Artists Talk with LVA: March 16, 2023

LVA Honors is March 22 and this week we talk with two of the Honorees, Doug DeWeese (Visual Art Educator) & Ceirra Evans (Emerging Artist). Tune in to WXOX 97.1 FM/Artxfm.com at 10 am each Thursday to hear Artists Talk with LVA.

Douglas DeWeese was born and raised in Louisville and has taught art in that community for Jefferson County Public Schools for nearly 27 years.  Doug earned his Bachelor’s degree in Georgia, a Master of Art in Teaching the visual arts from the University of Louisville, and is a National Board Certified teacher.

He has been a part of the visual art faculty at duPont Manual High School for 21 years where he teaches painting, drawing, and printmaking classes.  He has been vital in modernizing and continuing high standards for the visual art magnet program and school, serving on the Admissions Committee, Instructional Leadership Team, Hiring Committee, and former sponsor of the National Art Honor Society at duPont Manual High School.  

Ceirra Evans is a Louisville-based painter depicting Appalachia and the working-class southern narrative. Ceirra’s work has been reviewed by Hyperallergic, The New Yorker, and other publications. Her work is exhibited in 21c Louisville and is held in multiple private collections.

Born and raised in Eastern Kentucky, Evans’ body of work depicts scenes directly from her early life in the foothills of the Appalachian region. Her work depicts stories of generational poverty, trauma, rural queerness, and familial relationships. Ceirra’s work uses humor and illustration to sift through the discourse critiquing the region.

Artists Talk with LVA: March 9, 2023

This week we talk with Sunyang Lim in South Korea about the Korea Fiber Art Forum and Feral Fagiola about the exhibit she has curated for the 849 Gallery, Solve et Coagula, opening Friday. Tune in to WXOX 97.1 FM/Artxfm.com each Thursday at 10 am to hear Artists Talk with LVA.

Sunyang Lim is a Professor, Dongduk Women’s University, Seoul, Korea Fiber Arts, and Textile Design. She earned both a BFA and MFA from Dongduk Women’s University, Seoul, Korea, BFA, and has also studied at SUNY and in France and received her Ph.D. from Hanyang University. She is just one of the many artists participating in the Korea Fiber Form Biennial in Louisville. Her work can be seen at KMAC.

Feral Fagiola is an interdisciplinary artist exploring desire, power, and fetish in their work. Feral’s practice engages industrial materials, processes, and spaces as refractions of physical and implied structures of power on the body. Their sculptural objects, installations, and performances fantasize bodily possibilities through erotic rituals and material transformations. They are now the studio manager at Kentucky College of Art + Design (KYCAD).

Solva et Cuaglia, curated by Feral Fagiola is at KYCAD’s 849 Gallery through the end of March

Artists Talk with LVA: March 2, 2023

Moon-he Baik was a Professor of Interior Design at the Hite Art Institute in 1991-2021. She received her BFA from Ewha University in Korea, and her MFA from the University of North Texas. Her research focuses on Textile Design, Multi-Cultural Interiors, and Sustainability & Environmental Design.

Since 2018 she has been working to develop the Korea Fiber Form Biennial, which took place in South Korea in 2022 and is unfolding now in Louisville at LVA, KMAC, Asia Institute-Crane House, 21c Hotel & Museum, and the University of Louisville. She has now been invited to bring the Fiber Forum to the 2024 Venice Biennale.

In April 2023 Baik will once again be a featured designer in the KMAC Couture event!

Korea FiberArt International consolidates leading artists in Korean fiber arts to organize symposiums and workshops in correlation to exhibitions. The objective of KFAF is to shed light on Korea's creative endeavors using a wide range of fiber-based materials. The scope is broad from artistic narrative expressions to practical approaches that encompass function.

Artists Talk with LVA: February 23, 2023

REMEMBRANCE, an exhibition honoring the late Lida Gordon featuring Bette Levy, Elmer Lucille Allen, Denise Furnish, and Melinda Snyder, opens at PYRO Gallery on March 3 and runs through March 26, 2023.

“As an artist, I am interested in using historic handwork techniques to create contemporary art and to address personal and societal issues. It is important to me to use these skills in an increasingly technological/virtual world and to maintain an ongoing relationship with the past. 

 For the past 20+ years, I have been a hand embroiderer, using vividly colored silk thread on black grounds. This approach intensifies thread colors and creates strongly contrasting figure-ground relationships. Over time, I have developed a personal language of stitches that enables me to "paint" or "draw" with thread on fabric.  My subject matter is based on the photographic studies that I abstract and manipulate to emphasize seemingly inconsequential structures.  I am interested in textures and how to give form to structures through the layering of stitches and the use of color.  Labor- and stitch-intensive, my work often takes considerable time to research and complete.  It is the very detail of this work, however, that provides a meditational focus”.

The Sanctuary Project is a collaborative performance art initiative with Louisville Visual Art taking place on March 3 & 4 at LVA. Two of the five participating artists, Joyce Barbour and Magnolia Hensley came to talk about it. Joyce is a multi-media artist and teacher and Magnolia is an actor and improv artist.

Five artists create performances around the idea of sanctuary using a variety of media, space, time, spoken word, and music.

Joyce Barbour. Amy Davis. Magnolia Hensley
Sara Noori. Taylor Sanders Curated by Keith Waits

Artists Talk with LVA: February 16, 2023

Yoko Molotov is a multimedia artist specializing in transgressive, gender-fluid cartoons, comics, art books, poetry and performances. She is also in the bands Sweatermeat, Cowabunga Lullaby and in the music/performance group Harpy.

“I think everything I do is art. I think my whole life is art. Everything I do is for art. Every expression I make is an extension of that … I just live to create.” – Yoko Molotov

Yoko Molotov was born and raised in Louisville, KY nestled in the basin of a polluted river. She decided at age 9 she would do comics, at that age on college rule and the backs of important documents like her original birth certificate. Five years later she discovered the saccharine and disturbing world of manga and anime and knew it was where she belonged. Inspired by such artists as Mita Ryuusuke (Dragon Half) and studio GAINAX (Neon Genesis Evangelion, FLCL), she carved her own world with imagination and Bristol, constantly chastised for drawing in her High School days. In 2006, Yoko made top 20 in Tokyopop's Rising Stars of Manga Competition with her entry "NecrOphealia" and went along to create a Shoujo-ai Web Manga called "Stray Crayons". Both titles are now published by Demented Dragon. Yoko loves her city, her better half and best friends in the entire world, and loves nothing more than to get lost in a good story (whether it be manga or not) in a song, or better yet an adventure. Some of Yoko's other hobbies have included public access TV shows and a band she is in called Gentleman Stabber.

Regretfully, the archive recording of this interview was corrupted and is not available. Apologies to Yoko.