FLC play gives voice to activists for human rights

Director Felicia Meyer speaks with Fort Lewis College students during rehearsal for “Speak Truth to Power” on Oct. 10.

Ariel Dorfman’s play “Speak Truth to Power: Voices from Beyond the Dark” is not subtle. Nor should it be.

This is a play about human rights. About standing up for truth. About taking a stand against violence, starvation, torture and rape.

This is an important, timely and politically relevant performance, based on the book Speak Truth to Power by Kerry Kennedy. It pits the voices of human-rights activists from around the world against the blue-suit and red-tie corporate man and woman.

Fort Lewis College adjunct professor Felicia Meyer directs a simple production and brings out the best in her 11 student actors. All of them did a fabulous job. Amelia Charter really shined in her performance, allowing her elocution to resonate the emotion.

There were moments during the production when I wondered if I was watching young people act or simply young people deeply moved and affected by the play itself. It was an appropriate response to the work. These actors are channeling the emotional stories of actual human beings. Photographs of the activists are projected larger than life on a screen center stage.

This is not a play that leaves you happy.

This is a production that makes you stop and think about standing up for what is right. That one night this week, we should turn off the television and go volunteer with a community organization (handy list provided in the playbill) or at least write a letter to government officials asking them why they are authorizing torture or suggesting to them that poor children need medical coverage.

No matter your political affiliation, the facts presented are staggering:

• 3 billion people in the world live in poverty.

• 40,000 children die each day from preventable diseases.

• The world as a whole consumes $24 trillion worth of goods and services each year.

• 1.3 billion people in the world live on incomes of less than one dollar a day.

• The three richest people in the world have assets that exceed the combined gross domestic product of the poorest forty-eight countries.

The night I attended the performance, the house was filled with students. Many were required to attend and read the play. As we waited for the house lights to dim, they sent text messages to their friends on their cell phones. They snapped their chewing gum. They complained that the play was just talking. No big sets. No musical numbers.

When the lights dimmed and the performance began, it was silent. As we walked out of the theater, there was no more complaining. The room was filled with reverence.

“I’m really glad I came,” a girl said, as she exited into the Durango night.

A line of dialogue repeated itself in my mind: “Courage begins with one voice. It’s that simple. I did what I had to do. Anything else would have tasted like ashes.”

Artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a freelance writer.

Pure Prairie League, Firefall Acoustic to play FLC Concert Hall

Country rock band Pure Prairie League has mastered a formula for success in the new millenium: combining nostalgia with fresh passion for that old, familiar music.

“We try to make our audience feel young and old at the same time,” said Craig Fuller, the lead singer and songwriter.

This should be easy to accomplish when the band performs its 1970s hits “Amie” and “Falling In and Out of Love” on Friday at the Community Concert Hall with Firefall Acoustic.

Fuller, who formed Pure Prairie League in Columbus, Ohio, in 1969, wrote both songs. But he left the band after its second album was released in 1972, seven years before Vince Gill joined the group in 1979 and sang the hit “Let Me Love You Tonight.”

Fuller and longtime bass player Mike Reilly brought Pure Prairie League together again several years ago.

“We were curious how many people would come for nostalgia’s sake,” Fuller said.

They played 15 dates in 2001 and have expanded to playing 35 dates in recent years.

“The audiences (today) are more zealous than they were. More assertive,” he said.

There is another difference between then and now, Fuller said: “Back then we would do anything to see our name on an album cover. Even if it meant we only earned 2 cents a record.”

Today, the band is more interested in artistic control, cultivating its grass-roots fan base and taking its music to those fans, rather than hearing it on the radio.

“We’re more interested in making a living, rather than making a killing,” Fuller said.

And Pure Prairie League remains true to its country rock roots with rich three-part harmonies, strong lead vocals, acoustic guitar and pedal steel along with invigorating musicianship and melodic songs with meaningful lyrics.

“The band was lucky in finding a few songs that were direct and accessible lyrically,” Fuller said. “Songs you can sing along with.”

Pure Prairie League will be joined by another dynamic country rock band from the same era – Firefall Acoustic.

Firefall has deep roots in Colorado. The band formed in Boulder in 1974. Co-founders Jock Bartley and Rick Roberts met in New York City.

“I was playin’ with Gram Parson, Emmy Lou Harris and The Fallen Angels,” Bartley said. “Rick was playing the next night as a soloist, having recently left the Burrito Brothers, where he’d replaced Gram as lead singer.”

