Brother Mel has done it again...and again and again

Brother Mel's 83rd year--which we will be celebrating at The Arts Company during his 14th Annual Artistic Pilgrimage to Nashville June 3 & 4--has truly been another phenomenal year for this rare artist who has been a Catholic brother in the Marianist community for over 60 years and a practicing artist for over 50 years.

Brother Mel outside his studio

Between now and the time we will see him in early June, his year will be topped off in three important ways:

1) First and foremost: On May 21, St. Louis University will award him an honorary doctorate in the arts for his lifetime of making art.

2) As if that is not enough, some 18-20 of his large outdoor sculptures have been purchased by St. Louis University to be placed in a special park at the entrance to the university in the middle of downtown St. Louis in mid-May, just ahead of the degree ceremony. While the university and other businesses and public spaces have purchased and commissioned his work for years, this newest purchase and special presentation, plus this academic honor, is further testament to the demand for and quality of his work.

...and the best for last...

3) Lucky for Nashville, Brother Mel will be coming to Nashville just two weeks after this honor and the formal dedication will have taken place. If you are one of his special collectors and fans, listen up. He will be at The Arts Company for two occasions, accompanied by his latest exhibition of new work.

On Friday, June 3, he will be the subject of that night's Collectors Art Night at The Arts Company. To honor him further, his visit that night will be hosted and presented by some very special collectors who will be there to talk about why they keep coming back to his work and why it matters to them--from corporate to individual collectors.

On Saturday, June 4, he will be available to meet and greet his Nashville friends as they come to see his latest work...and to celebrate his 83rd birthday.

Brother Mel, Ovals, 11 x 21 x 21 inches

This year, we have asked him to focus on small sculptural shapes and colors, more artwork to "bring beauty to space to lift up spirits." It's exciting work commissioned especially for this year's Nashville exhibition. It's artwork we can all take personally.

In true Brother Mel fashion, once St. Louis University made their selections, within a short time Brother Mel had produced more large sculptures to re-populate his own sculpture yard outside his studio. He is never at a loss for new ideas, and his love of working at art all day six days a week never wanes.

We are lucky in Nashville to have direct access to this rare artist during his annual exhibitions.

The Shapes & Colors of Brother Mel

Opening at The Arts Company

Saturday, June 4, 6-9 pm

An Artistic Life in the Fast Lane

Drew Doggett is an energetic young artist whose entrepreneurial skills keep pace with the broad scope of his artistic vision and philanthropic commitment.

To give you an idea: Drew flew to Nashville, the day after returning from his recent second documentary trip--this one to Africa, to measure every inch of our downstairs gallery walls so that he could tailor-make every piece selected for the exhibit, each one large scale and to be mounted on aluminum. In addition, he was interviewed for a two-part story to appear in the April and May issues of Nashville Arts magazine. All that in a whirlwind trip of six hours.

Drew Doggett (far right) talks with Arts Company Owner and Director, Dr. Anne Brown; Michael Burcham, Executive Director, Entrepreneur Center (far left); and Lon Bouldin, Ventures PR.

His is an artistic life in the fast lane, for sure.

In the five years since he graduated from Vanderbilt University with a degree in Human and Organizational Development, he has established himself as a significant emerging photographer with three distinct bodies of work:

1) high fashion, beginning his NYC-based career with accomplished photographers Mark Seliger and Steven Klein, followed quickly by creating his own trend-setting style of high fashion photography;


2) documentary, committing himself to a 10-year series of documentaries focused on vanishing cultures in remote areas--the first one, Slow Road to China, about the people and landscapes of a remote Himalayan region of Nepal, will be part of this exhibition; and initiating Art Cares, a non-profit organization to benefit the cultures he documents;

3) and urban landscapes, through commissions from private, business and government clients.

As with any artist, the heart of the matter is in his work--his meticulous attention to detail both in his photographs and in their presentation; his clear understanding of what he is looking for in each of the areas in which he works; and his commitment to capturing the beauty of obscure and vanishing cultures in the world. All of this will be clear to you when you step into the door of our gallery. You will know this is a different kind of artistic journey.

The photographs speak for themselves, but they also speak of the spirit of adventure and the vision of this photographer's passion for his work. Think of this as an art lover's adventure--a remote primitive culture meets high fashion and urban environments, each offering distinctive visual insight into some of the beauties and realities of three cultures, all co-existing in our contemporary world, each one enriching the other.

This exhibition introduces Nashville to a young 21st-century artist whose photographic images reveal the work of an artist and entrepreneur who has achieved artistic, commercial, and philanthropic success in a very short time. This is Drew's first exhibit in Nashville, and, we hope, just the beginning of more great photographs and exhibits he will bring back to Nashville.

Join us to welcome Drew back to Nashville

Saturday, April 2, 6-9 pm,

during First Saturday Art Crawl.

