Twenty years ago, Metropolitan State College of Denver opened an off-campus gallery to serve as an outlet for students, professors and the community. Over those two decades, it has gone through a number of changes, the most recent of which took place this year. First dubbed the Center for the…
There’s no question that Santa Fe Drive is the art district in Denver, and yet it’s also true that most of the galleries along the row leave something to be desired. To make matters worse, in the last year or so, the street essentially lost two of its flagships: Gallery…
I could use this entire page — and many more — to talk about what a lost opportunity the 2010 Biennial of the Americas turned out to be. I’d start out by exploring the story of the stillborn “In Good We Trust” theme thought up by Bruce Mau, who split…
Although it has only been a going concern for a few months, the upstart Ice Cube Gallery (3320 Walnut Street, 303-292-1822, www.icecubegallery.com) has surely become one of the most impressive exhibition spaces in town. It’s not just how beautiful and spacious the facility is; it’s also the high quality of…
Contemporary art is characterized by stylistic diversity, with a wide variety of different approaches vying for attention — each with its own roster of adherents. This week, I’m looking at conceptualism, realism and abstraction, all of which have long traditions and yet are completely contemporary in feel. First, let’s look…
This is the tenth summer in a row that David Cook Fine Art (1637 Wazee Street, 303-623-8181, www.davidcookfineart.com), the state’s premier purveyor of late nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century material, has presented a group show dedicated to historic Western art. And as could be expected, the current incarnation, Colorado & the West,…
A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine who has vast knowledge of the visual arts called me and, in an accusatory tone, asked, “When are you going to review the Moore show? It’s the best thing to hit this town since Giacometti.” He was talking, of course, about…
Stark: Life in Black and White, at Foothills Art Center (809 15th Street, Golden, 303-279-3922, www.foothillscenter.org), is made up of the work of five Denver-area artists, each of whom has been given a mini-solo to showcase his or her black-and-white pieces. (There’s also a supplementary piece, by Greg Cradick of…
A pair of solos on display at Robischon Gallery delve into the field of conceptual abstraction, as both artists have created three-dimensional objects, not all of which could be called sculptures. Up front is Linda Fleming: Lingering, made up of recent works by this part-time Colorado artist. In the center…
The William Havu Gallery (1040 Cherokee Street, 303-893-2360, www.williamhavugallery.com) specializes in showcasing classic Colorado artists. That characteristic is exemplified in Tracy Felix and Sushe Felix: Common Ground. A husband-and-wife team, the Felixes don’t work collaboratively, but their work is interrelated. In the front spaces at Havu is a solid selection…
Former Denver Art Museum director Lewis Sharp, who retired at the end of 2009, really made his mark on the place. The most obvious example of this is the Hamilton Building, which nearly doubled the museum’s exhibition space. Less obvious is the way he reorganized the DAM’s internal structure, recasting…
Maruca Salazar became the director of the Museo de las Américas (861 Santa Fe Drive, 303-571-4401, www.museo.org) in the fall of 2009 and unveiled her first show, La Malagua, a couple of months ago. The exhibit highlights the work of a collaborative group of artists based in Puerto Vallarta and…
There’s no argument that Herbert Bayer, who lived in Aspen from 1946 to 1974, is the most important artist in Colorado history. He was internationally famous when he moved here, having been associated with the Bauhaus in Germany before World War II. And he embraced a wide range of artistic…
Leo Seltzer never lived to see the realization of his dreams for the sport he invented, which most modern roller derby scholars trace back to his 1935 Transcontinental Roller Derby at the Chicago Coliseum. Seltzer had Olympic ambitions for his roller guys and dolls, and he dared to dream of…
After much back and forth over the last few months, including a showdown in the middle of the Winter Olympics, Intrawest has repaid its lenders and completed a new loan. Locally, that means Winter Park and Steamboat may be staying the course until at least 2014, though the $107 million…
Works on paper are a standard feature of the art world, even if works made out of paper are not. Back in the late ’60s and early ’70s, however, a generation of artists began using paper as their medium — and Colorado artist Ray Tomasso was at the forefront. It’s…
Colorado artists have been making ceramics since the turn of the last century, but it wasn’t until the 1970s and ’80s that the scene here really hit its stride. This was a time when a group of artists whom I call the “greatest generation” were routinely producing world-class work. Luminaries…
Here’s some inspiring news snowboarders around the world have been waiting for: Kevin Pearce officially checked out of Craig Hospital this week, four months after suffering a traumatic brain injury in the halfpipe on December 31. He’ll remain in Colorado for a few weeks of outpatient treatment, but is expected…
Among the city’s cooperative venues, Edge Gallery (3658 Navajo Street, 303-477-7173, www.edgeart.org) is almost always interesting. Because the membership is diverse and quite accomplished, shows here are often surprising and always worth viewing. A friend had contacted me about In the Manner of Pollock, a solo made up of recent…
On June 2, 2006 Ben Bradley set out from his home in Tabernash, CO with a rare Never Summer split snowboard, some winter gear, his thumb, and not much else, hitchhiking his way to Jackson, WY to meet friends for some late-season snowboarding. He never made it, and his body…
The trajectory of the exhibition season has two principal arcs. The first gets going in the fall and peters out at the first of the year, while the second begins in late winter and early spring before hitting autopilot for the summer. It’s just like school. And that means we’re…
Hal Gould just turned ninety, and not only is he by far the oldest gallery director around, but his photo gallery, Camera Obscura (1309 Bannock Street, 303-623-4059, www.cameraobscuragallery.com), which he runs with Loretta Young-Gautier, is one of the oldest in the country. That said, there’s nothing old-fashioned about the place,…
