"The Forbidden Fruit: Alison Chism, Robert Falcone, Ellen Grevey"
2004-09-04 until 2004-09-25
Ohio Art League
Columbus, OH, USA United States of America

From the perfect candy-apple red of Eden’s Tree of Life to the fantastic hallucinatory fruits of Hieronymous Bosch, fruit – the word, the image and the item itself – is dripping with sensual/sexual metaphor. "The Forbidden Fruit" combines the gilded paintings of Robert Falcone with the blown glass sculpture of Alison Chism and Ellen Grevey. Falcone’s paintings are stylized representations of fruits presented in an iconographic fashion. Communicating on multiple levels, his work can be interpreted as portraiture, representations of the body, or even of particular individuals. It is loving and obsessive, almost worshipful.

Chism and Grevey’s glass pieces began as an exercise in symbolism and form – using shape and curve to illustrate the connection between edible fruits and the human body. These artists see fruit as directly symbolic of womanhood, drawing parallels regarding fertility, ripeness, and age. Their offering of forms will evoke thoughts on temptation, eating, sexuality, and reproduction.

 Longtime friends and business partners, Grevey and Falcone share an ongoing dialogue on everything from art making to criticism, and from art marketing to collecting. Falcone is a long time trauma surgeon and health care administrator. He began his college education as Fine Arts major and continued for three years before going into the Sciences. Grevey started school with a scholarship to OSU’s College of Engineering and emerged five years later with an Art degree. Both artists have that complex and inspired combination of right and left brain influences.

Chism and Grevey met in 1991 at the prestigious Pilchuck Glass School in Seattle Washington where both have studied and served on the school’s staff. After many inspiring summers "immersed" in glass, the two found themselves classmates in OSU’s graduate program, where they completed their MFA’s. Grevey is a 2004 recipient of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship for her sculpture. Chism’s exquisite glass work can be seen at the Thomas R. Riley Galleries in Columbus, Ohio.

IMAGE
Alison Chism
Peaches on the Vine

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for the State of Ohio

Other Important Exhibitions in Columbus