if ARTwalk: Salon I & II: December 11- 24, 2008

For exhibition installation images, click here.

THE SALON I & II

Dec. 11 – 24, 2008

an exhibition at two Columbia, SC, locations:

Gallery 80808/Vista Studios

808 Lady Street

&

if ART Gallery

1223 Lincoln Street

Reception and ifART Walk: Thursday, Dec. 11, 5 – 10 p.m.

at and between both locations

Opening Hours:

Weekdays, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m.

Saturday, 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Sunday, 1 – 5 p.m.

& by appointment

Open Christmas Eve until 7 p.m.

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 255-0068/ (803) 238-2351 – if-art-gallery@sc.twcbc.com

For its December 2008 exhibition, if ART Gallery presents The Salon I & II, an exhibition at two Columbia, SC, locations: if ART Gallery and Gallery 80808/Vista Studios. On Thursday, December 11, 2008, 5 – 10 p.m., if ART will hold opening receptions at both locations. The ifART Walk will be on Lady and Lincoln Streets, between both locations, which are around the corner from each other.

The exhibitions will present art by if ART Gallery artists, installed salon-style at both Gallery 80808 and if ART. Artists in the exhibitions include two new additions to if ART Gallery, Columbia ceramic artist Renee Rouillier and the prominent African-American collage and mixed-media artist Sam Middleton, an 81-year-old expatriate who has lived in the Netherlands since the early 1960s.

Other artists in the exhibition include Karel Appel, Aaron Baldwin, Jeri Burdick, Carl Blair, Lynn Chadwick, Steven Chapp, Stephen Chesley, Corneille, Jeff Donovan, Jacques Doucet, Phil Garrett, Herbert Gentry, Tonya Gregg, Jerry Harris, Bill Jackson, Sjaak Korsten, Peter Lenzo, Sam Middleton, Eric Miller, Dorothy Netherland, Marcelo Novo, Matt Overend, Anna Redwine, Paul Reed, Edward Rice, Silvia Rudolf, Kees Salentijn, Laura Spong, Tom Stanley, Christine Tedesco, Brown Thornton, Leo Twiggs, Bram van Velde, Katie Walker, Mike Williams, David Yaghjian, Paul Yanko and Don Zurlo.

Works of Art: Christine Tedesco

Untitled, c.2003

Dupioni silk

12 x 12 in.

$450

All works of art by Christine Tedesco are available at if ART Gallery, 1223 Lincoln Street, Columbia, SC.

Contact Wim Roefs at if-art-gallery@sc.twcbc.com or (803) 255-0068/(803) 238-2351.1.

Essay: Christine Tedesco

CHRISTINE TEDESCO

By Wim Roefs

In Christine Tedesco’s quilts and textile pieces, the quilters of Gee’s Bend meet modern artists such as Josef Albers, 1960s color field painters and even Sean Scully. While Albers was hard to miss, Tedesco arrived at her style well before becoming aware of the Benders or the likes of Scully. But Tedesco shares with the quilters the traditional textile craft of the U.S. South, where she developed her interest in the medium. She also shares with them a modern abstract aesthetic.

Isolated from the modern art world, the Benders developed their remarkable style from the early 20th century in rural Southwest Alabama using old clothing and discarded fabric. Tedesco came to her style in part through formal art education, using fancier fabrics, especially silk. Tedesco’s quilts are “reminiscent of 20th century modern master Josef Albers’ paintings that explore the shifting character of color based on its neighboring color,” curator Lori Kornegay wrote for the 1999 South Carolina Arts Commission exhibition Practical Extravagance. They “reveal an examination of the architecture of color while also functioning as beautiful adornments for a bed or a chair.”

Tedesco mostly uses dupioni silk, which is often woven from two different colors of thread and shimmers and changes colors in the light. She makes vibrant, both colorful and more monochromatic textile pieces that show sure but fluid line work. While Tedesco creates both symmetrical and asymmetrical patterns, she also matches symmetry and asymmetry in a single design, placing smaller shapes off-center within an overall symmetrical, often grid-like design.

Tedesco is an architect, and her geometric compositions and patterns have an architectural quality in which shape and color interplay. Wallpaper magazine in 1999 referred in that context to Tedesco’s “rational approach to the design of each work and her recognition of the parallels between architectural construction and that of her own craft.”

During studies in Italy in the early 1990s she discovered Italian tile design. “I began to notice the beautiful tile work that was everywhere throughout the country,” Tedesco says. “I began to photograph, draw and make watercolors of these tiles.” Tile design and architectural design provided her with a visual vocabulary for her textile works. “I also began to incorporate the gold and jewel tones of mosaics in Italian and Byzantine churches.”

But the initial impetus for Tedesco’s art came from her upbringing in the South, where she grew up loving the creativity of cooking and sewing, including making clothing and handbags. “Later, the study of architecture furthered my visual awareness for things in a built environment,” Tedesco says. “The act of making or creating anything, whether it is a simple tile pattern, drafting a complex technical drawing or making a quilt or garment has always been an artistic endeavor for me.”

