Artist Party Saturday October 17th, 6 to 9pm, With Tom Lattanand on guitar
Show runs September 7th, through October 24th 2015
Two brilliant Jingletown artists explore the more feminine side of art, through multiple mediums.
Susan Tuttle
"My main passions consist of photography and designing and producing jewelry, both self taught. I’ve been photographing for more than 30 years. My captured images are as I saw them and are printed without any computer manipulation other than color correction. I also enjoy creating mixed media pieces, particularly in the form of shadow boxes. I strive to capture humor, depth, and emotion of the unusual as well as the familiar. I become easily immersed in the other world behind the lens. I attempt to challenge myself in capturing an image that may not be clear to myself or to others."
Wendy McDermott
This body of work seems to have evolved directly from and is attributable to my personal experiences as a wife and mother over the past twenty four years. It also encompasses the stories of countless others who have followed similar paths - partly chosen by them and partly chosen for them by traditional societal values and expectations.
The pieces shown here are emblematic of the outer trappings of femininity and fashion while offering content that is characteristic of the internal struggles of maternal existence.
My previous work was characteristically functional – as wearable art – objects of adornment – with more thought given to design and commerce than to emotional or intellectual content. This is in keeping with generations of women that produced functional art for themselves and to sell – utilizing ornament and pattern – to beautify as well as to record their culture, religion or history into objects that they used every day. This “women’s work” imbued with these archival qualities has historically been rich with political and personal significance. (And, sometimes, it is merely decorative).
While I continue to investigate the realm of human adornment, I have now arrived at a different perspective in the body of work being shown here. This work is related to and in some ways derivative of being a jeweler and in fact, employs many of the same techniques. It exists in the framework of functional, wearable art, but is not really practical. Thereby removing itself from the context of “craft” and into a gray area where the oft separated worlds of craft and art blend.
Though this work is intensely personal (speaking to my own experience), I like to think that it is also universal (and even slightly political), in that a wide audience of viewers can and do respond to it as reminiscent of their own life experiences.
The intent here is to fill a gap - to recognize and speak to and for those ensconced in a suburban home environment, rarely recognized for their contribution, save a yearly Mother’s Day Card. It is presented in an attempt to foster a greater awareness among those whose lives are distant from this world – the world of women/moms in suburbia - who are uncompensated for their eighteen hour days - child rearing, cooking, laundry, cleaning, chauffeuring, scheduling, fixing, organizing, supporting, nesting, ad nauseum. They are the hardest working, most selfless and dedicated people I know.
Tom Lattanand on guitar
Tom Lattanand is a multifaceted guitarist, composer, song writer, and producer who resides in Oakland. His dynamic, multilayered, and percussive solo guitar playing creates a sound much bigger than one might expect. His guitar compositions are both intricate and high energy, while drawing from a wide range of musical styles. A steady presence in the Bay Area music scene since 1998, he has collaborated with a long list of artists, while he currently performs in the groups Albino and leads the newly formed project Root Logic. tomlattanand.com, https://www.youtube.com/user/tlattanand
