Sakeena Alkateeb, “Stick Drawing.”

On a recent Project Runway episode, Tim Gunn challenged the competing designers to construct garments using only items from a hardware store. Good thing the contestants didn’t have to go up against St. Anne’s-Belfield students Hannah Velie and Katelyn Coyner, whose dresses are among the standout pieces in this year’s High School Art Show, currently on view at the McGuffey Art Center.

Velie’s mini-dress, “Far Out,” pops with swirls of blue, green, purple, and yellow paper paint swatches spiraling outward on the front and back of a yellow oilcloth shift. Velie’s piece is not only fun, it’s also dead-on in its retro pop-art sensibility. Meanwhile Coyner’s “Lucky Strike” dress wows with a fringed bodice made of red-tipped cardboard matchsticks, a wide cummerbund of layered blue Diamond matchbooks, and a fringed skirt created with long wooden fireplace matches.

Can you find all of Velie and Coyner’s components at a hardware store? Why, yes, you can— and Project Runway judge Nia Garcia would never deem their innovative designs “boring.”

Innovation and mastery of technique are the keys to several students’ successful work in this year’s show. Renaissance School student Sakeena Alkateeb’s “Stick Drawing” is simultaneously raw and sophisticated. The quick India ink marks that Alkateeb has used to create her simple figure are free and energetic, but she has softened the composition and given it presence through varied weights of charcoal shading.

Western Albemarle student Ally Slechta also dazzles with technique in her batik, “April in Paris.” Even the darkest areas of Slechta’s Eiffel Tower, rising skyward behind stylized cherry branches, feature rich detail and texture. Further down the hall, another Renaissance School student, Marian Stevenson, has created a monochromatic red block print of a heron spreading its wings while standing above a fallen women that’s both strange and compelling.

Among the ceramic pieces, St. Anne’s-Belfield student Greg Wise’s whimsical creature is especially charming. Resembling a humorous cross between a dog and an alligator, the four-legged being’s body comprises parallel discs of bisque-colored clay. But it’s the movement in the scaly tale and expression of the painted-on eyes that bring the piece to life.

Also noteworthy for their outstanding technique are Western Albemarle students Reid Meador for her hand-tinted photograph of thread spools, and classmate Aly Baker for her watercolor, “Mrs. Roy.”

They may be young, but these local high school students combine fresh imagination with mature execution. As Tim Gunn would say, they “make it work.”

The annual High School Art Show is on view through March 31 in the upstairs hall gallery at the McGuffey Art Center. 201 Second St. NE. 295-7973.

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Lindsey Mears, “Abide.”

In the Japanese aesthetic of wabi sabi, which recognizes the beauty of imperfection, the word sabi refers specifically to a beauty acquired through age and wear. Think graceful curves of peeling paint or the varied patina of tarnished metal. One artist who venerates sabi is Lindsey Mears, whose exhibition, “Album: Winter into Spring,” is currently on view at the McGuffey Art Center, and her artworks are like shrines created for its dusty altar.

The 51 pieces in Mears’ show include hand-bound books, wall-mounted assemblages, freestanding sculptures, and shadow boxes. Although her pieces incorporate found objects— threadbare velvet boxes, fragments of wasp’s nests, faded photographs, and bedraggled feathers— Mears also uses a wide range of skilled art-making techniques, ranging from printing to paper-making to electroform plating, to enhance her collected treasures.

Mears’s aesthetic recalls Joseph Cornell’s— particularly in her piece, “The Temple of Costly Experience”— but her approach is decidedly feminine. With a mix of nostalgia and wryness, she examines old-fashioned notions of womanhood. Themes of mending and sewing, as well as ornamentation and cosmetic beauty, run through her work.

In “Vanity for a conjurer,” a fan-shaped box sits open, resembling a lady’s dressing table. Mears has placed an ivory-handled mirror, embellished with feathers, against the worn satin upholstery of the upright lid. A matching ivory-edged comb lies next to a wisp of horsehair tied with grosgrain ribbon at the bottom of the box, surrounded by cloudy glass bottles, one containing a copper-plated wishbone, another old buttons. The effect is at once nostalgic, curious, and humorous.

