First Glimpses and Last Looks

New exhibitions of local and regional artists are opening at Walker’s Point Center for the Arts and the Museum of Wisconsin Art, and this weekend is the last chance to catch 30 Americans at the Milwaukee Art Museum. Check out the complete Art Date for more info on additional gallery shows.

Annual Members Show
Walker’s Point Center for the Arts
839 S. 5th St.
Opening reception 5-9 p.m.
Exhibition continues through October 5

The artists take over the gallery at Walker’s Point Center for the Arts. Each year’s Members Show brings together a plethora of styles, with works in a wide range of mediums, including photography, painting, sculpture, mixed media and more. It is difficult to predict what this year’s exhibition will hold, but variety will undoubtedly be part of this display.

Tom Jones, Shades of Red. Courtesy MOWA.

Tom Jones: I am an Indian First and an Artist Second 
Mark Mulhern: Pulling Back the Curtain
Museum of Wisconsin Art
205 Veterans Avenue, West Bend
Opening reception 5-8 p.m.
Exhibitions continue through December 1

Tom Jones will show works from I am an Indian First and an Artist Second and The North American Landscape. Jones, an artist and photographer, is a member of the Ho-Chunk tribe and often explores notions of identity in his work.

Jones’ exhibition runs concurrently with the continuing exhibition Edward S. Curtis and the Vanishing Race, featuring Curtis’ photographs from the early 20th century documenting Native American culture and experiences.

Mark Mulhern, Brocante. Courtesy Tory Folliard Gallery.

Mark Mulhern: Pulling Back the Curtain also opens as the next solo show in MOWA’s ONE Gallery. This exhibition focuses on the process of art making, from the germination of an idea and its concepts to a finished piece.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 7 

Craig Blietz: Creamery 
Tory Folliard Gallery 
219 N. Milwaukee St.
Opening reception 1-4 p.m., artist will speak at 2 p.m.
Exhibition continues through October 12

Craig Blietz is particularly known for his paintings of cows, but this body of work goes outside the cow, so to speak. The prompt for these paintings was the inspiration from an old creamery and meditations on the changing nature of today’s dairy operations. Blietz’s color palette is rich and earthy, a beauty which illuminates the serene images of animals. This sometimes seems to purposefully jar with titles inspired by products, such as the dreamy, sleepy pale goat titled Chevre. 

Craig Blietz, Chevre. Courtesy Tory Folliard Gallery.

Saturday is the last day to catch a couple of exhibitions, including:

Naïves, Seers, Lone Wolves & World Savers XXIII
Dean Jensen Gallery
759 N. Water Street
Saturday hours 10 a.m.-4 p.m.

See the TCD review.

Group Exhibition
Elaine Erickson Gallery
207 E. Buffalo Street
Saturday hours 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m.

This show includes work by Karl Jahnke, Karen Halt, Rory Burke, Ryan Myers, Minkyu Lee, and Kay Myers.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8 

30 Americans 
Milwaukee Art Museum
700 N. Art Museum Drive
Sunday hours, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.

This Sunday, Sept. 8 is the last day to see this major exhibition surveying work by contemporary African American artists. See the TCD review.