So much to see, so little time. Get your gallery-going organized with this handy guide:
Month of Video: Traverse
Union Hall Gallery, The Coloradan, 1750 Wewatta Street, Suite 144
Thursday, July 13, through September 9
Opening Reception: Thursday, July 13, 6 to 8 p.m.
When Union Hall Gallery curator Esther Hz collides with Month of Video, something electric is bound to happen. Traverse is the result of that collision, with work by video artists Santiago Echeverry, Chrissy Espinoza, Annette Isham and Jenna Maurice taking on the theme of passing through the ravaged landscape and politically unstable modern world in search of new ways to cope and fight back. Elements of performance, moving visuals, activism and psychology come into play in this collection of complex visions.
Movement
Another Gallery, 345 Santa Fe Drive
Reception: Thursday, July 13, 5:30 to 8 p.m.
RSVP here
Another Gallery, a newer venue in the Art District on Santa Fe, sources artists working in modern trends from street and pop surreal to highbrow and just plain inspiring, design-wise. For Movement, owner/curator Taylor Herda sought out art that channels the spirit of movement and energy in more ways than you might imagine. Don’t forget to RSVP for the opening.
Revisiting the Family Album: Stories That Bind Us
Center for Fine Art Photography Online Exhibition, through December 31
Virtual Reception and Artist Talks: Thursday, July 13, 5 p.m.; RSVP for link at Eventbrite
The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins solves the problem of high-traffic travel on I-25 by posting its latest show, Revisiting the Family Album, online. Juried by Aline Smithson, founder and editor-in-chief of Lenscratch, it's packed with work culled from more than 2,000 images, all of it intimate, sweet, personal and historical as it cracks open the experience of going back in time. Access the exhibition at c4fap’s web page to see the skill and scope of the show, and RSVP at Eventbrite to tune in to the virtual reception and artist talks.
A prototype drawing by Lee Conklin of the lion image used on the album Santana, 1969.
Lee Conklin, courtesy Scott Montgomery
Vicki Myhren Gallery, 2121 East Ashbury Avenue, University of Denver Campus
Thursday, July 13, through September 13
Soft Opening: Thursday, July 13, noon to 5 p.m.
He might not be as well known as Rick Griffin, Stanley Mouse, etc., but artist Lee Conklin, known for his dense and organic drafting style, designed a considerable number of posters for shows at the Fillmore and Winterland in San Francisco back in the ’60s. Perhaps best known for his roaring lion drawing that graced the cover of Santana’s first album in 1969, Conklin is the subject of a small collection of about 100 drawings and posters opening at the Vicki Myhren Gallery at DU, including one prototypical concert poster for a typical Fillmore lineup that foresaw the future album sleeve. Put together by poster fanatic and art history professor Scott Montgomery (who also made the film The Tale of the Dog, about Denver’s Family Dog concert venue saga, with Dan Obarski), We Are Us will remain up through September, with a big closing reception with Conklin in person in the works.
Hike/Bike/Ski: Living in Motion
Center for the Arts Evergreen, 31880 Rocky Village Drive, Evergreen
Thursday, July 13, through August 19
Opening Reception: July 13, 4 to 7 p.m.
When Coloradans — and the rest of the world — seek adventure, the Rocky Mountains are at the doorstep, inviting hikers, bikers, skiers and all outdoor and fitness enthusiasts to head for the hills. The foothills town of Evergreen is often on that pathway, where you can take a break from driving to be inspired by art about mountain sports and get an adrenaline boost at the CAE.
Evocation
Walker Fine Art, 300 West 11th Avenue, Suite A
Friday, July 14, through September 2
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 8 p.m., and Saturday, July 15, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Walker Fine Art’s new show, Evocation, is about looking back and reflecting, as represented by the Proustian concept of In Search of Things Past (aka Remembrance of Things Past). Nostalgia, elegiac memories and beauty in retrospect all play into the wide-ranging imagery of this exhibition, which runs from the retro musings of Peter Illig and Doug Haeussner to the pure loveliness of nature in recall, as conveyed by Matt Christie and Virginia Steck.
Chelsea Kaiah, “Recusant Ute and Her Absence,” 2023, porcupine quills (natural and dyed), seed beads, greasy opals, gold Charlotte beads, antelope hide, felt and rope.