The piece also highlights Mears’ flair for theatricality. Many of her works involve stage-like settings, such as in  “The Temple of Costly Experience,” where Mears creates a proscenium arch with fabric swags and small bells. In “Tomorrow is Ours,” viewers become actors, gazing into an illuminated mirror, its silver scratched away to reveal an interior where a dove soars upward in a blue, starry heaven.

Throughout “Album: Winter into Spring,” Mears shows a dark sense of humor in the way she juxtaposes elements. For instance, a glass disk of gilded thorns sits at the center of a rose-filled jewelry box in “Learning about the Thorns.” Her compositions have an intuitive energy, but Mears has carefully considered the impact of every detail.

In her devotion to sabi, Mears nudges viewers to bathe in nostalgia and consider anew the beauty of things forgotten and left behind.

Lindsey Mears’ exhibition, “Album: Winter into Spring,” is on view through March 31 at the McGuffey Art Center. 201 Second St. NE. 295-7973.

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It’s hard to say who you oughta be more excited for here: on one hand, Justin Townes brings the royal Earle bloodline back around, which is an inherently fantastic thing given the esteem in which we hold Steve the elder. But Junior has been doing well for himself lately too, with 2009’s Midnight At The Movies getting an even warmer reception than the previous year’s debut; for now, he’s still squarely in the shadows of his eponyms (see also: Townes Van Zandt), but in a few more years, who knows. On the other hand, there’s also rootsy DIY pop songwriter Joe Pug, who opened for Justin’s pops last year while rustling up buzz for his early EP’s and finally dropped the debut full-length last month to flattering comparisons to Johns Hiatt and Prine.

Justin Townes Earle - Do I Ever Cross Your Mind [with Dawn Landes]
Justin Townes Earle - Mama’s Eyes
Justin Townes Earle - What I Mean To You

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Mary Schepisi, “Guns, Birds, and Words #8: No Violence.”

My father made a profound observation while visiting PVCC’s “Cut and Paste” show last week. He said he likes art that has meaning but which also offers “mystery,” prompting contemplation and allowing viewers to bring to it their own interpretations and associations. His words resonated when I took in Second Street Gallery’s current “Conflict/Interest” exhibition, in which war-inspired works are laden with meaning, but— with a few exceptions— not much mystery.

The nine artists who contribute to the show take an iconic approach to dealing with war by working and re-working the standard symbols: machine guns, uniformed soldiers, helicopters, etc. And many stick to a standard palette— red, black, gold, and army green— although two artists, Mary Schepisi and Eyal Danieli, opt for an in-your-face irony by using pink in two pieces.

A running theme in “Conflict/Interest” is the anonymity of war. Not only do soldiers lose their individuality in uniform, but battles also blur together in their repetition of violence. Richard Kraft’s four oversized silhouettes, printed in graphic red ink on white paper, depict uniformed men from various historical conflicts. Their outlines vaguely suggest context, such as the shape of a WWI-era trench coat or Fidel Castro’s cap, but for the most part, they’ve been reduced to action figures, a point driven home by Kraft’s entire project, “100 Soldiers for a Revolution,” printed on 2″ x 1.5″ cards that call to mind children’s trading cards or stickers. (Collect them all!)

Kraft’s piece illustrates another thread running through the exhibition’s works: a concern for how war has become an accepted part of our everyday lives. Mona Hatoum uses casts of toy soldiers in two pieces to convey war’s repetitive futility, and Mary Shepisi sews small needlepoint tapestries of guns and helicopters. Eric Parnes takes a slightly more specific approach by using gold leaf, popular in Middle Eastern homes, to gild weapons.

But with the exception of Naomi Falk’s “Re (Called) Quilt Project,” in which the artist sews vertebra-like pieces of porcelain, each representing a U.S. soldier killed in Iraq, under sheer organza in a seemingly endless quilt, the works in “Conflict/Interest” are mostly one-trick ponies. Once the viewer “gets it,” there’s little reason to keep looking. Which is a shame since SSG’s past war-themed shows by Sandow Birk, Andrew Schoultz, and Anne Kessler Shields offered multivalent reflections on armed conflict that were both relevant and rich with mystery.