Like Pure Prairie League, Firefall has had its share of band members come and go, but the music remains timeless with songs like “You Are the Woman,” “Cinderella” and “Just Remember I Love You.”

“The songs are still great. They have withstood the test of time, and today when we play them, they are still great songs that people love hearing again.” Bartley said.

What continues to inspire Bartley after 30 years with the same band?

“It’s very much fun on stage. That’s one of the absolute main reasons. The crowd reaction and the genuine enthusiasm and warmth we get back every night on stage and in the meet-and-greets after the show.”

Firefall also will perform Beatles songs from Bartley and Steven Weinmeister’s critically acclaimed new album “Colorado to Liverpool: A Tribute to the Beatles.”

Both bands are looking forward to playing in Durango. They toured together with the Legends of Country rock show last year, but it has been more than a dozen years since they’ve been to Southwest Colorado.

“We are glad we are able to come to a secondary market, a more rural community,” Fuller said. “We get to reach people that we wouldn’t get to see in Denver or San Francisco.”

Artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a freelance writer.

Boots Brown’s pit-fired vessels “Star Lighting,” “Super Nova,” “Fire Cloud” and “Fire Runner” appear in the David Hunt Ceramic Invitational at the Fort Lewis College Art Gallery.

Lisa Pedolsky’s work is in the foreground, and extruded porcelain lamps by Jennifer Neff are in the background.

The David Hunt Ceramic Invitational at the Fort Lewis College Art Gallery is an annual exhibition and sale of work created by Fort Lewis College alumni and regional artists.

Annual? Do we really need to see the same work by the same artists every year?

Why should anyone make the effort to attend an exhibit that features the same beautiful, bulbous, pit-fired vessels of Boots Brown; the same polka-dotted, terra-cotta works of Lisa Pedolsky; the same majolica birds, fish and animals of Leon Arledge; and more of the ho hum, traditional, functional works that round out this exhibit?

Enough, already. Give us something new.

How many times can we feature the same artist, the same work, the same show over and over and over?

The Fort Lewis College Art Gallery is part of an educational system. Their mission is to not only show the work of local, regional and student artists, but to expose these students and the public to art being created around the world. Why isn’t that happening?

Pick up Ceramics Monthly, American Style, Sculpture or any of the many art publications available, and you will find phenomenal, unique, creative work being made in stoneware, terra cotta and porcelain.

This show is an invitational. Why aren’t ceramic artists from outside the region invited to show their work? Is there anything we can do to help ratchet up the level of art exhibited at the college gallery and the Durango Arts Center, where many of these artists are also regular, frequent exhibitors?

Peter Karner’s lovely wax resist, geometric glazed vessels are available regularly at the DAC Gift Shop. Judy Brey’s “Blue Boat” was just exhibited at the DAC within the last few months. Brey’s “Horse” and “No Place Else to Be” in the David Hunt Exhibit are intriguing for their narrative elements. “Accessorized Doves” is an interesting installation. I like the black hoods over the dove’s eyes, but the birds themselves are poorly crafted and the application of metallic gold beaks to cover the yellow glaze that didn’t quite turn out right, detracts from the work. Where is the pride in craftsmanship? Where is the attention to detail?

Jennifer Neff shows something a bit different in her extruded porcelain lamps with their matte aqua glazes. Too bad she didn’t put as much effort into getting the right lampshades for the work as she did in creating the lamps. These lamps need contemporary shades, not old-fashioned pleated shades picked up at a garage sale.

There are redeeming elements to this show. Scott K. Roberts “Tea Caddy” features an elegant hint of metallic glaze, as if dusted with micaceous powder. Cole Taylor and Trevor Dunn’s large wood fired vessels are elegantly licked by fire. I particularly liked Taylor’s almost figurative vessel with its pinched in middle. Lorna Meaden’s soda-fired porcelain works are all functional, yet feature architectural flourishes like spindles and ornate cornices. Her “Lidded Jar” and “Double Spouted Sauce Boat with Ladle” are perfectly elegant.

Teapots are also a hit in this exhibit. Meaden has a wood fired teapot with a spherical side handle that begs to be picked up and poured. This contrasts nicely with her elegant porcelain teapot and a white, lidded pitcher. Pedolsky’s dot pattern and black wire wrapped handle contrast nicely with her angular shaped pot. Trevor Dunn has an earthy wood fired teapot and Peter Karner’s has a spindled lid, the shape of which is echoed in his rich jewel toned glaze.

