Opening ceremony for April ArtsCenter show to be held during ArtWalk

Chapel Hill and Carrboro residents will have the opportunity to experience the collaboration of three different artists and visit some of the many galleries and venues in the community in an evening of creative entertainment Friday. 

The exhibit, “Explorations of Surface and Color Within the Tradition of Painting,” will run until April 30 at the ArtsCenter.

The opening ceremony for the exhibit will be held during the 2nd Friday ArtWalk on Friday at the ArtsCenter. This event takes place at 28 venues in Carrboro and Chapel Hill on the second Friday of every month, where many businesses and art venues engage with the community and fellow art lovers. There will be live music and entertainment.

Art Menius, director of the ArtsCenter, said those who have come in to see the exhibition — which opened this week to the public — have enjoyed the display of colorful works.

Menius said he encourages everyone to come out for the official opening ceremony during the 2nd Friday ArtWalk as well.

The Chapel Hill and Carrboro galleries have put on the 2nd Friday ArtWalk event to give residents the opportunity to experience the variety of creative works in the area.

“It’s a vital part of our community every month,” Menius said.

Artwork from local artists Lynn Blass, Steven Silverleaf and Carol Retsch-Bogart will be shown at the exhibit. Brass was originally the sole artist involved with the exhibit, but a turn of events allowed her to invite two other artists to join her.

“When the time came, I had moved to Asheville,” Blass said. “All of our work is very different, but also very compatible. There’s a sort of chemistry between all of our work that makes the show look very lovely.”

Blass’ paintings are encaustic, a medium that has been around since the ancient Egyptian paintings and involves the use of molten waxes and pigments.

She said her paintings focus on the simplicity of childhood because she loves the way children paint.

“I love their freedom and their innocence and their simplicity, and just the way they see the world,” she said.

Blass said the other two artists in the exhibit — Silverleaf, who is showing his collage paintings, and Retsch-Bogart, whose paintings depict the mixed media style — made a good collaborative.

Silverleaf, a self-proclaimed gestural painter, said he has had connections with the ArtsCenter for the past 15 years, including a couple of different shows and a teaching position.

He said he brainstormed with Blass and Retsch-Bogart to combine the three different artists’ pieces in a way that worked. He said there was uncertainty about all three artists’ pieces working together, but that this show has its own special uniqueness.

“This show is three people who are very taken with color,” Silverleaf said. “It’s a very dynamite looking show.”

He said it's hard for him to find specific reasons to come to arts events because supporting the arts community has always been important to him as an artist.

“I live and breathe the arts, so supporting other artists, supporting other people in the arts, supporting wanting to think about different things and be stimulated by different things that are not in myself — it’s pretty much hand-in-hand," he said.

arts@dailytarheel.com