“Conflict/Interest,” featuring work by Eyal Danieli, Naomi Falk, Mona Hatoum, Tim Hetherington, Richard Kraft, Eric Parnes, Steven Rubin, Mary Shepisi, and Suara Welitoff, is on view through March 27 at Second Street Gallery. 115 Second St. SE. 977-7284.

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Davette Leonard, “Tangerine.”

Most people maintain romantic notions about the lives of artists and writers. But the truth is we all have to make a living. That guy and gal who sell you cabernet and beer at the Market Street Wineshop? He’s an accomplished poet, and she’s a brilliant actor. The woman who manages the dairy case at C’ville Market? She paints jaw-dropping still lifes in the manner of Renaissance artists.

In the case of the latter, Davette Leonard may keep you in yogurt and cheese by day, but her true passion lies in using oils and glazes on masonite to realistically depict small tabletop scenes, often involving fruit. Twelve of Leonard’s paintings, plus a portrait and a still life in egg tempera, are currently on view at the McGuffey Art Center.

Although her compositions involve fewer elements than those of the 16^th century Dutch masters who inspire her work, Leonard uses a similarly rich palette with careful attention paid to light. She arranges her objects on a simple cream-colored tablecloth— sometimes creased, sometimes folded— against monochromatic backgrounds.

Leonard replicates the Renaissance tradition of “vanitas” paintings, which visually lecture against worldly desire by alluding to the impermanence of life and material wealth. But rather than paint a skull amid wilting flowers and accoutrements spilling off a table, as earlier painters were wont to do, Leonard takes a subtler approach. Her sliced fruits are alluringly juicy but also show the first signs of decay in the darkened edges of their peels and slight browning of their flesh. Leonard often includes desiccated leaves, shells, and twigs to punctuate these tableaux.

Using colors that are true-to-life and luscious, Leonard keeps evidence of her brushwork to a minimum. Her objects’ edges, though not diffuse, have a softness that seductively pulls viewers into each painting, where meticulously observed details create small dramatic moments.

In “Clementine,” a dried-out leaf curls in front of an unpeeled fruit, the arc of the leaf’s central vein echoing the pulpy lines on the backs of nearby citrus slices. Elsewhere, Leonard’s interpretation of vanitas turns toward sensual aspects of desire. In “Tangerine,” the interior of a cut-open, tempting fruit whisperingly recalls female genitalia. The suggestion is quiet, yet a central crease in the tablecloth leads the viewer’s eye to it.

Luminous and exquisite, each precisely observed painting invites contemplation. If only Leonard could quit her day job, but, alas, still life isn’t real life.

Davette Leonard’s exhibition is on view through February 28 in the downstairs hall gallery of the McGuffey Art Center. 201 Second St. NW. 295-7973.

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Matthew Lively, “Thermo Baller.”

You may not know what “albedo” means, but, trust me, you’ve experienced it big time in the past week. Albedo is the amount of solar radiation reflected back into space from the earth’s surface, and it’s essential to planetary health. The best promoter of albedo? Snow with an underlying layer of ice (see, it’s good for something!), which is why the polar icecaps’ melting is such a threat.

Scientists offer myriad solutions for combating the planet’s diminishing albedo, from painting roofs white to launching mirrored satellites to generating cloud cover. Such visually intriguing ideas provide the impetus for artist Matthew Lively’s exhibition, “Odebla,” currently on view in Piedmont Virginia Community College’s North Gallery.

Collaborating with sculptor David Culpepper, Lively imagines the domestic consequences for a world where scientific intervention is necessary to maintain life. “Odebla” includes several paintings and small sculptures, but its heart is a floor-to-ceiling installation, “Satellite,” that extends across a 22-foot length of wall.

“Satellite” offers a bird’s eye— or rather a satellite’s eye— view of a modern subdivision, with several key differences. Clustered around gracefully arcing cul-de-sacs drawn in graphite, 72 nearly identical miniature houses are painted a uniform white and interspersed with 72 latticed brown “Radio Derrick” towers. The aerial perspective emphasizes the piece’s poetic rhythm and flow, and the shadows cast— particularly by the derricks— create an additional visual component.

