Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 5, 1992 TAG: 9201010233
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN GRIBBIN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
STUDENTS' EYES OPENED TO THE EXCITEMENT OF ART
It was an unlikely event, a truckload of art making its way down U.S. 220, then swinging west on Virginia 40 through Rocky Mount. Art theft is on the rise; this might have been a major heist. It wasn't. It was a legitimate traveling art show, the Artemis Art Show, and it was headed for Ferrum College.I wish I could say that once this art show hit town, things were never quite the same down at Frank Peters' store and Sigmon's barber shop. Art works its magic in mysterious ways, but most of what hangs on the walls in Ferrum has antlers. A good rumor about the new teller down at the bank is going to have have more immediate impact on the average citizen than a Paul Gauguin nude.
Over on campus, the arrival of the truck was more of an event. There were flurries in the air, but those who braved the elements could watch the show being installed in the staid Stanley Library Gallery.
"There are devils loose all over these walls," a little boy once remarked in a poem about a construction worker's family wandering into a modern art gallery. The Artemis Art Show was performing similar tricks, a three-ring circus of outlandish, outrageous, out-to- grab-you-by-the-shorthair-and- twist-you Art. These were the most confounded, unconscionably confrontational pieces you'd ever hope to meet.
I sent two freshman English classes into the gallery and held my breath.
True, we'd been discussing the role of the artist in society. We'd read a typically acerbic essay by critic and novelist Anthony Burgess decrying the contemporary notion that even a 5-year-old's creative efforts should be considered art. ("Art should have a ring of fire built around it," Burgess fumed.) We'd also read Bill Geist's "Sofa-sized Art," a witty sendup of "starving artist" sales.
But what was going to happen when students who'd grown up on computer games and Disney animation were confronted by Roanoke artist Bill Rutherfoord's vertically extruded sculpture of a sleek wooden businessman riding his briefcase to button-down success? Would the bite of Rutherfoord's awl be numbed by the Nintendo generation's uncritical acceptance of any and all images in a cartooned world?
I issued instructions for students to square off with works of art and record their impressions. Most of these works invited, no, demanded, interpretation. But that was only my view; it wasn't my eye I was trying to train. Would they be bored, after all? Could cultural apathy defeat even the vibrancy of this art? In the pit of my stomach, I felt that outcome was a real possibility.
Sure enough, a crowd immediately gathered around the only representational piece in the show, a painting of dogs and cats in friendly, panting poses. The students were taking the low road, the line of least resistance. Or so I thought.
Easing over to eavesdrop, I found them mulling over a troubling feature of the painting and homing in on the central artistic question. Just what was the effect of those Greek columns planted in the landscape? Did the artist have something in mind with that kind of juxtaposition? Did the columns represent the last vestige of civilization? Had animals taken over the world? Things were really cooking until some wag quipped that the dogs were smiling because the columns were actually fire hydrants.
Even that droll explanation raised a question. Could significant art be funny? It could, we agreed. But in their written reviews, the students were deadly serious, grappling with explanations and evaluations. Boredom was the farthest thing from their minds.
All good things must come to an end. Art hopped back onto the truck, heading for other galleries, other lives. Students moved on to other assignments. As for me, I've seen a lot of good work in the two years since then. But I still miss that traveling show.
\ AUTHOR Dan Gribbin , professor of English at Ferrum College, is the coordinating fiction editor and a member of the governing board of Artemis.