Juxtaposition
Poets will use the Japanese poetry form of a Haiku in response to a work of art, or an artist will respond to the poets Haiku. Basically, it is about inspirations — receiving inspiration from words or images. Having two multidisciplinary creatives working together to create collaborative works, the artist and the poet will find inspiration from each others words or visuals.
The following artists and poets are participating in WALK Gallery’s exhibition, Juxtaposition: artists respond to poets and poets respond to artists. They have been paired to create original works. The works and words can be seen March 5 – April 29th at 372 King Street (the old Millennium Building).
George creates photographic images in a wide range of subjects and styles. Eclectic in his taste and methods, he is working on a series of photographs of architectural elements in Paris and of street life in U.S. and European cities. Since moving to Mount Pleasant in 2001, he has taken a special interest in photographing water birds and local architecture.
In a long career as professional theater actor, director and producer, he took thousands of performance pictures in wide-ranging venues including the Opera Theatre of Boston’s production of Peter Sellar’s staging of Cosi Fan Tutte, shooting alongside the legendary Martha Swope. Many of his photographs are featured in the popular book Contemporary Stage Directing and in numerous magazines and journals. His work also includes professional portraits, a specialty in which he consulted with professional actors and résumé photographers.
Trained in 35mm film, he now works almost exclusively with digital SLR equipment. He is a member of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals.
Painter | Sarah Boyts-Yoder
Originally from Texas, Sarah Boyts Yoder relocated to Virginia and received her Master of Fine Arts degree in Painting from James Madison University in 2006. Along the way she has lived in Kansas, Indiana, New Mexico, and the Dominican Republic.
Sarah maintains an active studio at her home in Charleston and has since has one solo show and participated in several juried exhibitions throughout the country. Her work is also part of numerous private collections and was recently featured in Coastal Living magazine as part of the Idea Cottage in I’On, Mt. Pleasant.
Since moving to Charleston in 2008 with her husband their family now includes a 22 month old daughter, Sofi a, and a brand new addition, Ezekiel ‘Zeke’ (5 weeks).
Painter | Christine Bush
Christine Bush was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. She graduated from the University of Georgia in 2006 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting. Christine relocated from Athens, GA to Charleston, SC in August of 2008. She now works for Pet Helpers Adoption Center and Spay/Neuter Clinic while continuing to make and exhibit her paintings. Christine has exhibited her work in Athens, GA, Atlanta, GA, Charleston, SC and Cortona, Italy.
Painter | Karole Turner Campbell
Karole Turner Campbell also known by her initials as “KTC,” is a life long visual and performing artist.
She attended the prestigious High School of Music and Art in New York City. She then received her BS degree, in Arts Education, as an honors student from NCA&T University, in Greensboro, NC. In 1970 she began her career as an arts educator and specialist with the New York City Department of Education. Her long tenure with the school system ended in November of 2003, when she retired as the founding principal of Frederick Douglass Academy II.
Along with her passion for teaching and learning she maintained a parallel career in the performing arts as a dancer, choreographer, playwright and director. She was a member of the Lincoln Center Theatre’s Directors Lab.
Her visual arts training and participation was reawakened in 1987 when she took a sabbatical from teaching and enrolled in the Masters of Fine Arts program at the City College of the City of NY. Her area of focus was Drawing and Painting. She completed the program in 1989.
She and her husband Carl Campbell moved to North Charleston, S.C. in June of 2006. Since moving and returning to the visual arts, she has had four solo exhibitions and participated in eight group shows. She curated the “I, Too, AMERICA!” group show for the 2009 MOJA Arts Festival and is currently the “Featured Artist” of the Charleston Artists Guild Gallery (January, 2010). Her exhibition “Heads Up” will be at the North Charleston City Gallery during July, 2010.
Her motto: “The arts are the stuff of life.”
