REGIONAL SPOTLIGHT: TIME AND PLACE: THE ART OF JAN KAPPES AND DARBY ORTOLANO
Gallery Sponsor: 
Exhibit Sponsors: Doug and Debby Kroeschen | Kevin and Cheryl Settle
Members’ Preview | Saturday, January 11 | 6:30 – 8:30 pm
Preview Admission for Members is Free | Guests – $5 Admission
Gallery Admission: Free
Gallery Talk: with artists Jan Kappes and Darby Ortolano | Saturday, January 11 | 6:00 pm
EXHIBITING ARTISTS:
Jan Kappes
I work primarily from the bin of ideas and images that I stashed for “later,” while I went about my everyday life on the farm in Douglas County, IL. “Later” has become now, and I am compelled to rummage through the not-so-carefully stashed trash of yesterday for what I think of as spiritual sustenance, the things I’ve waited years to show the world… As well, my work echoes the challenges brought on by change and aging in my life.
Always seeking to see the mundane in surprising ways, I have expanded my media to include non-traditional, unexpected materials in both my two and three-dimensional works. Over the past few years, my experimentation with various inks and papers has allowed me to develop my unique process and to create two-dimensional pieces I call Inklings©. While I am proficient with many media, I have discovered that transparent, alcohol-based, colored inks satisfy my desire for sumptuous, intense color and blend-ability. They also allow me to edit my images almost endlessly and have become my media of choice for my two-dimensional work.
When something I’ve made makes someone smile or ask questions, my work has realized its purpose.
Darby Ortolano:
I grew up in both the tropics of Trinidad and the lush wooded hills of New York state. There was a summer as a child exploring the beaches of St. Petersburg, Florida, then I lived for many years in New York City, where the streets were lined with ginkgo trees and majestic Central Park was glorious in every season. I have now lived in southern Illinois for over 26 years.
All these places have given me a rich visual repertoire of nature’s sensual and evocative forms. I am left with an ineffable longing to recapture their spirit and retrieve my initial sense of wonder and the joy of discovery.
This exhibit contains work made over time showing the progress by which I arrived at my current work, which I call, inclusively, Reverie. In it I combine nature’s forms into complex, abstract microcosms. I begin by making many small pieces of great variety of form, then select among those pieces, spontaneously, and compose them into a final piece that resembles nothing specific, yet everything that is necessary.