It all leaves me thirsty and longing for a richer brew.

artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a member of the International Art Critics Association.

Ekaterina Harrison’s “Still Dreaming of Tomorrow” sits before Kathleen Holmes’ “Autumn Arbor” with Pip Howard’s “What Time Is It?” in the background. Pip Howard’s “Cityscape.”

“There is no more beautiful color than a bar of steel at 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit glowing in the sun,” sculptor Kathleen Holmes writes in an artist statement. She is one of four artists – Kathleen Holmes, Aztec.; Ekaterina Harrison, La Sal, Utah; Pip Howard, Aztec; and Rachael Anderson, Farmington, who are showing their work at the Durango Art Center. The show is called “Women Do Iron.”

Their work shows that metal can be turned into objects of fragile and delicate beauty.

Holmes’ elegant, scrolled, gate samples hang on a wall above one of her simple, highly polished end tables creating the appearance of a throne.

Holmes has been working with metal for more than 30 years, and she and her husband have their own business: Rustwater Forge. The show-stopping “Autumn Arbor” a copper garden arbor filled with metal vines and calla lilies shows attention to detail. It replicates nature in metal that endures the changing seasons. It is an arbor always in bloom.

Ekaterina Harrison’s “Still Dreaming of Tomorrow,” is a seated female figure with flowing hair. The body is rough with visible joints, while the hands and feet and face are smooth and real. It’s a gorgeous study of the human form, capturing the mood of a moment.

Another piece by this artist also captures a moment: the split second before a rattlesnake eats a mouse. Oddly, the snake is hungry although his midsection is already bulging with mouse. His mouth is wide open, his fangs bared, his split tongue reaching.

Harrison explores in metal classical imagery that is often only seen in traditional lost wax sculpture. But here, she wields a torch and hammer instead of just molding in plastiline.

The two other artists, Anderson and Howard, admit to being new to the medium, and that is evident in some of their work.

However, Anderson’s “Hearts Journey” and Howard’s “City Scape” would be dramatic as large works of public art.

A well-executed and thought-out work by Howard is “What Time Is It?” a nonfunctional clock in four fan-shaped pieces of metal with pseudo roman numerals cut out along the edges. The numbers are one through 12, but not in standard clock position, and the hands move, so you can decide what time you want it to be. Everything is off kilter.

Howard also creates hanging wall labyrinths that are abstract yet evoke the traditional lizard and thunderbird of the Southwest.

Most of her metalwork is created using recycled materials and scrap metal from the oilfields.

Metal is a strong medium. It is heavy, durable and strong. It is touchable art. If you knock it over, it probably won’t break, and you can’t poke a hole through it like canvas.

These women prove that a heavy, static medium can be infused with life and motion.

artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a freelance writer specializing in the visual arts. She was recently invited to become a member of the International Art Critics Association.

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"Women Do Iron," through Nov. 7, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, Durango Arts Center, 802 East Second Ave., 259-2606.

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John Mumaw’s photographs are about light and composition. As a surveyor by trade, Mumaw has access to places people don’t normally travel, and he has plenty of time to study the way the light plays across the southwestern land.

Never without a camera, he photographs in the tradition of Ansel Adams and Edward Weston: dreamy narrative landscapes with large Western skies, the storied faces of children, otherworldly botanicals.

The Cortez-based artist is featured at Image Counts gallery through October. His photographs hang from a portable wall in the middle of the gallery, seemingly nondescript against the larger images of local National Geographic photographer Larry Carver and those of gallery owners John and Eileen Baumgardt. Mumaw’s images fight to be seen among the larger, more flamboyant work.

But they fight well.

Mumaw’s images of South America contrast against images of the Southwest. In “Ake Atitl`E1n Sunrise,” three rickety wooden docks angled into a Guatemalan lake. The pink and orange light of morning reflects in the water and on the volcanic peaks that seem to rise from that lake. “Storm over Muling Point” captures a lightning strike in the midst of a canyon- lands sunset.

In “Moonrise over Chimney Rock,” Mumaw captures a pearlescent full moon hung in a purple sky above the thick, red rock that casts its own large shadow. A freshly paved asphalt highway winds its way through “Comb Ridge,” the evening light illuminating the cliffs and rocks that appear to be a bank along the highway river. And in “False Kiva Ruin,” the ripples in the sand and rocks in the endless valley below the kiva are echoed in the clouds above.