The two-story houses in “Satellite” are similar to the houses that provide the focus for several of Lively’s oil paintings. In each case, he depicts mechanisms, such as a satellite tethered to a roof or an accordion-like ventilation pipe with red bellows, attached to cartoon-like homes, which otherwise are emblematic of story-book happiness.

In two pieces, Lively moves away from imagining methods of engineering the earth’s atmosphere and toward considering how to keep its potential toxicity at bay. In the small sculpture, “Albedo Dome 1,” he places a cheery little house surrounded by stylized green shrubs under a blown-glass bubble. The dome’s strange frosted portals have a roundness that visually echoes the spherical bushes. Lively takes this vision into two dimensions in the large oil painting, “Thermo Baller,” which offers viewers an aerial view through brown-flecked clouds of bubble-protected domesticity.

Lively’s ideas are rich, but his execution is equally interesting, incorporating drips in his paintings and allowing sculpted elements to remain off-kilter. Consequently, “Odebla” offers both fuel for thought and entertainment for the eye.

Matthew Lively’s exhibition, “Odebla,” is on view through March 3 in the North Gallery of the V. Earl Dickinson Building at Piedmont Virginia Community College. 501 College Dr. 961-5362.

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Convicted killer Soering is now caught in an international tug-of-war between Kaine, left, and McDonnell, right.
FILE PHOTOS BY DAVE MCNAIR, LANTERN BOOKS, LINDSAY BARNES

It’s a stop-the-presses moment as the new governor, acting after consultation with new Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli as well as state legislators, including Charlottesville-area Delegate Rob Bell and Senator Steve Newman, who serves the district where the 1985 murders took place, has asked the Justice Department to undo outgoing Governor Tim Kaine’s final act in office: moving convicted killer Jens Soering to Germany.

“I hereby revoke Virginia’s consent to the transfer,” Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell writes in a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. “I am responsible for ensuring that justice is done.”

Kaine made the move without fanfare on his final day in office. And his only defenses thus far— obtained by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the newspaper that broke the story— are that 1) he’s been assured (more)

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Ross McDermott, “La Faquetigue Courir de Mardi Gras.”

Ah, the road trip: an all-American tradition, often undertaken with a friend and a theme, say, visiting minor-league ballparks or driving the length of Route 66. Local photographers Ross McDermott and Andrew Owen set off on their own odyssey in a camper fueled by veggie oil with an artistic agenda: to drive cross-country attending festivals and competitions— large and small, the odder the better— in order to document what McDermott feared was a vanishing aspect of American life.

Fourteen months, 40,000 miles, and 37 gatherings later, the duo has returned with a transformed outlook.

“Festival life is strong,” they write in the statement accompanying their exuberant exhibition, “The American Festivals Project,” currently on view at The Bridge.

A giant green map of the U.S., crisscrossed with dotted white lines indicating McDermott and Owen’s circuitous route, dominates the main gallery. Hundreds of sticky notes, each with a thumbnail snapshot of a memorable moment, plaster the map and offer insights into the photographers’ personal journey, doing away with their anonymity behind the camera.

On the surrounding walls, oversized photographs capture the color and spirit of the myriad events they witnessed, often encapsulated in a portrait of a participant. For instance, McDermott’s picture of a little girl in a pink pajama-like costume standing in the middle of a two-lane road, the mask over her eyes slightly askew, captures the homespun aura of La Faquetigue Courir de Mardi Gras in rural Louisiana.

Many of the photographs have a National Geographic sensibility— not surprising since Natty Geo helped fund the trip— but many also succeed as stand-alone images beyond their documentary context. Owen’s shot of a fish-catching demonstration inside a glass tank at the Okie Noodling Festival in Paul’s Valley, Oklahoma, is particularly stunning. In this surreal composition, a disembodied human leg and the tail of a large fish jut from left and right into the center of the frame, hazy with refracted golden sunlight.

