Capital City Arts Initiative debuts 'Constellation' exhibit

CARSON CITY — The Capital City Arts Initiative, also known as CCAI, announces its exhibition, "Constellation" at the Community Development Building, the Brick, 108 E Proctor Street, Carson City.

Nine students from the University of Nevada Reno’s Bachelor of Fine Arts program have work in the exhibit. The free exhibition is available to the public from Sept. 16 to Dec. 10, 2019, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m.

The artists include Rachael Blizzard, Tessa Clawson, Josh Galarza, Robert Ibarra, Sandra Kramp, Carla Miller, Cesar Piedra, Shara Sinatra, and Amber Skilling.

Current and historical events intrigue artist Carla Miller and inspire her to paint: “10-1-17 Las Vegas” has memorial portraits of each of the 58 massacre victims; “11-8-18 Paradise” portrays the Camp wild fire that destroyed an entire northern California town. Tessa Clawson, serving as her own muse, created her grid of self-portraits as a form of self-exploration to discover what is real about herself and her life.

Robert Ibarra uses his pen and ink drawings to capture the essence of his subject, not just their physical likeness. Using a darkroom technique known as Cliché Verre, Ibarra adds marks, textures, or etching along with darkroom techniques to a photographic negative to achieve his desired image. Rachael Blizzard creates her abstractions using discarded, recycled, and found materials paired with natural and hand-made dyes, inks, and paints.

Josh Galarza’s monotype print, “The Space Between Us,” made with inks on a tattered pair of jean shorts refers to contemporary street life and the difficulties involved in surviving and thriving. As foxes represent not only a guide to stray one from trickery, but as tricksters themselves, they serve Shara Sinatra as both muse and model for her large ceramic images. Cesar Piedra admires cuttlefish for their extraordinary ability to camouflage with their surroundings through texture, pattern, and color. Peidra invites his fellow artists to provide their own finish to one of his ceramic cuttlefish thus showing viewers the different avenues that each one navigates.

Amber Skilling creates monochromatic sculptures of uncomfortable domestic moments to draw attention to the normality of pain in everyday lives — pain revealed means pain disbursed. Music motivates Sandra Kramp’s colorful and whimsical creatures who represent amplified fun and give viewers access to beauty in unexpected places.

Sharon Rosse, CCAI Executive Director, said “CCAI is delighted to work with our partner schools and to present this exhibition of UNR’s students’ work. We are proud of the professional level of the students’ art and of the faculty who encourage and nurture their imaginations and skill levels.”

This show is another in CCAI’s ongoing series of student exhibitions in the Brick.

The Capital City Arts Initiative is an artist-centered organization committed to the encouragement and support of artists and the arts and culture of Carson City and the surrounding region. The Initiative is committed to community building for the area through art projects and exhibitions, live events, arts education programs, artist residencies, and its online projects.

The Capital City Arts Initiative is funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, John and Grace Nauman Foundation, Carson City Cultural Commission, Nevada Arts Council, Nevada Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities, NV Energy Foundation, Southwest Gas Corporation Foundation, U.S. Bank Foundation, and its members.

Please visit CCAI’s website at www.arts-initiative.org for additional information.