Painter | William Davies
Bill Davies ability to express himself artistically was evident at a young age. His talent for painting and sculpting was recognized with numerous awards. Although largely self taught, he received training at the Albright Institute of Art and the Bryant Art Studio in New York. He studied with notable artists such as Charles Burch eld and Sandra Chessman and Larry Gri th. At age 20 Bill’s first solo exhibit at the Rue Franklin Gallery in Bu ffalo, New York, was widely acclaimed. Soon the responsibilities of family and service to his country, diverted his art career. Today Bill’s lifestyle allows him to pursue his passion for creating art with commitment.
Early on, Bill’s artwork was inspired by life on the shores of Lake Eerie, New York. Now, the captivating habitat of the Carolina’s stimulates his imagination and brush strokes. His evolving love aff air with the elements of water and nature is uniquely captured in his paintings, which bridge the spectrum of serene and mystical, to bold passion. Bill observes that his artwork tends to re flect the rhythm and intensity of a moment in time, which can change with one’s perception.
Painter | Renee Kahn
Renee Kahn was born in New York City in 1945. She started painting at a young age and attended the Art Student’s League of New York and the High School of Music and Art. She majored in art at The City College of New York and went to Brown University for her Masters of Arts in Teaching. Initially, Ms. Kahn taught fine arts, ceramics and art history in the Providence, Rhode Island school system, but her love of painting lead her to pursue that interest fulltime.
Ms. Kahn exhibited locally in Rhode Island and nationally from the 1970′s until she moved to Charleston, SC in 2000. Since moving to Charleston she has continued to exhibit nationally as well as in numerous locations in South Carolina. Ms. Kahn will be exhibiting in Jaff a, Israel in March, 2010.
Ms. Kahn’s artwork has appeared in Transparent Watercolor by Inessa Derkatsch, and Revealing World Religions by Cynthia Eller.
Ms. Kahn started the group of artists known as the Professional Artists of Charleston who meet regularly to discuss art and exchange information. Ms. Kahn’s conceptual approach to the figure has been molded by memories, emotions and her reactions to body language. She expresses her emotions through body language, design and color. Her themes are family, religion, relationships, motherhood, and life’s passages.
The goal in her paintings is to create maximum intensity using the least amount of means.
Painter | Lori Love Penland
Lori Love Penland received her BA from the University of South Carolina in 1983 and her MA in 1987. In 1982 she was selected to study abroad at the University of Warwick in Coventry, England. Since that time, her education and involvement in the arts has continued at the Gibbes Museum in Charleston, SC, The Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia, SC and most recently at Creative Sparks in Mt Pleasant, SC. She has been juried in local as well as national shows for both her abstract and fi gurative work, many of which may be found in private collections. More recently she has invited to show at Infusion Gallery in Hawaii.
Painter | Cynthia McNaughton
The work of Cynthia McNaughton is instilled with the use of Gesture—whether actual or implied. Her goal is to engage the viewer by creating images with a kinesthetic sense. Revealing all of an image, concealing part of the image, or revealing some aspects of it, create additional psychological expressions and feelings. Combining gesture with what is implied, revealed and hidden allows the viewer to respond subjectively to the work.
Ms. McNaughton’s choice of mediums includes whatever materials are necessary for expression. Her selection of materials and surfaces is based solely on achieving the desired expressive result. Whether utilizing mediums conventionally, or in combination with other materials, the process is secondary to the fi nal outcome.
Ms. McNaughton received her Bachelor of Arts in Art, with a Concentration in Computer Art, from Otterbein College. She graduated Cum Laude with Departmental Honors. Recognitions include a Student Photography Exhibit at Columbus State Community College, an Otterbein College Student Juried Award, and a Painting Commission for the Greater Council of Ministries in Dayton, Ohio.
Painter | Rebecca Shaw
Born in New York, Rebecca moved throughout the Northeast before attending Anderson University in South Carolina. Grabbing her B.A. in Art: Painting & Drawing, she moved to the Charleston area to pursue a continued career in custom framing and freelance art.
As an artist she prides herself on her ability to undertake virtually any project without sticking to one particular style or subject matter. After successfully working with oil and watercolor, she has now turned her attention to ink. Ink, like watercolor, helps her to let go of her control over the medium and focus on expressing energy and mood. She considers it a parallel to life and how sometimes it’s best to just allow things to take their course. Rebecca still continues to live and work in Charleston and is proud of her “Art Walk” in the empty storefronts on Daniel Island.
