Art Beat

Michael Paglia's brief sketches of what's happening in the Denver art scene.

Comments (0) By Michael Paglia Thursday, Apr 27 2000

It was only this past January that Angela Rios, a former account coordinator for MCI, opened the funky little Morph Gallery in the Golden Triangle. The intimate space, which is made up of three small rooms in a tidy red brick rowhouse, is currently featuring New Show, a group effort by five local artists.

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In the front room are Hugo Anderson's paintings, which combine the female nude with illegible text, and a couple of raku pots by Jeanette Connor. The show doesn't hit its stride, though, until we reach the middle room, where Carlos Valenzuela's mixed-media abstracts, including "Foreign" (above), have been hung. In the back space (which also serves as the office) are expressionist paintings by Jim White and photo montages of nudes by Ronda Stone. Scattered throughout the gallery are copper sculptures by John Anderson.

The area around Morph is teeming with similar shoestring operations, but as indicated by the construction of the eighteen-story Prado loft building across the street, things are liable to change. New Show closes May 12.