Hello everyone.  I am super excited to announce our spring/summer schedule, and detail what you can expect from CSG in the next 8 months. (This post will evolve over the next week as I get images and information from artists.)

First off, January will see the closing of Steve Olson’s solo show on Saturday, January 21st from 7-10.  The 24th will begin our figure drawing intensive workshop, Cult Status Academy, which will culminate in a student group show, March 3rd.

From there we have local wonder boy Alex Kuno Solo: The Miscreants of Tiny Town and the Unknown Unknowns, March 24th.

The end of April brings us ‘Flesh’ (a working title), a group show about the luminosity of the human form, with CSA instructors Luke Hillestad, Luke Tromziak and Jamie Cook, and artists Caitlin Karolczak, Kara Hendershot and last but not least, JM Culver.

May will be Cult Sisters III: Art is My Boyfriend, the weekend after Art-A-Whirl.  All of our original sisters and a few new friends will show in our yearly testament to the ladies.

June we have Ryan Henry Ward (known simply as ‘Henry’) as our 2012 resident artist from Seattle.  He is well known for his large colorful murals all around Seattle, depicting animals and awesomeness.  His residency will have him painting several murals around MPLS/STP, and then having a solo show at the end of June.

July will be Chris Williams solo upstairs, and Chris’s collaborative efforts with Biafra, Inc. downstairs.

August will begin with artists Mark Rivard and Russ Olson’s dual show, coinciding with Uptown Art Fair, and the end of the month we have a very special surprise for you, which I will write about in a separate blog soon.  Think edible Rudy Figilicious ….hmmmm.

Eventually, all of these events will have way more info and their own pages.  For now, contact me via cultstatusgallery@gmail.com if you have any questions or would like more information about anything.  I can’t wait for our exciting year!

Hello from San Francisco!  This year I decided to take a much needed ‘break’ from the winter wonderland that is MPLS, and hide out in a milder climate, and hopefully make some friends in the art community here.  I think it’s important to forge eye-to-eye relationships in this time of digital imagery and Facebook (im)personalization.  I also think it’s astoundingly important for artists to have excellent skillz in a number of diverse media.  One of the most important skills an artist can have is to be able to convincingly and quickly draw or paint a human form and face.

This is an old school train of thought, I am aware, but the ability to draw a figure says more about an artist’s eye and use of gesture, line, light and shadow, than it does of a beautiful finished product.  Gestural figure drawing is the closest an artist comes to their true inner voice and skill.  I believe (and this is just what I believe, it is not by any means law) that an artist should possess the ability to create in a 3D world what they see in their heads.  In order to do this, you must have as much knowledge of technique and materials as possible.  There is literally no end to how much an individual artist can know about technique and materials.  It is a life long quest in understanding, and every tidbit of skill accumulates over a lifetime, ever evolving.

Saying that an ability in figure drawing is archaic is like saying one doesn’t REALLY need to know how to read.   As an artist, I always am looking for avenues to expand my repertoire, and what we have come up with at Cult Status Academy will surely fill a niche in Uptown for artists to do just that.

Sadly, I can’t participate this go-around.  It’s a grand winter experiment for everyone, trying to beat the blues.  Luke Hillestad, Luke Tromziak and Jamie Cook have all signed up to instruct figure drawing classes, three nights a week starting next week and running through February, culminating in a student group show March 3rd.  Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday every week for 5 weeks from 7-10.  The guys will be rotating nights, and one will be a tableaux, which will be the same scene every time.

$15 per class, $14/pc with purchase of 5 classes, $13/pc purchase of 10 classes, and $180 for unlimited.  We provide easels and drawing boards, you bring your own materials.  Charcoal, paint, whatever your medium.  These classes are designed with the artist in mind, to hone your skillset, and loosen your hand and body.  This is University level instruction at a fraction of the price.

Follow this link: Cult Status Academy to find out more.