Winter is an unwanted guest in a city with the word "spring" in it. And sculptures outside Springville's art museum appear both humorous and bizarre when capped with snow. In fact, last Tuesday, L'Deane Trueblood's sculpture of a child was completely embedded in snow - except for a tiny opening. Looking closely, I could see a bronze eye peering out at me.
But, believe me, it's no snow job when I say there are four significant exhibitions now on exhibit inside the museum.- The Step-Down Gallery is filled with 74 artworks acquired by the museum during 1992 - seven short of all the works acquired through donation, trade or purchase last year.
Viewers who glance at the exhibit for the first time express surprise at so many abstract works. But museum director Vern Swanson says "so many" equates to only three - by Lee Deffebach, Craig Matthews and Layne Mecham. The works dominate because of size.
Although Swanson is excited about these fine examples of abstract paintings, he's thrilled with other acquisitions as well. He proudly pointed to Charles Peterson's trompe l'oeil painting "A Bit From The Studio of William C. Morris, 1888"; George M. Ottinger's "Sugar Refinery Burning" (c. 1870); and James T. Harwood's "Study for Adoration of the Ages," a nude female figure painted while he was under the tutelage of Leon Bonnat in Paris. "In my opinion, this is the best nude figure painted by a Utahn during the first half of the 20th century," he said.
The acquisitions are impressive, but average appraisal value is $1,555 - about half of the accumulated value from previous years.
"There are not a lot of `heavy duty' pieces," he said. "That's because many are works on paper, generally smaller in size and executed by `secondary' Utah artists."
- Gracing the Southeast Gallery is the Utah Art Council's traveling exhibition taken from "Utah '92: Painting and Sculpture." Call for entries attracted 700 artworks. Guest juror Peter Briggs selected 80 for the show last year at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts. This traveling show, however, contains only 17 paintings and sculptures - about one-fifth of the accepted pieces.
When making his selections, Briggs stated that he was particularly drawn to "works of art which articulated an individual view of the world and at the same time demanded that I consider it."
So it's not surprising creative, off-the-wall entries - both representational and abstract - dominate the show. Some of the artists featured here are Gregory Abbott, Hal Douglas Himes, Jen Shurtliff and Maureen O'Hara Ure.
- Filling the Music Gallery are genre paintings from the permanent collection. Curated by museum aide Heather Densley, this cohesive exhibit depicts Americans enjoying their leisure moments.
One painting that doesn't quite fit that category is one of the museum's most significant works - "Polar Expedition" (c. 1944), a magnificent oil painting by famous American artist Rockwell Kent. The work was shipped to Springville for the Spring Salon of 1947. The sophomore class at Springville High School gathered enough money to purchase it and add it to the museum's collection.
In fact, it was the practice of junior and senior high school students to raise funds each year to buy works for the collection. And a number of them are included in this show. Also in 1947, the seventh graders at Springville Junior High School purchased a painting by Utahn Cornelius Salisbury titled "Curtain Time - Salt Lake Pioneer Theatre." Six years earlier, the junior class at the high school purchased "New England Farm Yard," an impressive painting by W. Lester Stevens of Massachusetts.
- The Russian Realism exhibit in the West Gallery highlights 35 years of a figurative genre school of painting that ran from 1937 to 1972, with the most important works done in the 1950s.
"I'm excited about this artwork," Swanson said. "Here we find a tradition of fine art realism that is process-driven, not product-driven. Artists have used methods of doing preliminary oil studies, working from live models and making plein-air observations rather than relying on photos. Every one of these paintings is of a contemporary event that took place at the time the work was painted."
The paintings are monumental - but only in size. There are no "grandiloquent," saccharine poses. There are no slick, polished surfaces with an immense amount of detail. Instead, the artists have captured the working class with honesty, authenticity and sincerity.
The people are not smiling, yet there is no hint of defeat or hopelessness. "There's a positiveness about this art that is not too common in other Russian art," Swanson says. "I call it `tough optimism.' Here are people who are not just enduring, but prevailing."
A close look at the surfaces reveals that paint has been applied energetically. Swanson calls it a "two-fisted" approach. "But the artists give you enough detail for you to finish the work."
He labels the style "Social Impressionism," which is a far cry from French Impressionism. He says the palette is more tonal, images are less distorted and the focus is on people - not landscape.
It was partly through Swanson's efforts that these works have been placed in the Springville Museum of Art on extended loan. Swanson has also been instrumental in compiling a 20-page catalog that is now being published. He is also writing a book about this significant style of Russian art.
The four exhibits will continue through January. The Springville Museum of Art is located at 126 E. 400 South. Hours are 2-5 p.m. Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, except Wednesday (10 a.m. to 9 p.m.). For details, call 489-2727.