A New Online Marketplace

Charlie Buckley, The Arts Company, oil on muslin-wrapped panel, 14 x 8.5'', 2010

Business models are a dime a dozen these days. Every time we think we have one cornered, it slips away in mid-thought. It's a swift world out here.

From day one in our art business our idea was to make art commercially viable by locating in the middle of an active marketplace where people transact all kinds of business within close proximity to each other on a daily basis. A hundred years ago that was the town square. Then the center of cities. Then the suburbs. Then shopping malls. Now we're back to the town square, but without the brick and mortar.

Bob Grannis, Capital Construction, photograph, 20 x 30'', 1957

The new town square is online, with a multiplicity of communities you can choose to connect with. You create your own town square online, defined by the people with whom you converse and share confidences and by the sources you count on for shopping and purchasing.

Even though we are in the art business where everything is original, one-of-a-kind, it's hard to know how to find a brick and mortar location in a prime traffic location where people go to transact business and look for tangible goods and services. For us, the center of downtown Nashville continues to be a good bet. For a simple reason. Nashville is magnet for creativity, and downtown is an arts destination. People from around the world come to downtown Nashville to seek out the Nashville experience--that is, the unusual combination of lots of institutional and commercial venues in music, art, museums, libraries, and honky tonks, all within walking distance of each other. Fortunately, that combination attracts consistent foot traffic. Still, that's a kind of activity-based market scenario, not the daily kind of traffic that stems from the daily business of people's lives.

Charles Keiger, The Vault, oil on panel, 20 x 18'', 2009

It is not easy to find a thriving daily physical marketplace. The marketplace of our time is online, and any business wishing to thrive has to reckon with that elusive, seemingly amorphous structure and find new ways to get their goods and ideas noticed. Case in point: we now look online or "onphone" to locate brick and mortar places. In essence, when someone finds us now, it's likely through an online source more than just happening to be in the neighborhood.

This is not to bemoan change. On the contrary, we are looking for that new thriving market where real goods and real people can still get together in an active marketplace environment. That's why we are moving forward quickly to adapt ourselves to the new online marketplace. We are launching a new business partnership with Moontoast, an online social commerce platform. We are matching their online savvy and resources to ours--fresh, original, contemporary artwork, a selection that can be encountered and purchased online 24/7.

We can't wait to see who we meet up with in this sprawling new world of tasteful commerce. Join us if you dare. Try it out. Be a pioneer with us. We promise that over time it will be one heck of an adventure. We'd love to have you with us.

All you have to do is click here: theartscompany.moontoast.com. Join our online community, and together we will help shape this emerging marketplace for artwork.

Beauty in the Mystery: by Robin Venable

*Image of Einstein from: http://wespenre.com/quotes.htm

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."

This is a quotation by one of the most inventive and creative minds of our time - Albert Einstein. His revolutions in scientific thought - specifically the theory of relativity - are some of the most profound revelations of the human mind.

I am currently reading his biography simply called Einstein by Walter Isaacson. Through the detailed accounts of his personal life and scientific struggles and triumphs, one sees a man whose quest for the unknown mysteries of the universe are unquenchable. These mysteries would keep him deeply thoughtful his entire life.

Some of the most (dare I use the word) beautiful artistic expressions are those that leave us guessing... ones that take us on our own quest for understanding with some guideposts along the way...but not too many so that we can find our way on our own.

Here are a few examples from artists that we represent that give the viewer that air of mystery, which, according to one of the greatest minds of our time, keeps us alive.

Tony Breuer, Virginia Falls, mixed media on canvas, 30 x 40''

Bill Starke, Climber, cast aluminum, 25 x 13 x 9''

Jim Hubbman, Corvus Camerae, watercolor and graphite on paper, 40 x 25.5''

Rod Daniel, Canyon de Chelly #9, archival digital print, 48 x 32''

Aggie Zed, Man with Box, porcelain, 7 x 4 x 5''

Don Dudenbostel, Tonna, platinum print, 5 x 4''

Charles Keiger, Wishing for Blue Skies, oil on panel, 22 x 20''

Modern Day "Window People": by Robin Venable

With the huge success of social media networks like Facebook, we are able to peer into other people's lives. That is, the lives that they want us to see.

In a somewhat-controlled environment I am able to post status updates, pictures, and videos to inform my "friends" of my ever-changing life.

Norman Lerner, "Piano Tuner, 1950's", archival digital print, 13 x 19 inches

When I post something, I know that it will pop up in my friends' news feeds, but I don't know who is actually coming to my page, looking at all of my photos, or analyzing my status updates.

A little creepy? Absolutely.

Norman Lerner, "Elevator Operator, 1950's", archival digital print, 13 x 19 inches

Have you ever felt like someone was looking at you? When viewing Norman Lerner's "Window People" I feel that uncomfortable tingle of watching eyes. The dilapidated windows house all sorts of people - a frowning, bulbous-nosed woman in her seventies sitting instead of standing, an old man who tunes pianos daring you to come in the front door, a bald elevator operator with sunken eyes looking out blankly...

