THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 30, 1994 TAG: 9410280235
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
LENGTH: Long : 107 lines
I think the lime-green, cone-shaped sculptures out on the floor at the Virginia Beach Center for the Arts are huge caterpillars - imaginary relatives of those caterpillars with spiky horns that feast in my vegetable garden every summer.
You know the caterpillars I mean? They are ugly enough to give you bad dreams. Almost as big as dogs, they blend in with the foliage so well, they startle you everytime you find one.
Yet the catalog for Fabricated Nature, the sculpture show at the arts center describes Ming Fay's work as being reminiscent of ``segmented pods.'' And so the two sculptures may remind you of green peas. On the other hand, they remind arts center education director Betsy DiJulio of cactii.
That's the fun of Fabricated Nature. The sculptures can be most anything you want them to be. Although most every piece evokes something familiar from the natural world, whether insect, seed pod or jellyfish, nothing is literal. In fact the forms and shapes are created with highly unnatural materials like plastic, rubber or wire mesh.
For example Mark Calderon's steel basket is full of brass leaves, and Niki Ketchman's upside-down centipede with a thousand wavy leg-tentacles is made of aluminum and wire.
Caterpillar sculptor, Ming Fay, is probably my favorite artist there. One of her other sculptures is a large brown crinkly seed, a peach pit perhaps, that stands thigh-high on the floor.
Her third, entitled Ginseng, could be a sculpted ginseng root as if it had just been dug from the earth with all its little secondary trailers still hanging on. When I look at Gingseng another way, I see a seahorse with two tails.
Whether seahorse or root, most of the sculptures will bring a reaction of some kind. You'll see seeds, pods, plants, insects and other beasts that live in your wildest imagination.
A huge, dense black spiderlike figure hangs from the ceiling. Sculpted by Petah Coyne, it reminds me of those horrifying photos of dust mites, enlarged thousands of times. But this is one giant dust mite, and it looks as if it doesn't need a microscope to grow bigger at any moment.
Another favorite of mine is a clear, yellow plexiglas sail of a stinging nettle by Jill Viney. It's got to be the sail of an imaginary kin of the Portuguese Man-of-War, one of the more colorful and poisonous stinging nettles. Through the molded yellow plexiglas, you can see tubular shapes in muted colors, the poisonous innards of a very poisonous creature.
Folds of rubber laminate hang from a wall. The artist Heide Fasnacht calls her work Second Skin. The catalog describes the piece as a pelt, but I instantly thought of a recently shed snake skin.
Perhaps I had snakes on my mind because I had just seen nearby Elisa D'Arrigo's coiled jug-basket, made of wire, lying on its side on the floor. A large snakelike form, also made of coiled wire, was escaping, from the basket. A cobra?
One of Carol K. Brown's aluminum Wallflowers, had to be a sea anemone, I decided. Another was a sea cucumber.
You could spend a long time putting your imagination to work at her other sculpture, entitled 432 Tondos. It is a rectangular arrangement on the wall of 432 small 4-inch black medallions. A raised natural form, however odd, is in the center of each. I saw everything from cones to claws, from sea anemones to ducks.
Fabricated Nature will be on display through next Sunday. There are 40 sculptures representing 16 artists. Don't hesitate to bring the kids. Their imagination will get a good workout and there's even a special handout for parents and children to use when they tour the exhibit.
You'll even enjoy some of the ``natural'' items at the gift shop now. There are whimsical, painted bird houses and feeders, suet packs for the birds, beeswax candles and natural products, such as hand creams. Round balls and human torsos, covered with tiny shells, also are part of the gift shop wares.
In addition, the arts center is hosting a free lecture on Fabricated Nature, followed by desserts and coffee at 7 p.m. Wednesday. Education director DiJulio and the curator, Jan Riley, will speak about the sculptors and their art. Be sure to call 425-0000 for reservations by Tuesday.
The arts center hours are noon to 4 p.m. Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and closed on Monday. Admission is free.
P.S. THE FRIENDS OF THE FRANCIS LAND HOUSE will meet at 3 p.m. today at the house to hear a talk by William Coles, director of the Watermen's Museum in Yorktown. At the meeting, the group will present the Francis Land House with four reproductions of a chair listed in a 1736 inventory of the estate of Francis Land III.
A GALLERY OF FLOWERS is the theme of the Council of Garden Clubs' flower show from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 2, at the Founders Inn and Conference Center on Indian River Road. Tickets for $15 include lunch, fashion show, music and door prizes. Call Elaine Yagen, 486-4064.
THE DIKE ROADS at Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge will be closed to the public from Nov. 1 to May 31 to provide undisturbed habitat for migratory birds. The beach front and trails on the northern 1.5 miles of the refuge will remain open daily from sunrise to sunset.
Call 721-2412 for more information. MEMO: What unusual nature have you seen this week? And what do you know about
Tidewater traditions and lore? Call me on INFOLINE, 640-5555. Enter
category 2290. Or, send a computer message to my Internet address:
mbarrow(AT)infi.net.
ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Carol K. Brown's ``4 Wallflowers'' is among the works on display in
the Fabricated Nature Show at the Virginia Beach Center for the
Arts.
by CNB