The Inventory: February 15-26, 2008

Untitled, c. 2003

Dupioni silk

12 x 12

$450

if ART

presents at

Gallery 80808/Vista Studios

808 Lady St., Columbia, S.C.

THE INVENTORY:

A Group Show of if ART artists

Feb. 15 – 26, 2008

Artists’ Reception: Friday, Feb. 15, 5 – 10 p.m.

Opening Hours:

Saturdays, 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Sundays, 1 – 5 p.m.

Weekdays, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. and by appointment

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 238-2351 – wroefs@sc.rr.com

For its February exhibition, if ART presents The Inventory, a group exhibition of artists from if ART Gallery. The show will consist of many new works by if ART artists as well as older pieces from the gallery’s inventory.

Included in the show will be work by Columbia artists Jeff Donovan, Mary Gilkerson, Marcelo Novo, Anna Redwine and David Yaghjian. Other South Carolina artists include Carl Blair, Jeri Burdick, Phil Garrett, Bill Jackson, Peter Lenzo, Dorothy Netherland, Matt Overend, Edward Rice, Tom Stanley, Christine Tedesco, H. Brown Thornton, Leo Twiggs, Katie Walker and Paul Yanko. Furthermore, the show will present work by former South Carolina residents Tonya Gregg, Eric Miller and Andy Moon. Also included are California collage artist Jerry Harris, Dutch painter Kees Salentijn and German artists Roland Albert, Klaus Hartmann and Silvia Rudolf.

Biography: Christine Tedesco

Christine Tedesco of Pendleton, SC

Christine is a woman who was brought up in the south learning the domestic arts of cooking and sewing. She grew to love the creativity in doing these things. Later, the study of architecture furthered her visual awareness for things in the built environment. The act of making or creating anything, whether it is a simple tile pattern, drafting a complex technical drawing, or making a quilt or garment has always been an artistic endeavor for her.

After many years of working only in architecture, Christine has broadened her practice with her husband, to include architecture, art and design. Their interests encompass furniture, lighting, products, photography and textiles. They exhibit and market their work at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) in New York City. In recent years she has completed several commissions for public spaces.

Construction Crew II: December 8-19, 2006

if ART, International Fine Art Services

presents at

Gallery 80808/Vista Studios

808 Lady St., Columbia, S.C.

C o n s t r u c t i o n C r e w II:

MATT OVEREND

VIRGINIA SCOTCHIE

CHRISTINE TEDESCO

PAUL YANKO

Dec. 8 – 19, 2006

Artists’ Reception:

Friday, Dec. 8, 5 – 10 p.m.

Opening Hours:

Saturdays, 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Sundays, 1 – 5 p.m.

Weekdays, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. and by appointment

For more information, contact Wim Roefs at if ART:

(803) 238-2351 – wroefs@sc.rr.com

For its holiday exhibition at Gallery 80808/Vista Studios in Columbia, S.C., if ART, International Fine Art Services of Columbia presents Construction Crew II, a group exhibition with work by South Carolina artists Matt Overend, Virginia Scotchie, Christine Tedesco and Paul Yanko. Like the first if ART Construction Crew exhibition in December 2005, the show consists of two-dimensional and three-dimensional art that has strong constructional or architectural characteristics. The exhibition opens Friday, Dec. 8, with a reception from 5:00 –10:00 p.m. and runs through Dec. 19. Opening hours are weekdays, 11:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m., Saturdays, 11 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., and Sundays 1:00 – 5:00 p.m. Overend, Scotchie, Tedesco and Yanko are represented by if ART Gallery, 1223 Lincoln St., (803) 238-2351, where additional works of art by all four artists will be on view.

Overend will show paintings of buildings and architectural structures, a new direction in his art. Scotchie will show her well-known abstracted, ceramic sculptures and objects. Textile artist Tedesco will show colorful quilts and textile pieces of different sizes, typically with abstract, geometric patterns and compositions. Yanko offers colorful, abstract paintings often with a heavily built-up surface.

Matt Overend (b. 1950) is a native of Las Vegas who grew up in Atlanta and has lived in Smoaks, S.C., since 1981. He was with Janet Orselli in an if ART exhibition in March 2005 at Vista Studios. In the past two years, he has had solo exhibitions in Hilton Head, Camden, Charleston and Charlotte. Overend in 1973 graduated as an aerospace engineer at Georgia Tech before studying art at Santa Barbara City College in California, the University of California at Santa Barbara and Yale University.

Virginia Scotchie (b. 1955) is an internationally renowned ceramic artist who teaches at the University of South Carolina art department. Earlier this fall, she returned from Taiwan, where she did a major commission for the Yingge Ceramic Museum. In recent years she has been an artist in residence at the University of Hawaii and Taiwan’s Tainan National University for the Arts.

Christine Tedesco (b. 1959) is an architect and textile artist in Pendleton, S.C. Her work has been part of the U.S. State Department’s Art in Embassies Program, featured in Tanzania and Honduras. She has shown in the Mint Museum in Charlotte, N.C., and was included in the 2001 S.C. Triennial and the opening exhibition of New Orlean’s Ogden Museum of Southern Art in 2003.

Paul Yanko teaches at the S.C. Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities in Greenville. He holds an MFA in painting from Kent State University and a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art. He has exhibited at the Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art and the McDonough Museum of Art in Youngstown, Ohio. This will be his first exhibition in Columbia.