Story and Photos by Madelynn Vislocky
Eugene coffee houses, galleries, and stores opened their doors after hours Friday night forall to come in and enjoy what featured local artists had to show. Taking my first trip on the Lane Arts Council’s First Friday ArtWalk I visited three participating locations: Oregon Arts Alliance (formerly known as Oregon Crafted), Goldworks, and The New Zone Gallery. Each had something special to offer, including time to meet and talk with the artist. Ethos sat down with three local talents to discuss their personal inspirations and ideas.
Oregon Arts Alliance
Madelynn Vislocky: Why did you choose photography as your inspiration?
David Simone: Photography gives me the option of capturing the beauty of the world with incredible accuracy.
MV: I can see in your work here at the gallery that you like to focus on landscape. What do you look for in them?
DS: I like landscapes that have abstracts and let me twist the natural world into my own vision.
MV: Do you only shoot in color or also black and white? Do you prefer to work with film or digital?
DS: I do not work with film anymore and with digital I am able to convert one picture in black and white to color easily. I have been taking photos professionally for 45 years so I have worked with a lot of film throughout the years.
MV: What is your inspiration for your work?
DS: Beauty in the earth. I love to be outdoors and I travel a lot to find that beauty and see it. I am not religious but however this world was created is awesome.
Goldworks
MV: How would you classify your style of work?
David Lang: In general, my work is magical realist that combines surrealism and realism into a magical quality. However, my work being featured right now wouldn’t apply to that concept. I call this work my future tech pieces.
MV: What are your future tech pieces about?
DL: The Shamanic idea that time is simultaneous. Future and past exists right now.
MV: How long have you been an artist? What got you started?
DL: I have been an artist since the 1970s. I got started from a mystical experience and understanding nothing is impossible. I thought if I could be anything in the world what would I want to do and decided on an artist. I knew this also as a response to my inner life movie.
MV: What is your inner life movie?
DL: As the movie plays in my head I see images and if I see an image I like I stop the movie and make it art. The movie is a Shamanism tool called, “Journeywork.” Movie watching was my Shamanic journey with no intention. By doing art I am bringing my inner landscape, a real place in the Shamanistic world, out to the world.
The New Zone Gallery
MV: How did this gallery get started?
S. La Riccia: It got started in 1984 as a non-profit organization. It is member run with about 50 members.
MV: How did you get involved with the gallery?
SR: I got wrangled into doing it because I was a promoter artist so I had those skills to fit the job perfectly. I have been a member on the board since 1998.
MV: I see a special show is going on tonight: the Salon des Refusés. What is the story behind it?
SR: It started some years ago when people who were refused by the major’s art show would come here to try and get shown. The major had nothing to do with them being rejected, it is a three person jury.
MV: Why did the jury reject them?
SR: They would be refused for space and quality. Usually it is the Salon des Refusés but it changed this year to the Salon du Peuple due to changes we are making.
MV: Does this gallery always have the Salon show going on?
SR: No, this is a yearly show [that goes until November].
MV: What is your personal inspiration for this piece, “Farnsworth’s Dilemma”?
SR: This piece has something from every decade of the century in it. I usually used SX-70 Polaroid manipulation as my media until they stopped producing the film. So I switched to this. Playing videos, ringing like a telephone, and dispensing brandy are just a few things this art piece does. It took me two weeks to build. I took static things and brought them together to be a interactive piece.
