BETTINA SPECKNER AT SIENNA PATTI
/Sienna Patti, a contemporary gallery in Lenox, hosts Bettina Speckner in a show titled "Things of This World Keeping Their Difficult Balance" (August 21-October 4). SIENNA PATTI, 80 Main Street, Lenox, MA 413.637.8386
"The artist’s newly acquired production technique is a romantic journey in and of itself. She travels into the Bavarian forest with a handmade camera obscura and a jerry-rigged portable darkroom to find her favorite stack of wood. She collects flowers on her way to the studio for her still life compositions, to complement her deliberate arrangements of otherwise ordinary objects—a glass, a set of keys, a laptop computer. She is fully immersed in the moment the camera captures, effectively recording her own experience of being there. She witnesses the emergence of the image on the plate—“A silent, melancholic, still result, but a thrill to see it appear,” as she describes it. The image is developed in the same location that it was taken, every step of the photographic process sharing the same continuous sweep of time, echoing the same single, still moment." SIENNA PATTI GALLERY
"Speckner presents the viewer with the nebulous relationship of object permanence to subjective experience. The solid, concrete matter of the world is still open to interpretation, the static object still subject to how it is seen and experienced in the moment. Between the exacting and the ethereal, between gravity and weightlessness, the objects themselves have to negotiate their balance." SIENNA PATTI GALLERY
Sienna Patti reaches beyond the Berkshires, working with artists of international distinction. The vision for the gallery is described as "... a project and exhibition based program focusing on the work of contemporary studio artists. The artists bridge the worlds of art, craft, and contemporary design with innovative use of materials and mediums. Artwork made with a nod to craftsmanship by artists that are using it as an intellectual and structural vehicle for their ideas."
The gallery exhibits jewelry, sculpture and photography from several artists, with one area of the gallery space dedicated to visiting shows, and other areas intimately showcasing the work of jewelry artists. It's all a visual feast.
A GROUPING OF RINGS BY BARBARA SEIDENATH
