The current show, 16 + 16, is an exhibit of the 16 gallery owners plus 16 of their friends who work in roughly the same media, i.e. sculpture, photography, etc. Valerie Mann invited sculptor Ken Thompson from Blissfield, MI, so in honor of sculpture, she's created a couple of new purse sculptures. Above, is Evening Bags for the Midwestern Woman: Potluck. The Evening Bags for the Midwestern Woman series started out about 10 years ago with a humorous look at fashion, an appreciation for design and a curiosity of materials. This particular piece is created, in part, with actual aluminum pans from school potlucks. Read the artist's statement about this series:
I've been working on the "Evening Bags for the Midwestern Woman" series for a good 10 years. It started out as an exploration, a response, really, to my vintage purse collection. I started collecting vintage purses after helping my parents clean out my grandmother's house and finding a spectacular 1940s boa constrictor purse, still in the tissue and box it came in. Never used. "What farm woman in her right mind would carry such a (beautiful) thing? And where?", I'm sure she thought at the time. (I always remembered her carrying these behemoth, vinyl shoulder bags that weighed more than she did.) Imagine my surprise to find this little secret, forgotten and hidden in the attic.
So the series came about as a response to my fledgling collection, a study of materials, structure and form. I decided to use my palette of re-purposed materials and delve into this study and to question practicality of purses and this expression of fashion sense and, ultimately to celebrate it with a sense of humor.
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