A & E

At first glance, "Snowblind," the latest exhibition to fill the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust's voluminous SPACE gallery, Downtown, looks to be like just another group of works by young locals. After all, some of the names are the same or readily recognizable from previous shows held there.

For example, the works of Corey Antis and Josh Tonies, both of whom have local connections, were displayed in "Home/Away," another survey-like display guest-curated by Thad Kellstadt in the early spring of this year.

This exhibition is a Kellstadt production, too. But where it differs is that instead of a survey of local art by young artists, this show features works by artists from as far away as Manhattan, Atlanta and and Seattle.

For several years now, Kellstadt has been the Pied Piper of Pittsburgh's 20- and 30-something artists. Having an enviable post with the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, he has been behind the scenes of numerous exhibitions at Wood Street Galleries and SPACE, not to mention the Trust's two smaller galleries at 707 and 709 Penn Ave. And, having an amiable personality, he has made friends with countless artists and art aficionados since moving to Pittsburgh from the Columbus, Ohio, area years ago.

But like several of the artists in this show, Kellstadt has decided not to let the grass grow under his feet. He recently moved to Chicago with his girlfriend, who is attending graduate school. He's keeping on with his own unforgettable, quirky works, and is steadily preparing for a solo exhibition that will open in Raleigh, N.C., this fall.

But as memorable as his works are, this exhibition serves as another testament to this artist and curator, whose shoes will be hard to fill. That's because Kellstadt has the ability to view all art as local and accessible, as if a part of the global village, rather than one specific place.

Still, he has a fondness for the city. "Pittsburgh's just too good," he says.

"I think what is different from seven to 10 years ago is that people are staying in Pittsburgh after college and moving here just to make art. Josh Tonies is an example. He moved here a few years ago as an artist independent of college. Many people have. Maybe it says these younger artists are interested in making good, interesting work, and this is a good place to do that. It's obviously not to rent lofts Downtown and sell paintings for thousands of dollars."

So who are these artists of the global village making art for? "They're making it for themselves and their peers, and for righteous reasons. At least the people that I know," Kellstadt says.

Tonies' work definitely speaks to those ideas. Having close associations to weather patterns and the notion of home as well, they have universal appeal. One would be hard-pressed not to think of Hurricane Dean when looking at "Flood," for example, when confronted with its numerous houses awash in swirls of blue paint. "Duststorm" too, speaks of natural disasters affecting the homeland. And "Oilfield," of disasters man-made.

Antis, on the other hand, brings the global village down home with large-scale paintings in acrylic that play with the notion of spatial relationships, some domestic and some totally ambiguous.

Pittsburgh native Antis, who recently completed his master's of fine arts degree at Tyler School of Art near Philadelphia, plans on exploring the experience of space and architecture through painting in Philadelphia for the time being. But he is sure to become a solid player in the art game, and will be missed yet heartily welcomed if he decides to return home.

One wall of the gallery is covered with a collaborative piece by Christopher Herren, Chad Gordon and Tonies. Herren hails from Atlanta and Gordon lives in Manhattan. All longtime friends, their piece "Change of Address" pretty much sums up the underlying transient theme of the show. It seems, when looking at the multiple images of airplanes and automobiles mounted on variously shaped pieces of scrapwood, that these young artists are trying to drive home the idea that nothing is permanent, perhaps except for memory. But even that is fleeting.

Herren taps into that especially well with his series of artworks made with a wood burning tool. One is tongue-in-cheek and features reproductions of the box tops of nearly every wood-burning kit available since the 1960s, painstakingly burned into wood by the artist with one of those tools.

The other series consists of wood-burnings of landscapes and bodies of water. Done in a half tone-fashion, not unlike the tiny dots that make up images in this newspaper, they are remarkable for the time and skill it had to take to create them.

Finally, Seattle artist Heidi Anderson completes the show with unusual works that are not unlike Kellstadt's own, being campy, kitschy watercolors of imaginary hippie-like characters who live a transient lifestyle of sorts among mushroom trees and totem poles. In a way, they're not unlike the works that Kellstadt showed in "Home/Away." That is, an imaginary version of an acid trip turned road trip.

"The similarities are probably that good old lofty top coat with a weird undercurrent of 'hippie gone bad/bad trip' thing," Kellstadt says. "She's from the Northwest. I see that vision in her work. It's scary to me. I think that's why I like it.

"The difference is, her work is fearless," he adds.

So too is Kellstadt's work, which is why he will be missed as well.

• Most Read
• Most E-mailed
• Latest News