Newspaper article (Intowner)

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Adams Morgan Artist Matt Sesow Featured in Baltimore Museum Show

epyey HO: Fluid Universe,” which ust opened and will be on view until September 4, 2005, presents the 10th i hibition” of Baltimore's aston- ishingly vibrant American. Visionary Art Museum includes, among others, the work of local artist Matt Sesow, winner of several recent artist awards including two Adams Morgan Festival first and second prizes. 1 Setting Sail (with Sesow’) joins the work of 39 other self-taught visionary artists whose paintings, seulplures, installa-

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tions, and automata celebrate, entrance, caplivate, and terrify the viewer with images and objects regarding the vital role played by water in the life of man on earth

Sesow’s explosively colored and powerful ly composed expressionist paintings in this exhibition are broad brushed self-portraits

poco Out of Water

swith a compellingly dramatic tension that draws in the viewer. Both Setting Sail and ‘Out of Water capture on canvas and board doubling figures, expressions, and marke ings—on the first—and a powerful head complete with a characteristic Sesow rau sma scar marker on the second, (As is noted in the museum's press materials, “when he ‘was eight, Sesow was playing in afield by an airstrip and was struck by a landing airplane, The propeller severed his left arm... Many

Cont,, Sesow, p20

Meet Matt Sesow

Closer to home, on Sunday, October 10, between 11 am and 6 pi, the artist will be hosting an Opew Studio at 1851 Columbia Road, NW (W603) to show and discuss his work. For more information, call 319-1459 Or ena to oF visit www.sesow.comt

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SESOW

of his works contain a ‘trauma sear’ icon representing the changes one goes thorough afler a life-changing or trauumatic event”

Equally compelling is the work of two other artists singled out with Sesow. in the museum's press material. Extraordinary works are those of Nancy Josephson, inelud= ing her altar room to the mermaid Goddess La Siren, and Tom Dunean’s huge kinetic sculpture of Coney Island. Josephson, who isa spiritual follower of Vodou, also engaged for this remarkable exhibition a number of Haitian artists with whom she has worked during many visits to Haiti. Duncan's work, which is ofa totally different nature, isnone- theless very much like Josephson's in its largeness of scope, ambition of intent, and joyous enveloping of its viewers. The loving and meticulous installation of Duncan's ‘and Josephson’s works by the museum's staff is the perfect appreciative complement to the fine work of these profoundly gifted arts

‘Among other artists to whose work I was especially drawn were that of the primitive and powerfully evocative oil pastel painting of Eddie Arming, whose Coppertone Girl i riot that of the ‘Texas Gulf Coast that Arming ‘would have known; the walking stiek made ‘of sea shells and wood by the Finnish/

Russian/Ametican artist Harry Korpela; “Mr. Imaginaton’s” bottlecap sculptures; and. Paul Edlin’s mosaic-style drawings iniade of cutup slivers of postage stamps, In a class by itself is the Rev. Albert Wagner's The Parting of the Red Sea, a work which combines in my visual memory with the great painting by Frederic Edwin Church fof Niagara Falls with one of those famous Fuhuristic paintings of an entire factory's labor force advancing like an inverted V. ‘This remarkably tich and handsomely ‘mounted and lighted exhibition will reward the viewer with an encounter that is the: matically varied yet artfully intertwined, fone comprising an amazing comucopia of ‘meaningful and beautifully rendered art treasures. And the show’s theme of “Holy 1,0 Fluid Universe” could not be more vital to our environmentally degraded 21st century, As noted by Rebecea Hoffberger, the inspired (and inspiring) director and founder of the museum, “Holy H20 will express the ever-changing, Muid nature of cour world and broadcast an artistic SOS. bout our planet’s number one erisis—the availability of abundant and pure water.

American Visionary Art Museum is located at the foot of federal Hill on Baltimore's Inner Harbor, 800 key Highway; te, (+10) 244-1900; www.avamimages.org. Hours: Tue-Sun., L0am-6pm. Admission, $9 ($6, seniors and students