It is the endlessness of the West that Mumaw portrays best. His photographs have roomy depth of field.

And his composition is elegant. In “Sleeping Ute Mountain Sunset,” he sets up his shot so that the water in the foreground is shaped almost identically to the mountain beyond. A full cloudy sky is ablaze with fluorescent yellow, orange and salmon reflected in the water, the middle ground of the photo dark green and leafy and the Sleeping Ute mountain periwinkle in the midst.

His photographs of children are some of the best work on his Web site, although Image Counts selected only one for this show. The image of two brown-skinned boys in a fishing boat, one holding a twig pole over murky water, captures a moment in the life of South American children. Both gaze nonchalantly, uninterested in whatever is taking their focus away from the fishing. The photo is called “Brothers.”

“Hope” is one of those otherworldly botanicals. The image, which the gallery chose to represent the artist and his show, is of coils of razor wire against a white sky, a clump of fuchsia thorny bougainvillea in the left foreground. It’s a more abstracted shot than anything else in the show and while strong, doesn’t seem to represent the light, composition and depth of field that Mumaw captures so well with his digital camera.

Mumaw’s work is well executed; his composition and layout are classic. The photos should be larger – 16 by 24 inches or 24 by 36 inches – this would make the viewer pay attention.

And, while I prefer the classical white-mat, black-frame presentation for photographs, the gallery does support itself through its custom framing section, and it seems appropriate that the work would be shown in colorful matting with diverse frames .

artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a freelance writer specializing in the visual arts.

Marj Hahne, left, and Emily Wortman-Wunder, recipients of artist-in-residence awards from the Durango Art Ranch, spoke about their work Wednesday at Maria’s Bookshop.

For Emily Wortman-Wunder, a biologist and author, her science and her fiction use similar tools of observation. “Though I’ve never radio-collared a character,” she said Wednesday night at Maria’s Bookshop.

Wortman-Wunder and Marj Hahne, a poet, are in Durango for a month as artists-in-residence with the Colorado Art Ranch. They read from their work and discussed writing with a dozen people at our local bookstore.

Both talked of removing the ego from writing, nurturing the dark issues that most people reject and being aware of the key thing to focus on while discarding details.

Neither talked about mapping, the theme for the Durango Art Ranch program that brought them to town. Hahne, however, read from the project she came to Durango to work on, prose poems for every element in the periodic table.

Colorado Art Ranch brought three writers and three visual artists to Durango for a month-long residency. They were given a house and studio space to share and attended this month’s Durango Artposium, which was staged by the Art Ranch.

Wortman-Wunder, Hahne and B.K. Loren are the writers of the group. Only the first two remain in Durango. A computer problem forced Loren to return to her home in Broomfield. But all came with a specific project.

For Wortman-Wunder, it was completing a novel set in a fictional town like Durango. For Loren, it was working on a food book she is writing with a celebrity chef.

Hahne explained why she chose to participate when she saw the project.

“It was a body/gut hit,” she said. “I like that it inquires into something in a multidisciplinary way.” Hahne attended the first Art Ranch event in Salida in May.

When asked about Durango, Hahne said she didn’t yet have a sense of the people but added that it’s “easy to meet your kindred here. Not because they are few and far between, but because they live here.”

Wortman-Wunder said this residency was different from others she’s attended because it was more community centered. Residents are required to give back to the community one day. Several have worked with students at Fort Lewis College and attended a local artists’ group meeting. See box at left for the visual artists’ open house.

“There was a lot of effort put into us getting to know people and interact,” she said. She added that each resident was assigned a local art buddy. The art buddies were Katie Clark, Jules Masterjohn, Mary Ellen Long, Carol Ozaki, Joan Russell, Carol Martin, Maureen May and Paul Pennington.

For Wortman-Wonder, who is a mother with two children, the time she had here in Durango to focus on finishing her novel was “gorgeous.” And she got to return to the town she lived in 15 years ago.

Loren also has loose ties to Durango.

“I resent that most residencies are on the East Coast,” she said. “There are few in the West and very few in Colorado, so I want to support them.”

artsjournalist@centurytel.net Leanne Goebel is a freelance writer specializing in the arts.

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Open Studio with Roberta Smith and Julia Karll, visual artists-in-residence from Durango Art Ranch, 5-7 p.m. Wednesday, Art Building, Room 170, Fort Lewis College.

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