Painter | Thomas Sweeney
Thomas began painting as a child and eventually wound up studying architecture. During a life drawing class in his 4th year of college he became interested in exploring the growing link between these two initially disparate aspects of his design process. After earning a BS in architecture at Clemson University he received a National Merit Scholarship to attend The Art Institute of Chicago, where he completed his BFA. Thomas then went on to do post graduate work at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Clemson University. He currently lives in Charleston, SC with the offi ce and studio under one roof in order to make it easier to combine them both. Painting while working for an architect creates combinations of these dual interests that is typically latent and occasionally blatant throughout his work.
Poet | Kwame Alexander
Kwame Alexander is a poet, publisher, and an award-winning producer of literary programs, Dubbed a “phenom” in the poetry world by The Charleston (SC) City Paper, Alexander has written for television, the stage, and authored 13 books including the best-selling Do The Write Thing: 7 Steps to Publishing Success, And Then You Know: New & Selected Poems, and a young adult title, Crush: Love Poems. He speaks, and conducts writing/publishing workshops at schools and conferences throughout the country.
Alexander resides in the Washington, DC area, where he produces the annual Capital BookFest presented by The Washington Post, and currently serves as Founding Director of Book-in-a-day, a literacy program that teaches and inspires youth in the writing and publishing process. The Kwame Alexander Papers, a collection of his writings, correspondence, and other professional and personal documents is held at the George Washington University Gelman Library.
Love Poem #101
You said our relationship
Was sorta like school,
that I was failing your class,
And should study harder.
Well, maybe I need a better teacher.
Poet | Marcus Amaker
Marcus Amaker was born in Las Vegas and lived in Texas, Japan and Maryland before settling on Charleston in 2003. He started creating art at an early age – his first original music was recorded when he was 8 years old, and he began writing poetry and doing graphic design in high school. Since moving to Charleston, he has continued to devote his life to art, with three published poetry books (“listening to static” and “poems for augustine” in 2005 and “the soft paper cut” in 2007), seven self-released home studio albums and countless web sites, posters and art projects. As a spoken word poet, Marcus has traveled around the country and performed for national television.
Recently, Marcus is launching a new publication in Charleston called Charleston Scene, through the Post and Courier. The magazine will debut on Thursdays and will debut on 3/11/10, focusing on art, music, theatre, poetry, movies and multi-media.
The best way to sum up Marcus is to read something he wrote when he was 10 years old: “When I grow up, I want to become a rock star like Prince.”
He hasn’t changed one bit.
“at the dawning”
how do you stand still
when a woman is an earthquake,
shaking the ground
beneath your feet?
how do you act cool
when she is a volcano,
erupting fire in your veins?
how do you tiptoe
around the remains of the past
that lay sleeping
in the darkened corners of your mind?
how did you find
yourself drowning in desire
after your heart
suffered a deep drought?
why do we doubt love
when its truth is never hiding,
and why does she remind me
of the red sun’s rising?
what are the questions
we are afraid of,
and how do i get
to the answers?
Poet | Ellie Davis
Educated at Southern Methodist University, the University of Kansas, and the University of Witswatersrand in Johannesburg, Ellie Maas Davis has written extensively on the environment and issues of human rights. She serves as an acquisitions editor for Joggling Board Press and sits on the board of directors of the Lowcountry Initiative for the Literary Arts, in addition to curating Charleston’s longest running weekly literary series, Monday Night Blues. Published in a number of anthologies and journals, she is the author of The Humours of Folly and often reviews books for The Post and Courier.
Wolf Cry
Momma’s all legs as she skips to the tip of the tide
where, similar to a jumper riding bareback,
hazel gray sand plunges into the shore.
Tossing Daddy a smile, she gives me a wink I hold
like a small crisp apple until the surf swallows her whole.
Moments pass like a factory bell. Waves being waves
offer no clues until I spot a single rosebud. Two, three,
then a flailing of red-tipped warblers.
Ah, the sweet, satisfying relief! Like a chocolate on my hotel pillow
or a man who holds the door, I fall for it every time,
run to her like a crying child for a lost dog.
