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SUMMARY:Art Supply Drive!
DESCRIPTION: Calling for all spare art supplies!  \nWe are partnering with area art stores and community members to provide a free art supply day for artists of all ages in September!\nPrairie Rose Needleworks\, The Knittery Nook\, and The Octagon Center for the Arts are committed to making creativity inclusive so we’ve teamed up to for a special art & craft supply drive. Bring your new and/or gently used art & craft supplies to one of our locations during the month of August. The Octagon will then host a special free art supply day for the community in September. \nDonation Rules: \n\nWe accept items that can be used for art/craft activities for any age\, from fingerpaints and fat paintbrushes to oil paint and embroidery thread.\n Any liquids (paint\, glue\, etc.) should be at least half full and able to flow through the lid.\nYarn\, thread and other fibers should be wound or neatly presented. Please do not send a nest that needs to be untangled.\nFiber (yarn\, roving\, etc.) donations should be packaged in a Ziploc bag or airtight container\nItems should be in clean containers. A little paint on the bottle is fine but please don’t send dusty or musty items.\nItems should not be overly faded or smell bad.\nAll items should be unbroken and able to be used without requiring repair.\nStorage space is limited so please bring in a reasonable amount of donations.\nOnly drop off donations during open hours and bring them inside the location. Do not leave items in front of locations during closed hours.
URL:https://octagonarts.org/event/art-supply-drive/
LOCATION:Octagon Center for the Arts\, 427 Douglas Avenue\, Ames\, IA\, 50010\, United States
CATEGORIES:Events
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SUMMARY:Group Art Exhibition: Alexandra and Jeremy Ackerman "Just Duet”
DESCRIPTION:Just Duet\nGroup Exhibition by Alexandra Ackerman and Jeremy Ackerman\n\nExhibition Dates:\nAugust 18th\, 2025 – Exhibition Opening Day\nSeptember 5th\, 2025 – Exhibition Reception 5:30PM – 7:30PM in the Community Gallery\nSeptember 5th\, 2025 – Exhibition Closes\n\n \nArtists’ Statements:\n\nAlexandra Ackerman:\nFor as long as I can remember I have found comfort and joy in making things with my hands. Art has helped me process and respond to the beauty and complexity of the world through every phase of life. Now\, as an adult\, I can see that all my work is in honor of childhood and in dedication to my childhood self\, the girl who found pure freedom in creating her own worlds. My paintings are “internal landscapes”\, unique environments that reflect a deep love of color\, pattern\, nature\, and play. My visual language draws from my years of experience farming and gardening across the country. I have found infinite pleasure in the simple act of watching plants grow; my hands in the soil\, bearing witness to the life cycle from seed to fruit\, contemplating the mysteries of clouds\, bugs\, and steaming piles of compost. The transformative experience of pregnancy and motherhood have also shaped me as an artist\, giving new meaning to the concept of “creation”.\nFor the past twenty years I have constantly sought to balance my roles of mother and artist\, finding joy and tears in the process. During the pandemic I shifted my focus from watercolor to acrylic and mixed media. I began gluing fabric scraps onto wood panels\, and painting around and over them. Cutting and gluing was grounding and healing in a time of extreme uncertainty. My current work – a series of acrylic and fabric paintings on wood – explores a combination of contrasting themes: wild vs. cultivated landscape\, domestic vs. natural environment\, order vs. chaos. Each painting seeks harmony and balance in color and composition\, texture and pattern. I am especially inspired by folk art\, botanical art\, aboriginal art\, and patchwork quilts. I hope my paintings will stimulate curiosity and encourage the viewer to look at the world with fresh eyes. \nJeremy Ackerman:\nThe irreverent artist Ray Johnson produced a series of seemingly improvised performances during his career that he referred to as “Throw Away Gestures.” Usually consisting of a few unremarkable objects\, Johnson would break down social norms by interacting with these objects in playful yet unsettling ways. These performances were not slick but rather a series of