Chelsea Kaiah
Chelsea Kaiah and Cody Norton, Aberrant Behavior
Control: Juvana Soliven
Making a Mountain: Ana Maria Hernando
Jennifer Pettus: Assiduous
Lewis Neeff, The Mercury Oracle
Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut Street, Boulder
Friday, July 14, through September 9
Artist Talk: Friday, July 14, 4 p.m.
Mercury Oracle Public Reading With Lewis Neeff: Friday, July 14, 5 p.m.
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 8 p.m.
Curator Drew Austin is fully utilizing every space in the Dairy galleries this summer with a six-pack of artist presentations, several of them exploring different routes of fiber art and weaving.
Sasha de Koninck's experiments in deconstructing and repurposing garments for Control ask interesting questions about whether or not the results are clothing or sculpture, and how garments mimic unexpected or anthropomorphic characteristics.
For Aberrant Behavior in the center’s dedicated Creative Nations Sacred Space for Indigenous Art, Chelsea Kaiah and Cody Norton explore and compare Indigenous and queer hunting practices through video and traditional beadwork.
Juvana Soliven’s Control in the lobby, inspired by the SCOTUS decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, pictures elements of control through work-intensive craft mediums such as beading, metalsmithing, enameling and sewing as an expression of activism. Using these various materials and techniques, Soliven creates webs, nets and linked metal armor as metaphors for the battle ahead.
Ana María Hernando, who made an art career out of her belief in the quiet but powerful feminism of women working together, will be building a tulle installation in pink and orange through July for Making a Mountain, with a built-in participatory element for anyone who’d like to pitch in. She’ll be building a mountain of tulle to represent Ñusta, or the feminine spirit of the mountain in her native Argentina. Upon completion, the installation will be on view through early September.
The group show Assiduous, a seven-artist display showing the depth and reach of fiber art as a medium, again refers to the intensive work and detail it requires. Artists include Andrea Dolter, Chelsea Kaiah, Wendy Kowynia, Jennifer Pettus, Melissa Pickering, Shelly Sommer and Rebecca Vaughan.
Lewis Neeff compiled and completed a Kickstarter for his own divinatory card deck, the Mercury Oracle; six of the images and titles grace the Dairy’s exterior.
Ana María Hernando, “Homage to the Ground and to the Air,” 2022, tulle, wire, wood and felt.
Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of the artist and Robischon Gallery
Dairy Art Center, 2590 Walnut Street, Boulder
Friday, July 14, through July 29: Tuesdays through Fridays, 10 a.m. to noon and 1 to 3 p.m.; Saturdays, 1 to 3 p.m. and 3:30 to 5:30 p.m.
As noted above, Ana María Hernando’s Making a Mountain installation build is ongoing at the Dairy through July 29, and crafters with sewing machines and skills are invited to help. To participate, you don’t have to be a pro sewer — the work of preparing the strips of tulle is simple — but bring your own sewing machine if you can; there will only be one open-use machine per work period. Choose a day and time and sign up in advance; the sessions are meant to emulate the joyful process of women working together like the craft circles of Hernando’s youth.
Engulfed
Tim Koch, Novelty
Artworks Center for Contemporary Art, 310 North Railroad Avenue, Loveland
Friday, July 14, through September 30
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 6 to 9 p.m.
Artworks in Loveland is pushing all the scorching-hot environmental buttons for Engulfed, an international group exhibit addressing the rise of apocalyptic wildfires around the globe, from the initial causes to the misery of aftermath. Novelty, a solo show by Artworks alumnus Tim Koch, comes off like a slapstick exhibition of things designed to make you laugh until your cheeks hurt. He says the enjoyment of his work depends on the release of dopamine in your brain, which is something all of us can use once in a while.
Tom Bond, Add 10 Stones to This Monument
Balefire Goods, 7513 Grandview Avenue, Arvada
Friday, July 14, through July 29
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 7 p.m.
Balefire hosts artist Tom Bond, whose show title, Add 10 Stones to This Monument, references an Old West myth about the lost gold mine of Pegleg Smith. It’s said that if treasure hunters searching for the hidden vein add ten stones to Pegleg's monument, they just might get lucky and strike it rich. The point? We can waste our lives or add to the monument, leaving behind something that people will remember. Bond’s 2-D and 3-D works could also have something to do with rocks.
CHAC, Street Art on Canvas
Northglenn Arts, Community Room I, 1 East
Memorial Parkway, Northglenn
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 7 p.m.