The exhibition extends into The Bridge’s anteroom, where hundreds of 4″ x 6″ photos are clipped to five tiers of monofilament. Viewers can flip each image up to read a caption noting the festival and location. Another area features smaller portraits, and in a niche, a monitor screens a video of interviews with festival participants.

The two intrepid, road-tripping photographers conclude, “Americans love to find their tribe and celebrate.” Jump in with McDermott and Owen— they’ll show you where all the best parties are!

Ross McDermott and Andrew Owen’s “The American Festivals Project” is on view through January 30 at The Bridge. 209 Monticello Road (across from Spudnuts). 985-5669.

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Greene County teen Colby W. Eppard died January 1 following a police chase which ended when he allegedly began shooting at officers.
FACEBOOK PHOTO

“The eight (8) videos you have requested will not be provided to you.”

So says Lt. Todd Hopwood, spokesperson for the Albemarle County Police Department, who cites two sections of Virginia Code in denying a reporter the opportunity to view police videos that might shed some light on the last moments of the life of Colby Wade Eppard. The 18-year-old Stanardsville man died January 1 after allegedly stealing a patrol car, leading law enforcement officials on a three-jurisdiction pursuit, and firing at officers.

Similar denials were issued by Captain Charles Swingler of the Greene County Sheriff’s Office and by Corinne Geller of the Virginia State Police, the entity leading the investigation. Apparently, they have that right.

“They don’t have to release all of it, or any of it,” says Alan Gernhardt, staff attorney for the Freedom of Information Advisory Council in Richmond. “It’s in their discretion.”

About two months ago, in a separate case, the (more)

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Peter Krebs, “May 19.”

I confess. I occasionally feel jaded by the local art scene and drift into a been-there-seen-that attitude of lassitude. But then someone like Sonjia Weber Gilkey comes along and shatters my ash-colored glasses by turning my expectations upside down.

Tall and elegant, Gilkey always cuts a striking figure among the “usual suspects” at art openings. But now she’s given me something to admire beyond her style and presence. Gilkey, it turns out, is not just an art-lover, but also an art-maker, and her monumental wall sculptures of crocheted rope are among the highlights of the “New Members Show,” currently on view at the McGuffey Art Center.

Working in an atelier in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, Gilkey has created abstract vertical works inspired by Kundalini spiritualism that incorporate objects gleaned from beachcombing, such as fishermen’s nets, shells, feathers, worn glass, and driftwood. Gilkey skillfully balances her textural elements, introducing movement via spirals and carefully draped ruffles. Her minimal use of color– for example, a bit of purple woven into the upper tier of “Soul Traveling”– and contrast of layers with negative space enhance the impact of each piece.

Hanging at the south end of McGuffey’s upstairs hall gallery, Gilkey’s organic-feeling wall pieces complement Amber Zavada’s sculptures, crafted from natural materials, atop pedestals running the length of the hall. Although Zavada has several cast-bronze pieces on show downstairs, her upstairs work features twigs, seedpods, and twine combined in precariously balanced structures that allude to social relationships with ladders, nets, and nests. Charming yet dark and otherworldly, her small-scale sculptures create Zavada an aesthetic like the lovechild of filmmaker Tim Burton and sculptor Andy Goldsworthy.

Another new McGuffey member engaged with nature is recent New York transplant Peter Krebs, who previously exhibited in Charlottesville at the now-defunct Migration gallery. Krebs has continued his series of skyward-looking portraits of trees painted on stained wood for the McGuffey show and added several small pen-and-ink drawings of tree roots. His large nighttime image, “May 19,” featuring a starlit sky seen through a lacy black canopy of charcoal, is particularly engaging.

Rounding out the stellar upstairs-hall fare are Aaron Eichorst’s mixed-media compositions that digitally mix photography, well-known artworks, and flowers in humorous and surprising ways. Meanwhile, downstairs, highlights include Bethany Pierce’s small cosmological oils, Darrell Rose’s image-packed abstracts, and Susan Haley Northington’s minimal yet effective landscapes.

Thanks, new McGuffey members, for dispelling my local-art doldrums.