untethered gestures that were meant to surprise those\nbearing witness. Simple\, uncomplicated\, yet full of possibilities. In my most recent series of mixed media cut paper collages\, I’ve adapted Johnson’s concept of the “Throw Away Gesture” for two dimensional work. Scribbles became loose forms that were drawn up very quickly; sometimes without even looking at the paper. As the number of my throw away gestures accumulated I would look for interesting relationships between them. The drawn gestures then went through a comically tedious process of being cut out with an x-acto blade. Ultimately\, I was left with a collection of forms that were chopped up\, reduced\, expanded\, connected\, colored\, layered and sometimes actually thrown away.\nMy lifelong fascination with music played a major role in the aesthetic of these works. Rhythm and color push against each other as the cut out gestures dive\, slam\, twerk\, bounce and pogo; avatars for all the things floating around in my head. In these artworks the viewer might see glimmers of my lived experience of punk rock\, doo-wop\, death obsession\, new age philosophy\, hamburgers\, boom boxes\, spirits in the material world\, guilt\, divine comedies\, garbage collection\, aboriginal dreamtime conduits\, cosmic jazz and other such additions to a life time laundry list. In the end\, these sets of throw away gestures and random rules ushered in a new era of psychedelic storytelling that was in hot pursuit of self actualization. \n \nArtists’ Biographies:\n \nAlexandra Ackerman:\nAlexandra Ackerman is a mixed media artist who uses color\, pattern\, and form (both organic and geometric) to create playful and dynamic abstract landscapes. Her artwork has been influenced by her years of experience working on farms and in gardens across the U.S. She is also inspired by folk art\, patchwork quilts\, abstract expressionism\, and the Midwest landscape. Originally from Ann Arbor\, Michigan\, Ackerman grew up a keen observer of the natural world\, knowing from a young age that she would be an artist. She earned her BFA at Massachusetts College of Art\, where she explored a variety of media\, often incorporating fabric\, collage\, and found objects into her work. Ackerman has continued her exploration for three decades\, maintaining a childlike freedom in her painting while balancing her roles as artist and mother. She has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions nationally and her work has found a home in many public and private collections. Recent exhibitions include the Iowa State Capitol\, Memorial Union Gallery at ISU\, and the Dubuque Museum of Art biennial. Her work can be found at Liz Lidgett Gallery and Prairie Lights Bookstore. Alexandra shares a studio with her husband\, Jeremy\, in downtown Iowa City. \nJeremy Ackerman:\nIn the 1990’s\, visual artist Jeremy Ackerman attended Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. There he studied unconventional painting and installation with Afro Cuban artist Magadlena Compos-Pons. Heavily influenced by Compos-Pons’ polymathic approach to art making\, Jeremy began to explore a multitude of media including drawing\, sculpture\, film and performance. After moving back to his hometown of Minneapolis at the end of the century\, Jeremy continued to create art work while also founding the critically acclaimed eclectic pop group\, Walker Kong. During this creative era of music making\, Jeremy also began to experiment with cut paper collage. As his cut paper practice developed\, so did his vision for what could be expressed with the medium. Jeremy has spent the last two decades creating a body of cut paper work that distills hyperactive movement into eye popping psychedelic dreamscapes.\nDuring the pandemic Jeremy created his most ambitious work to date “Run Run Run (We Could Have Died)!” The first public viewing will be at Octagon Center for the Arts. In addition to growing his visual art\, Jeremy recently started a recording studio/ DIY music label\, Mouse Traxx Sounds. He is a current member of the music group\, Oranj Ruffs\, whose debut album was released in June 2024. He lives in Iowa City with his partner Alexandra\, and their two children.
URL:https://octagonarts.org/event/justduet/
LOCATION:Octagon Center for the Arts\, 427 Douglas Avenue\, Ames\, IA\, 50010\, United States
CATEGORIES:Events,Exhibits
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