Curators Lucille Rivera, Shantel Lucero and Jay Jaramillo pulled together a group of CHAC gallery artists and mural painters who took it indoors for Street Art on Canvas in their satellite space at Northglenn Arts. Viva comunidad!
Tim McKay, GEOEVO (Geometric Evolution)
Leah Fernandez, Hypervisible
Pirate: Contemporary Art, 7130 West Colfax Avenue, Lakewood
Friday, July 14, through July 30
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 6 to 10 p.m.
40 West co-ops act as one with Friday show openings at Pirate and the Hub at 40 West. Starting with Pirate, stop by for a new round of Tim McKay’s color-forward geometric abstractions that play with shapes, while Leah Fernandez hangs portraits and figures that seem to float in a pastel space surrounded by what could be called linear energy lines or outer expressions of inner emotions.
Laura McCracken, Exploring Solitude
Pam Farris, Conspiracy, Inc.
Unified
Next Gallery, Hub at 40 West, 6510 East Colfax Avenue, Lakewood
Friday, July 14, through July 30
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 10 p.m.
At Next, Laura McCracken defines solitude in darkly colored slabs of melted, fused glass, and Pam Farris evokes fearful wonderment and nervous chuckles at the way conspiracy theories have changed over the decades. Unified showcases artworks by special needs students at Deer Creek Middle School and Chatfield High School who are supported by the Unified art program.
Reed Weimer, "Resultant Motion."
Reed Weimer
Core Art Space, Hub at 40 West, 6510 East Colfax Avenue, Lakewood
Friday, July 14, through July 30
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 5 to 10 p.m.
Core is hosting an open-call art show on the theme of Once Upon a Time. Juried by Valkarie Gallery’s Valerie Savarie, who as an altered-book artist knows a thing or two about storytelling, the submitted artworks reference narratives and characters, somewhere in the space between fiction and the real world. It might feel a little like wandering through a library of storybook illustrations.
Sue Crosby Doyle: Rocks of Ages
Kerem Smith-Stone: Cloud Singers Show
Heather Hauptman: What if she…the absence of the divine feminine in the patriarchy
Nolan Tredway: Soft Mutations
Edge Gallery, Hub at 40 West, 6510 East Colfax Avenue, Lakewood
Friday, July 14, through July 30
Opening Reception: Friday, July 14, 6 to 9 p.m.
Edge’s foursome includes a series of drypoint prints of rock formations native to the Southwest by Sue Crosby Doyle; Nolan Tredway’s Soft Mutations stars a group of under-par works he created during the pandemic and has now reworked with more pleasing results; Heather Hauptman mused on the idea of What if She…the absence of the divine feminine in the patriarchy using fiber, photography and poetry that she’ll read at 7 p.m. during the opening reception; and Kerem Smith-Stone’s new works for Cloud Singers Show examine what it takes to find Black freedom.
60th Annual Members Show
Colorado Photographic Arts Center (CPAC), 1200 Lincoln Street
Saturday, July 15, through August 12
Opening Reception: Saturday, July 15, 5 to 8 p.m.
CPAC’s new space will be christened with a big members’ exhibition juried by Mia Dalglish and Lisa Woodward, co-curators of Pictura Gallery in Bloomington, Indiana. They selected works by fifty photographers out of 700 images submitted by 136 gallery members; thirty of those are on display in the show, and twenty more were included in the catalogue’s Special Mention section. Cash awards will be presented to the Best in Show and Director’s Choice winners, and Honorable Mentions will be honored.
And you, the viewer, will be treated to a fine visual buffet of photography.
Month of Video: Screening: Signal Culture Alumni: Selections From Videosyntezy 2
Buntport Theater, 717 Lipan Street
Saturday, July 15, 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.
Month of Video presents a selection from the nonprofit experimental media arts residency program Signal Culture, which recently relocated from upstate New York to Loveland. Phillip Stearns’s Apieron | Peras 4 MOV live performance will no doubt be a high point of the evening, with Stearns demonstrating his low-tech, high-resolution analog audio-video synthesizer contained in a Nintendo Gameboy case, which he calls “Slain Boy.”
Heads of Hydra: Julie Lizak, Alchemy
The Bardo Coffeehouse, 238 South Broadway
Opening: Sunday, July 16, 2:22 to 4:30 p.m.
Richard Alden Peterson and Dave Seiler of the anti-curation platform Heads of Hydra will debut a photography exhibition of wavy blown-up water imagery printed on wood by Julie Lizak at the Bardo Coffeehouse.
