painted it on location. And it's amazing what a little fresh air can do to trigger a new approach.
Although "Utah Grandeur" opened Oct. 29, the catalog for this show will not be completed until around Nov. 21. When available, it will consist of 60 pages - five color plates, 44 black-and-white photographs, and a text by Swanson that chronicles the history of grandiose landscape painting in Utah.
Swanson pointed out that it was impossible to print the catalog before the show. "I just couldn't write it without first examining the show."
Call for entries, by the way, attracted 210 works; less than half of them made it into the show. Swanson and his assistant Lila Larsen were both the jurors and curators.
The other 31 works in the show were taken from the permanent collections of the Springville Museum of Art, the Utah Arts Council and the University of Utah.
Representing the early periods in Utah are works by George M. Ottinger, Alfred Lambourne, John Tullidge and H.L.A. Culmer.
The exhibition, sponsored by Geneva Steel Corporation, remains through the end of the year at the Springville Museum of Art, 126 E. 400 South. Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, (to 9 p.m. on Wednesday), and 2-5 p.m. on Sunday. The museum is closed on Mondays. For more information, call 489-9734.
-Visitors to the Springville Museum of Art will miss a large portion of the museum's offerings if they fail to walk through the galleries on the second floor. In addition to large rooms filled with impressive works from the museum's permanent collection is a one-man show of watercolors by Brian Thayne. Housed in the small Works on Paper Gallery, it continues through November.
For this exhibit, Thayne dips into Utah landscape and genre scenes, as well as subject matter gleaned from his travels to Mexico, Italy and Belgium. Two watercolors that particularly caught my eye were "Sidewalk Cafe" and "Appaloosa."
The show continues through November in the Works on Paper Gallery.
-The Drawing 1989 exhibition fills B.F. Larsen and the Fourth Floor Galleries in the Harris Fine Arts Center at Brigham Young University. This national drawing competition is not a traveling show. It materialized as a result of the efforts of BYU Gallery Director Timothy Rose.
Artists from all over the country responded to the invitation to enter the show. In fact, over 700 slides were mailed to Rose. Only 91 works made it into the show.
Jurying from slides has its drawbacks. What looks two-dimensional in a slide might turn out to be three-dimensional (Scott Evans' relief sculpture, in which he combined a zinc plate, copper wire, oil pastel and graphite). Others turned out to be paintings (Judith Porter's acrylic on paper/collage). But, for the most part, the entries fit appropriately in the drawing category.
Several Utah artists are represented in the show, including Hagen Haltern and Al R. Young. In fact, Haltern's "Women of Masaar J. Sharif" won second place and a purchase award; and Al R. Young's "The Towers of Chillon" won a third-place cash award. First-place cash award went to Pat Barton for "Testis est mihi Deus." Two other purchase- award winners were David Hoeft and Fran Murphy.
"Drawing 1989" remains at the Harris Fine Arts Center through Friday, Nov. 17.
-Bruce Smith's provocative paintings of canning jars, cloth, fruit and other objects are still attracting attention in BYU's Secured Gallery. While I was there, members of an art class were sitting on the floor carefully scrutinizing the paintings, taking notes, and drawing Smith's imagery on paper.
In this show - titled "Does the Organism Reflect the Psyche?" - Smith unveils six recently finished works. Included in them are several small numbers and letters, which, according to Smith, can be tied in with the same theme that was used with canning jars. He said, "The numbers symbolize our society's tendency to classify, whereas the other objects represent my need to contradict that tendency."
Smith is an associate professor of art at Brigham Young University. He has been teaching there for 11 years.
His show continues in the Secured Gallery, F-303, through Friday, Nov. 17. Secured Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday and Tuesday, and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday through Friday.