Norman Lerner, "Resigned, 1950's", archival digital print, 13 x 19 inches

Perhaps we should feel that same unpleasant twinge when we log on to Facebook - feeling the clicks of the mouse as people visit our page.

Lerner's "Window People" are timeless. With his camera he has captured moments of connection between the observer and viewer (The original prints are silver gelatin prints that have now been converted to digital prints.) that make us want to know more about the people in the photographs. He has preserved that moment in time in which the gazer is caught looking... and now, just like Facebook, we get to look back...uninterrupted, and with all the time in the world.

Meet Norman Lerner, master photographer and Nashville resident

Norman Lerner is one of those classic American artists whose photographs have been acknowledged in exhibits, articles, and museum and private collections around the country since the 1960s. His studio was anchored in NYC for a number of years, always near the major art museums he visited regularly during lunch hours, museums that ultimately exhibited and purchased his work. A venerable statesman for photography as an art form, Mr. Lerner and his wife recently selected Nashville for their retirement destination, because of "the civility of the place and the people," he says.

Norman Lerner, Grand Central Station Waiting Room, 1950's

Since his move to Nashville, he has been actively engaged in organizing the various parts of his photography--from the classic fashion photography of the 1950s, to studies of the body, and the documentary-style photography of urban lives in NYC and compelling landscapes to the innovative figurative abstract series, Transfigurations, created and printed beginning in the late 1960s.

Norman Lerner, Lingerie, 1950's

Norman Lerner worked as a fashion and commercial photographer in New York City from the early 50s to the 70s. He maintained an active commercial studio of some 40 employees, their primary work coming from the major magazines in the city. But that was just the beginning for him. He states that, "my photography did not end when the model left the studio. The city and its people were a part of me and I was part of them. Everything about the city fascinated me so it seemed only natural for me as a photographer to record the people and places in which we all lived. When I left the studio the camera was always with me and it because an extension of my being. It was as natural as breathing."

Norman Lerner, A la Klein

His regular forays into the museums, especially one recurring visit to the Jewish Museum on Fifth Avenue when they presented the sculpture of Yves Klein, led to another path for him as an artist. His response was "I can do that," meaning that as a photographer he could make figurative sculpture work, photographs that would have sculptural texture. He secured a grant fro State University of New York Foundation to create his Transfiguration series. Armed with a large format camera, models, and his fully-equipped professional printing studio, he set out to make black and white sculpture through camera, paper, and chemistry. The results, inspired by what he had learned about texture from Edward Weston, are not quite like anything else. Minor White, one of the 20th-century American masters of photography first discovered and showed this series.

Lerner's photography has been shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. MOMA added selections from his Transfiguration series to their potography collection, as did the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.

His photographs have been published in numerous publications, including Color Magazine, Black and White Magazine, Popular Photography, US Camera, Look, New York Times Magazine, GQ, Glamour, Men's Wear, Photographer's Forum, Boy's Life, 35mm Color, Camera, and Darkroom; it has been highlighted on The Today Show and Casey Allen's WNDT show, "In Focus."

Norman Lerner, Window Washer, 1950's

In the 1960s, he was founder and chair of photography for the first fashion degree program in the United States at the Fashion Institute of Technology in NYC. In 1986-1994, he was coordinator of the photography studies program at California Polytechnic State University, and remains connected with them as Professor Emeritus.

Mr. Lerner has been able to sustain his creative side while teaching and owning a demanding commercial studio serving high end clients in the magazine world. In all that he has done, his artistic vision has been primary. As he says it, "I have always kept a little seed of creativity alive. I have never permitted it to go dead." That explains in part why at age 83, he maintains that though he is retired from active business, he simply cannot take time off from his work as an artist, because "I haven't reached retirement age. There is this project that I'm working on..." He continues to work on photographic projects and organizing his lifetime of work.

Nashvillians now have a chance to meet Mr. Lerner personally and see his work at The Arts Company. On February 4, there is a Collectors Art Night with Mr. Lerner as one of the guests. Click www.5thavenueofthearts.com to make a reservation. On February 5 during the First Saturday Art Crawl, he will be in the gallery to talk with guests about his work. Click here to preview some of his work-- www.theartscompany.com.

Of Things To Come

Norman Lerner, "Window Washer", Copyright Norman Lerner

Happy New Year to all of us who love to discover, see, and talk about what matters in the world of art that touches our lives.

We have lots of discoveries to unveil and lots to talk about in this New Year. Check in frequently -- in house and online.

Come see us to toast the New Year this Saturday, January 8th. What fun it will be. Mr Lerner's "Window Washer" will be here to greet you.

Anne, Brian, Robin, and friends