The McGuffey Art Center’s annual “New Members Show,” is on view through January 31. 201 Second St. NW. 295-7973.

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Minutes before a jury found him guilty of attempted extortion, Richard Wade Kendrick, with family members behind him, waits for the verdict.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

A controversial government-backed lawsuit against a recycling entrepreneur suffered a major blow Thursday when a Fluvanna County jury convicted 50-year-old Richard Wade Kendrick of trying to extort his former employer, Peter Van der Linde. In a separate action, Kendrick had been expected to serve as the star witness in the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority’s lawsuit against Van der Linde, but now it appears that Kendrick might have to be plucked from jail if he’s still needed to testify against his old boss.

Already, the Authority’s case against Van der Linde— although it has the support of such community notables as Albemarle Supervisor Ken Boyd and Charlottesville City Councilor David Brown— has drawn criticism for using provisions of RICO, the federal Racketeer Influenced Corruption act, to punish a challenger to the Waste Authority’s power.

A year ago, Van der Linde immediately captured the lion’s share of the market by opening a facility that recycles construction debris, and late last month he opened an expansion that sorts and recycles household waste as well.

Waste Authority director Tom Frederick was (more)

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Patrick S. Shemorry in happier times with estranged wife Starla Knight.
FACEBOOK PHOTO

With his weeping mother looking on, former Charlottesville realtor Patrick S. Shemorry was sentenced Wednesday to nine and half years in prison for hiring a hitman to kill his estranged wife.

“This is such a terrible crime,” said Judge Norman Moon as he deliberated, adding that “but for the grace of God” a woman would be dead and 28-year-old Shemorry would have been facing life in prison or capital punishment.

That “grace” came in the form of the hired hitman, identified in a defense pre-sentence memo as Shemorry’s former friend Michael Allen Terry, who, instead of carrying out the killing, went to authorities with recordings of Shemorry discussing his desire to have his estranged wife killed.

““It’s a f***ing war, and she’s just a casualty,” Shemorry said on an audio recording played (more)

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One scientist was so irked by global warming skeptic Pat Michaels that he ill-advisedly jotted an email expressing interest in slugging Michaels.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

The summit on global warming opened in Copenhagen December 7, but the heat generated by hacked emails that appeared November 20 has refused to cool, even in the face of the salacious Tiger Woods scandal.

Former Virginia state climatologist and global warming skeptic Pat Michaels (”Hurricane Pat,” as we once fondly dubbed him) pops up in an email as someone that a scientist from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California would like to attack— and not just in the latest issue of a peer-reviewed journal.

“I’m really sorry that you have to go through all this stuff,” Benjamin Santer allegedly wrote a colleague. “Next time I see Pat Michaels at a scientific meeting, I’ll be tempted to beat the crap out of him. Very tempted.”

The electronic missives purloined from the (more)

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UVA athletic director Craig Littlepage, left, introduces UVA’s new head football coach Mike London.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

UVA athletic director Craig Littlepage announced that University of Richmond head football coach Mike London will replace recently fired UVA head football coach Al Groh. London comes to UVA after only two seasons as head coach for the Spiders, but Littlepage expressed no reservations about his decision.

“We need a coach that can win,” Littlepage told the crowd of spectators and media that had gathered in the dining hall at John Paul Jones Arena. “Mike stood out on the strength of his character, as a coach, teacher, and leader. He will give UVA football an exciting jump start.”

London racked up a 24-5 record at Richmond and won the 2008 Football Championship Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-AA) title.

London becomes the third African-American head coach in (more)

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Michael Underwood, Escapement.

Occasionally, a non-filmmaking artist decides to take a stab at the cinematic art form. Sometimes the results are shockingly good. For instance, painter Julian Schnabel’s Basquiat, Before Night Falls, and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly are breathtaking films. Other times, as in the case of Michael Underwood’s Escapement, currently screening at the Niche in the Fine Arts Library, well, not so much.

