Us in Flux and Darren Waterston

 I paid an 11th hour trip to Greg Kucera and Lawrimore Project to check out the Us in Flux and the Darren Waterston shows.  I've been interested in Waterston's work ever since I saw the cover of the first Silversun Pickups full-length, one of the few times I've been turned onto an artist by seeing their work on a record cover (Stanley Donwood being another that comes to mind).  Waterston is one of those guys who has used some similar abstract techniques to some of the things I have done, and frankly, I wanted to see what he was up to so I could steal from him.  I was surprised to see that he had incorporated a bunch of animal imagery into his work. 

Well, turns out that before he was doing these non-representational works that I was more familiar with, he had used a lot of iconic imagery in his work, some of it animal form, so in a sense, he was returning to some older material.  To me, though, it felt like he might have been embracing current trends. 

Never-the-less, interesting to take a look at them.  The way he painted the animals was excellent, I'm just not so sure they belonged in the environments he placed them in. 

Also, it was the last day for the Us in Flux show -  an exhibition of artists doing takes on jewelry that was a a lot more stronger than I expected - some of the artists really created some interesting pieces, I particularly enjoyed Robert Longyear and Celia Braga's works, although I wish Celia's weren't hanging from the light tracks.  The show was mostly in the back at Kucera, with an installation by Iris Eichenberg over at Lawrimore Project (I swung by, but had to gaze through the window)

 Slightly fuzzy pics of Robert Longyear's creations.  They now are reminding me of Batteries Not Included, but that's not a fair comparison. 

 I didn't really get very strong pics of this show at all. 

 A ghostly tiger painting by Darren Waterston.

Darren really painted the hell out of that bird, but in that space, I was way more into the rock shapes the bird was posed on.  Why always with the animals?  Of course, I just did the same thing with some of my latest works so who am I to talk. 

 Lawrimore Project - installation by Isis Eichenberg