With 12 new paintings, Sally Gauger Jensen reflects on Bay View store windows with precise, prismacolor pencil strokes. Although subtly evoking surreal memory and narrative, Jensen refracts reality through photographic paintings that skew commonplace perspectives in her exhibition, "Bay View Barbie Returns: Back by Popular Demand," at the Marshall Building's Grava Gallery opening April 15.
Jensen's store windows primarily capture the creative displays and model-like mannequins from Luv Unlimited, a fashion merchant located on Kinnickinnic Avenue. She scanned approximately two-dozen photographs taken on early Sunday mornings before choosing three or four compositions to crop and commit to pastel paper. Then Jensen carefully edited the images when delicately coloring between the lines with sharp pointed pencils to achieve the brilliantly hued and intricately nuanced storefronts. The perfectly executed paintings play on the retro appeal inherent to Barbie and Ken memorabilia.
By manipulating the unusual perspectives that meld several dimensional spaces into one image, Jensen presents an eerie human quality to her scenes and figures, even when portraying the merely plastic, posed manikins. Her illusions converge in a favorite painting of Jensen's titled The Hood Ornament where the mannequin in the window arises from the front of a car parked in the street although observed only in the storefront's glass. These fascinating narratives infuse Jensen's artwork, although she invites viewers to study her paintings and titles "and then personally respond with their own story."
Jensen's dramatically stunning images, filled with captivating and exacting details, honor Milwaukee's revitalized Bay View neighborhood. Admire these fresh paintings and meet Jensen at receptions on April 15, 6-9 p.m. or April 16, 2-4 p.m.
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Visual Art Happenings
"Visual Literacy: Artists' Books and the Vanishing Text"
UW-Milwaukee Mitchell Hall Gallery
Corner of Kenwood and Downer
Graduate art history students in museum studies present rarely shown selections from UWM's Special Collections Library and the Milwaukee Art Museum. Max Yela lectures at the opening, 5-7 p.m. April 7.
"The Artist's Garden"
DeLind Gallery of Fine Art
450 E. Mason St.
As the weather warms and thoughts turn to spring, many of us keep our eyes to the ground looking for the first signs of flowers. Get in the spirit with the brilliantly hued floral watercolors of Milwaukee's Arpik Weitzer, with an opening reception 5:30-8 p.m., April 8. The show will be up through April 30.
"An Interwoven Landscape"
Cardinal Stritch University
6801 N. Yates Dr.
Students Melissa Sue Alvin McCorkie and Mimi Stephan create in multiple medias including found objects, stained glass and textiles in an exhibition that opens April 8. Visit the First Ever Stritch Fish Fry beforehand on 4:00-7:30 p.m. April 8 in the Sister Camille Keibahn Conference Center, or view the exhibition at the artists' opening reception on Gallery Night, 5-8 p.m. April 15.