A photographer by training, Underwood and his brother, Matthew, set out in 2002 to make a documentary examining whether or not four dams on the Snake River, a tributary of the Columbia, should be removed to allow dwindling salmon populations to recover. In 2009, the brothers completed the project, although it’s unclear from the 28-minute video what was filmed when and how the situation may have changed over the seven-year span.

Escapement contains all the elements of a standard documentary. Shots to establish a sense of place? Check. “Talking heads” expressing contrasting viewpoints? Check. A map for geographical reference? Check. Archival photographs enlivened by camera pans, a la Ken Burns? Check. Successful documentaries, though, require attention not just to visual components but also to sound, editing, and storytelling.

Escapement’s biggest technical problem is its sound. One minute the spoken words are clear, the next they’re layered with interference. In at least two places, the stereo abruptly shifts to single channel. This inconsistent quality is jarring, distracting, and screams “amateur.” In addition, when Escapement includes voiceover, the narrator reads the script in a sing-song-y cadence that undercuts the words’ meaning.

The editing is also uneven. Interviews last too long, and the narrative thread does not un-spool smoothly. Also, the map is a visual snooze, and the use of black frames to divide the film into sections is overworked. In one instance, an interview subject’s words are inexplicably voiced over a black frame for several seconds before he is revealed.

Which is not to say Escapement doesn’t have redeeming aspects. Chief among them: every shot is beautifully composed, often contrasting the geometric lines of manufactured structures with the organic flow of nature. Underwood also skillfully imbues the video with a strong palette of red, blue, yellow, and green that provides unity.

Escapement is most successful when its compelling shots wordlessly tell the story. Underwood’s images of glass windows at a dam revealing fish swimming upstream through green water are particularly memorable.

But he probably shouldn’t quit his day job.

Michael Underwood’s documentary, Escapement, is on view through December 31 at The Niche in the Fine Arts Library. Fiske Kimball Fine Arts Library, Bayly Dr. (across from the Architecture School). For more information, visit http://thelibraryniche.blogspot.com.

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Tony Carmadella, Phil Reiman, and Mark Swanstrom of DARPA stood outside all day at the Tonsler Park tennis courts waiting in the snow for balloon seekers.
PHOTO BY KATIE HARTWELL

Update 11:16pm Saturday, December 5: There’s a winner…

Ten red weather balloons were placed around the country Saturday, December 5, by the Defense Department’s DARPA program to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the internet with a competition to test how information spreads online. One of those balloons, #3, flew right here in Charlottesville at the Tonsler Park tennis courts at Cherry Avenue and Ridge Street. All 10 balloons were set afloat for nine hours, and the Charlottesville balloon came down at 4pm EST.

The prize for the winning team (which needs to register at the DARPA website) is a whopping $40,000 and entries are accepted through December 14. For those of you in that mad race, the Charlottesville coordinates are 38 degrees, 01 minutes, 33 seconds North (latitude); 078 degrees, 29 minutes, 23 seconds West (longitude). Good luck! –with reporting by Katie Hartwell

–6:15pm post clarified to specify time zone of the Charlottesville balloon.

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Jefferson Area Tea Party chairman Bill Hay has his differences with Congressman Tom Perriello, but he does not condone burning Perriello in effigy.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

About a week after Guy Fawkes’ Day, the British holiday celebrated with bonfires and effigy burning of the guy who tried to blow up Parliament, a Danville group announced its plans to burn Congressman Tom Perriello and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in effigy at a November 21 bonfire. Yet Charlottesville-area reaction indicates that some Virginians don’t quite have the same stiff upper lip as their Brit cousins about torching likenesses— especially of their elected leaders.

“This is not something we condone,” says Bill Hay, head of the local group. “I had a conniption when I heard about it.”

Hay says that the Jefferson Area Tea Party, as much as it (more)

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Steve Taylor, “Corn Field.”

The last time Steve Taylor exhibited at the McGuffey Art Center, he filled the main gallery with oversized oil-on-canvas landscapes. He reserved one wall, though, for a collection of small studies on paper. Taylor’s large paintings were competently executed, but these smaller works, created quickly and with less concern for control, sang with a vital lyricism.

