For
more than a decade, Columbia, S.C., artists and those of the
Kunstlerwerkgemeinschaft (KWG) in Columbia’s German sister city of Kaiserslautern
have been going back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean. Columbians Mike
Williams, Stephen Chesley, Jeff Donovan, David Yaghjian, Tonya Gregg, Laura
Spong and others went to Kaiserslautern to work and exhibit. KWG members Roland
Albert, Ralph Gelbert, Klaus Hartmann, Reiner Mahrlein and Silvia Rudolf came
to Columbia, and their work graces the walls and backyards of many a local
home. During their Kaiserslautern visit last year, Donovan and Yaghjian even ran
into a City of Columbia delegation headed by mayor Steve Benjamin.
The
informal artists exchange’s next installment is Columbia/Kaiserslautern: The
International (Mural) Project, an if ART Gallery exhibition at Gallery
80808/Vista Studios, Columbia, S.C. Seventeen artists – six German, nine from
Columbia and two formerly of Columbia – will participate in the event, which
will consist, first, of the creation of a collective mural and, second, the
exhibition.
Two
Kaiserslautern and nine Columbia artists collectively will create a mural at
Vista Studios between September 29 – October 5. The mural will be on a
patchwork of canvas pieces mounted to a wall as one single work of art. The
German mural participants are Hartmann and Rudolf; the Columbia artists will be
Chesley, Donovan, Mary Gilkerson, Gregg, Peter Lenzo, Anna Redwine, Spong,
Williams and Yaghjian. The mural will be the centerpiece of the Columbia / Kaiserslautern exhibition.
“It’ll
be interesting to see how the mural turns out,” said if ART owner Wim Roefs,
who is organizing the event. “These are artists with often rather different
approaches and styles. On the other hand, they all have great affinity for each
other’s work and all are talented and assured in their own abilities, so I
suspect they will work to compliment each others’ contributions rather than
artistically fight each other. I wouldn’t be surprised we if we were to end up
with a work of art in which the various styles are beautifully integrated.”
All
mural artists also will be showing individual works in the exhibition, which
will run October 5 – 16, 2012, opening with a reception on October 5, 5:00 –
9:00 p.m. Others participating in the exhibition are Kaiserslautern artists
Roland Albert, Ralph Gelbert, Reiner Mahrlein and Jorg Heieck; Aiken, S.C., artist
H. Brown Thornton; and Columbus, N.C., artist Janet Orselli, who is a Columbia
native.
On
Sunday, October 7, 2:00 p.m., during a panel discussion, participants in the
Columbia-Kaiserslautern exchange will talk about their experiences. “Columbia
artists typically come back highly energized from their trips to
Kaiserslautern,” said Roefs, who has visited Kaiserslautern several times. “The
KWG, which has it’s own collective studio, is a vibrant group or artists that
also includes literary and performing artists. It’s a
membership-by-invitation-only club and its members are highly respected,
serious artists who have organizational talents to boot. It’s an inspiring
combination.”
The
collective mural will be shipped to Kaiserslautern after the exhibition. In
Kaiserslautern, the mural first will be exhibited in its original form. Next, KWG
members will add to the mural, exhibit the new version and then ship it back to
Columbia.
“It
should be good week,” Roefs said of Hartmann’s and Rudolf’s visit. “Silvia and
Klaus will be working here alongside their Columbia peers. Artists will be
going in an out of Vista Studios, working on the mural, exchanging ideas, drinking
coffee. We’ll have a series of luncheons and dinners, and I am sure everyone will
come out of the week energized.”