Daddy doesn’t lift so much as a finger. He has his reasons.
Poet | Mary Hutchins-Harris
Mary Hutchins Harris is a poet and essayist. She has been a featured Poet for the Piccolo Spoleto Sundown Series, the South Carolina BookFestival and the Piccolo Spoleto Stories for Life Festival. She has been published in Tar River Poetry, Antietam Review, Pirene’s Fountain and other literary print and on-line publications. Her chapbook, “A Tongue Full of Yeses” was selected by Kwame Dawes for publication in the 2007 South Carolina Poetry Initiative/USC Press Chapbook Contest.
Sleight of Hand
I ask you to take a word
and hold it in your ear,
practice saying it in the mirror
with different expressions
on your face, accenting
each syllable up and down
a scale of notes, low to high,
from beneath the big toe
of your right foot to behind
the top edge of your left eyebrow,
listen to it hum from a stutter,
then watch it drop into a puddle
of milk, slow motion, bouncing
an echo off your tongue
to find its saltiness, its sweetness—
if it is a good one, it will have both—
then spit it into your hands
and roll it between your fingers
like a coin, playing music
on your knuckles, and if
when you rim it, it rings clear,
lay it gently on the window to see
if its colors blend with the rest,
and if it does, breathe deep
and if not breathe deeper
and then begin again.
Poet | Bryan Penberthy
A former AWP Intro Award winner, Bryan Penberthy lives in Charleston, South Carolina. He holds an MFA from Purdue University, where he was poetry editor for Sycamore Review. His poems have appeared in Crazyhorse, West Branch, Bat City Review, River Styx, New Orleans Review, and elsewhere.
The End of Free Love
And wasn’t the drunkest mania we’d ever caught
like a bad crush
on merlot: days wrapped in wash-dulled sheets, no matter
the hundred miles
between our cities, their factories like monuments to folly,
producing only smoke.
It didn’t matter that you wanted us to fight in bed,
urging ourselves
beyond temporary wounds and into permanence; that I was
unable to admit
reluctance for the mornings I couldn’t raise my left arm
without wincing,
the memory of your teeth a ring around my clavicle,
a familiar pattern
surfacing. And weren’t our complicities like a remedy
for love, absolution
from the butcher’s work those memories would exact? Our bodies
weren’t built to last.
The elaborate mythologies we’d bury in each other
wouldn’t stay put,
rising as bruises, as ravenous ghosts, as inadequate courtesies.
Poet | Marjory Wentworth
Marjory Wentworth’s poems have appeared in numerous books and magazines, and she has been nominated for The Pushcart Prize four times. Her books of poetry include Noticing Eden, Despite Gravity, and What the Water Gives Me, collaboration with artist Mary Edna Fraser. Her children’s story, Shackles, recently won a Silver Moonbeam Award. Her forthcoming collection, The Endless Repetition of an Ordinary Miracle, will be published in April 2010. Marjory teaches poetry in “Expressions of Healing,” at Roper St. Francis Cancer Center. She also teaches in a poets-in-the schools program at Burke High School in Charleston, SC.
She serves on the Board of Directors for the Lowcountry Initiative for the Literary Arts (LILA), The Poetry Society of SC, the University of SC Poetry Initiative, and the Yo Art Project. Her work is included in the South Carolina Poetry Archives at Furman University. She is the Poet Laureate of South Carolina. Ms. Wentworth works as a book publicist.
Japanese Landscape
in Hokusai’s Mountainous Landscape
with a Bridge dark birds circle
the tallest peak like footprints
leading to a valley hidden
by muddy hills dissolving
on a flood plain where a bridge
descends into a cluster of red
roofs tucked in a cedar grove
the sun sets on mountains
beginning to flame red
is the color of a woman
but the fine calligraphy
flowing through clouds
like strands of rain
is painted the color of dirt
Poet | Dan Wright
Education BA Literature/English Language, Eastern Michigan University
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[...] next show, “Juxtapositions,” is tentatively scheduled for March 5, and highlights how artists respond to poets and vice [...]