So I smiled when I learned the title of Taylor’s current show in McGuffey’s downstairs hall gallery: “The Small Stuff.” For this body of work, Taylor combines oil, acrylic, ink, and oil pastel on paper to create landscapes from memory. All of the semi-abstract works, save two, are limited in scale and express Taylor’s affection for the Blue Ridge Mountain vistas of his present and a poignant nostalgia for English landscapes from his youth.

Many of the pieces offer Taylor’s evocative recollections of Huntcliff, a striking sheer-sided promontory that juts into the sea in northeast England. The artist provides two large photographs of the landmark for reference, but his lovely and widely varied impressions don’t rely on viewers’ familiarity with Huntcliff for their success. Taylor’s gestural strokes and deft layering of colors give viewers all the information necessary to emotionally respond to the work.

For instance, in “Huntcliff Rain,” Taylor offers an almost monochromatic painting that compels with its subtle color variations. A peach-grey sky hangs above the blue-grey cliff, quietly enlivened by green along its ridge, while a stretch of green-grey beach arcs in the foreground. The overall effect is melancholy and atmospheric.

Particularly interesting is the way Taylor uses the page itself as a frame for his images. The borders of his landscapes remain diffuse and raw, often revealing the intricate layering of his palette. Although the edges of the tiny “Corn Field,” suggest a series of horizontal sweeps across the page, the center of the image thrills with scratch-like furrows of green and reddish-pink running through a yellow field beneath a late-evening mountain skyline.

“The Small Stuff” also includes several monoprints, which are a new endeavor for Taylor. What is noteworthy is how each print is barely there and yet succeeds in evoking a landscape. For instance, “Essex” reads as a plowed field despite being essentially a faint, multi-colored blot on the page.

When it comes to Taylor’s work, contradictions rule: the less literal, the more evocative, and the smaller, the greater the impact. Less is beautifully more.

Steve Taylor’s exhibition, “The Small Stuff,” is on view through November 22 at the McGuffey Art Center. 201 Second St. NW. 295-7973.

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A major search effort to find Morgan Harrington launches Friday morning, November 6, and continues through the weekend.
PHOTO FROM STATE POLICE

The Jefferson Room at the Cavalier Inn at the corner of Emmet Street and Ivy Road was filled to capacity tonight— and then some—  as hundreds of Charlottesville residents and out-of-towners registered for a weekend search for Morgan Harrington, missing since an October 17 Metallica concert at John Paul Jones Arena.

The search is being organized by the Laura Recovery Center, a nonprofit search agency founded by the parents of Laura Kate Smithers, a 12-year-old Texas girl who was kidnapped while jogging and murdered in 1997. In addition to Morgan’s parents, Dan and Gil Harrington, various law enforcement agencies are helping coordinate the search.

This weekend’s searches will  begin Friday morning, November 6, at 9am. Interested volunteers, who do not need to have attended the pre-search presentation, should meet at the Forestry Center at 900 Natural Resources Drive behind the Fontaine Research Park. Would-be searchers must be 18 or over and have valid identification.

Laura Recovery Center founder Bob Smither, father of Laura, spoke at the hotel, just blocks from where Morgan was last seen on Copeley Bridge, to the hundreds of assembled volunteers– so many the presentation had to be given twice.

While most of those gathered will spend some portion of the next three days tromping through brush looking for any sign of Morgan, some made the trip just to show support.

“We were away and just found out what happened,” said Ray Mayberry, whose wife, Carole, worked with Dan Harrington at Carilion Clinic in Roanoke. The retired pair said they are unable to participate in the rigors of a ground search, but drove from Roanoke to show support.

“We want to do what we can to help,” Mayberry explained.

Starting Friday morning, groups of 10 will be assigned as-yet-to-be-determined search areas, Smither explained; any possible evidence discovered should not be touched. Volunteers are invited to show up throughout the day, as their schedules allow. The last groups will likely be sent out no later than 3pm.

“Our only priority,” said Smither, “is finding Morgan.’

Anyone with questions about this weekend’s searches can call (434) 960-0401.
Last updated Friday, November 6 at 3:27pm. Correction: Cavalier Inn is not a Best Western.—ed
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