CORE 2024
Exhibiting compelling art created by local artists!
Gallery Hours:
Wednesday - Saturday 12 - 6
and by appointment
Solo Exhibitions
through November 30, 2024
Pioneer Square Art Walk & Artist
Reception:
November 7th from 6-8pm
With generous support from 4Culture, CORE gallery has weathered the challenges of the pandemic. Our door remains open and walls filled with innovative art created by local artists! Thank you 4Culture!
CORE Gallery Artists
THE COMMITTED SCRATCH
Steve Gawronski
THE COMMITTED SCRATCH - The whimsey of curves and the safety of vertex
This show is one resultant of how I processed a recent surprise.
The surprise: a tree fell on my neighbor’s house and he ended up moving away. After 20 years living next to our friend, life took him to live with his out of state relatives. His wood shop, his guitar, his hot plate, his extensive vocabulary – all gone in a matter of 3 months. It was a surprise and I’m still a little heartbroken and unsettled. It didn’t make any sense at the time and the whole affair just left me hollow.
So, after some confusion and sadness, I set to work with that event as a catalyst and some icons (fish, house, tree) to illustrate some foundation shaking events: flooding, tree fall, isolation, neighborhood growth and flying fish.
Why the fish?
Mixing disparate icons and/or ideas has been my way of processing the world around me for most of my creative career. There is some inefficiency to this methodology but I keep returning because the results inspire me. It’s a rule I employ to facilitate (force) new connections and sometimes results in the act of creation. AND It lightened my heart to see an angelic harbinger carelessly hovering around such serious events. It’s curves soften and connect the surrounding patterns.
Why vertex?
In math, vertex is (the point furthest from the base) where calculations start and stop, understanding and quantifying originate. For some, vertex is literally a safe place in the same way that a house is a safe place.
These A36 blackened steel plates were hand scribed (scratched) before paint was applied. Hence the show title “the committed scratch”. There is only forward, there is no undo or redo button in this process. Kind of like a tree falling on your house – there’s no going backwards.
WHEN THE CICADAS FALL SILENT
Amanda Hood
Enter into the magic and mystery of summer in the wilderness, where the raw forces of nature—thunderstorms, wildfires, and the resilience of plants linger in ephemeral, seductive, and melancholy memories.
In these works, I delve into the interplay of light and dark, capturing the dualities that shape our world. Just as thunderstorms give way to clear skies and wildfires pave the way for new growth, my work reveals the beauty that emerges from destruction, and the way darkness magnifies light.
As we navigate an age marked by environmental degradation and increased isolation, our encounters with nature and visual media evoke a heightened awareness of what is fragile and fleeting in life. The duality of extreme beauty and profound pain exists not only in the landscape but in the emotional landscapes we inhabit. Researcher Susan Cain’s work on the “bittersweet” nature of life suggests that these heightened moments of transition and endings can lead to self-transcendence. When we embrace the full spectrum of joy and sorrow, light and darkness, we deepen our creativity and connection with others.
My paintings aim to evoke these emotional undercurrents, using contrasts—between light and shadow, clarity and ambiguity—to reflect the complex experiences we all share. Through images of nature, I seek to explore how the sublime still inhabits our contemporary understanding of beauty, destruction, and renewal.
