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RUSTING AMERICAN
INFRASTRUCTURE
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Inside Out
Course taught by Daniel Kohn and Charlie Hunter
June 18 evening through June 22, 2008
Great River Arts Institute, Bellows Falls, VT

As artists we strive to describe or explain the world, be it that which we see, hear, imagine or breathe. This workshop will focus on sight. However, nature exists both as "Natural" and "Human-made" environment. To play fully with this two instructor ballet, we will be painting both Inside an old industrial space, and Outside in the landscape.

Participants will be encouraged to explore their own interests through painting,and that of their peers, through vision and discussion. We will focus both on issues of representation and abstraction - the relation between the seen and the painted. We reach an understanding of that which we observe through our individual powers of sight, but also with the hand that draws and the body which occupies its own unique place in the landscape. The mind, as well, is a part of that.

So both practice and discussion are to be expected. Participants will be expected to use the time to push the envelope of their own work. Work in the studio and outdoors will be punctuated with at least one critique session a day.

This is a place where we can put ourselves on the line; participant and instructor alike will learn from one another. We plan to work hard during the days, but also spend some evenings together as well, to strive to make our time together as rewarding and cohesive as possible.

Workdays will be 9:30am to 5pm. We will kick off the workshop with a dinner on Wednesday evening to get to know each other a little (June 18). Site visit and Drawing will take most of Thursday (June 19) Friday will see a move to painting based on but not restricted to the previous day's drawing. Friday evening we will enjoy a good meal together and have a slide show and discussion. Saturday, more painting. Sunday push the limits and end with another meal for those who can hang around.

Meals and lodging are not included in the class price, but the instructors may spring for a bottle of wine or two.

For more information, visit http://www.greatriverarts.org, 802-463-3330

CURRENT SHOWS:

The next scheduled show opens Friday, April 4, 2008 at Vermont Artisan Designs located at 106 Main Street, Brattleboro, VT.

BIOGRAPHY:

Charlie Hunter was raised in Weathersfield Center, Vermont where he was home schooled in the house built by his Great Great Great Grandfather. Hunter majored in art at Yale University, studying with painters William Bailey, Richard Lytle and Bob Reed, architectural historians Vincent Scully and Alex Gorlin and designers Alvin Eisenmann and Inge Druckery. He lived in Northampton, MA in the 80's and 90's, working as a graphic designer and music manager, returning to Vermont in 2000. During his years as a designer, Hunter created over fifty album covers for acts on major and independent labels. In the 90's he won the Canson-Talens International Pastel Grand Prize.

Charlie Hunter now shows his paintings regularly at galleries in the Northeast and his works hang in numerous private collections. When not painting, he runs occasional transcontinental music and art trains, live music events, and is active in local farmers markets.

ARTIST STATEMENT:

The new paintings are almost all painted on site in one sitting. They don't shy away from power lines. They're what I think our life out here in de-ruralizing Vermont looks like.

When people are looking at old snapshots it seems to me that fairly quickly they tire of the self-conscious camaraderie and forced smiles: they start to peer behind the supposed 'subject,' seaching with a hungry recognition for the dormant but hardly-forgotten aspects of everyday life contained within. Oh, right! - That's what gas pumps used to be shaped like! or Look at the toaster! or What were they thinking with the AMC Pacer, anyway? These new paintings, then, are not necessarily for now. They're for forty or a hundred years hence, when God knows what will look cool and what that we all approach today with a straight face will be subject to immense ridicule.

The way I've usually painted has been very tight and naturalistic; faithful images with a dose of morose romanticism. In the last year I have started painting bigger with cheaper brushes, old rags, paper towels and fewer colors. I like where these paintings are going. I want my paintings to look like music that pulls a melody out of noise.

The late, great Chris Whitley said this past summer that he loved the 'ragged line' of my work. I could ask for no more than that.

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