"Alter Egos - Voices from Inside: Ceramic Sculpture by Beth Cavener Stichter, Janis Mars Wunderlich, and Marty Shuter"
2002-10-02 until 2004-10-30
Ohio Art League
Columbus, OH, USA United States of America

OAL is pleased to present Alter Egos: Voices from Inside, Ceramic Sculpture by Beth Cavener Stichter, Janis Mars Wunderlich, and Marty Shuter, from October 2 – 30, 2004. The silent conversations inside our heads are more convoluted and complex than are those we dare express aloud. They are too often colored by internal contradictions (who we are vs. who we want to be), demands that pulls us from our dreams and emotions that carry the weight of the unavoidable truth. The work of these three artists manifests their own inescapable inner dialogues: metaphors for aggression, isolation, desire and feral tension. They are treatises on being exhausted, overburdened, and ultimately and fantastically responsible for life.

The sculptures on their own have an innate narrative that is both disconcerting and familiar. They draw you in with a discomforting attraction. Stichter mixes animal body language with human proportions and gestures that result in all too recognizable psychological portraits that are subtly feral and all too recognizable. Wunderlich too combines animal with human, this time giving an uneasy edginess to motherhood. In the world of her art, two-headed mothers wear their offspring like possums carry their young and birth is attended by the whole family. Shuter gives a literal face to her own emotional life with make-believe portraits that are both secretive and raw. Alter Egos: Voices from Inside will put the three artists’ work in new relationships; the resulting connections will lead to deeper exploration of expressions of our humanness.

Shuter, Stichter and Wunderlich are all MFA graduates of the Ohio State University Ceramics Department, and are the recipients of numerous honors and awards. Wunderlich is a four time winner of the Ohio Arts Council Individual Artists Fellowships, as well as a Greater Columbus Arts Council Fellowship in 2004. Stichter just completed a two year residency at the prestigious Archie Bray Foundation in Montana, and was a 2003 recipient of an American Craft Council grant. Shuter has exhibited widely and received many awards, notably through the Ohio State Fair and the Ohio Arts Council. While teaching at OSU-Marion, she is also preparing for a solo show at the Dublin Arts Center in Dublin, Ohio.

IMAGE
Beth Cavener Stichter
Ceramic Sculpture

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for the State of Ohio

Other Important Exhibitions in Columbus