Telluride Arts: First Thursday Art Walk, September 2011

30 Aug Telluride Arts: First Thursday Art Walk, September 2011

Feel the frisson? Thursday is the day the Telluride Film Festival announces its program for the 38th season. It is also Telluride Arts’s First Thursday Art Walk, a celebration of the arts in downtown Telluride for art lovers, community, guests, and friends.

For the First Thursday Art Walk, one dozen venues open their doors from 5 – 8 p.m. to introduce new exhibitions and the artists themselves. Telluride’s fine restaurants feature Art Walk specials to round out a great night out on the town.

New this summer, select venues extend their open hours to welcome families for a special Kids Walk. A treasure map provides a self-guided tour and simple activities to teach basic principles of art through observations. Key venues also offer hands-on activities.

Highlights of the September Art Walk include two shows at Telluride’s Ah Haa School for the Arts, 300 South Townsend.

In the Daniel Tucker Gallery, Nicole Finger explores “E-Motion,” movement in two dimensions. (See related story to hear an interview with the artist.)

In the East Gallery, painter Kathy Hirsh looks at what’s “Beneath the Surface,” an investigation of color, “luscious, subtle, vibrant, complex.”

“Watching the movement of light across the landscape, I create a local palette that captures the color of the air and the nuances of temperature and value, light and shadow.”
 
Lustre, an Artisan Gallery, 171 South Pine, showcases the fall collection of Orhan Gurhan, 24k gold creations set with rubies, Chinese turquoise and carnelian. Featured in this special trunk show: The Gobi Collection inspired by Gurhan’s travels through Mongolia to visit the haunts of his ancestors and the Museum Collection, commissioned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and National Geographic, brings to light hidden treasures from the National Museum in Kabul, plus one-of-a-kind gems from all over the world and classic gold and diamond pieces.

Follow this link to hear a representative from Gurhan talk about his work. (The interview is from August 2010.)

Telluride Arts’s Stronghouse Studios and Local Artist Gallery, 283 South Fir Street, celebrates the work of Judy Haas, including ceramic plates, trout pastels, botanicals and prints.

The Telluride Gallery of Fine Art, 130 East Colorado, has two major shows, sensuous figurative oils by Malcolm Leipke and original drawings by ten top children’s book illustrators, including the work of Maurice Sendak, Etienne Delessert, Bernie Fuchs, Henrik Drescher, Laurent de Brunhoff, Peter Sis, Gennady Spirin, Peter McCarty, Tomie De Paola, and Jeanne de Sainte Marie.
(For Telluride Inside… and Out interviews and videos with Delessert, Drescher, Sis, McCarty and de Sainte Marie, type their full names into Search.)

To hear a recent interview with Liepke follow this link.

The five-star Wilkinson Public Library, 100 West Pacific, features paintings by Alison James.

“There is nothing better than an autumn day in Colorado with the first slight chill in the air and the aspens quaking beneath a spectacular blue sky. If I can capture a just little of that in a painting I’ll be happy.”

Upstairs at the Library are new works by Meredith Nemirov. And in the Stairway is a small presentation of psychedelic and mushroom-inspired art by graphic designer Andrew Mcgranahan and this year’s poster artist Aaron “Inkling” Cruz Garcia that encapsulates Shroomfest’s themes of exploration and experimentation.

For more information about Art Walk or Kids Walk, pick up a free brochure at any participating venue and around town or call Telluride Arts 970-728-8959, TellurideArts.org, or Telluride Arts on Facebook and Twitter.

And to preview some of the work, watch Clint Viebrock’s video.