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Video Interviews with Jeff Condon and Susan Jacoby

As part of the GAAC’s The Sky Is Always There exhibit, we spoke with two visual artists whose works are a testament to their fascination with and reverence for the sky.

Jeff Condon, an artist based in Grand Rapids, has been considering the sky overhead since childhood. Jeff has translated and explored that interest in his pastel paintings. Clouds are now a signature part of the work Jeff does. Read more about Jeff here: https://jeffcondonart.com/

Painter Susan Jacoby divides her time between two skies: the one under which she lives in Illinois, and the other in Leelanau County. Susan works in oil, and is a great observer of the world above her head. But her interest and nearly singular focus on skyscapes began with her work painting the landscape. Read more about Susan here: https://susanjacobyart.com/home.html

The videos below will be viewable starting January 10 at 5pm. NOTE: Due to an unfortunate technical error, the paintings discussed with Jeff Condon during his interview are not visible during the viewing of the recording. Click on the images below. Our apologies to the artist.

Shrine to the Arts of Music, Film, and Television | A Conversation

As part of the GAAC’s current exhibit, Shrines + Altars, a conversation with Josh Denby, head of the Sight + Sound Department at the Traverse Area District Library, about the library’s shrine to the arts of music, film, and television. Behind the Sight + Sound desk is a series of shelves filled with a thousand-plus objects, little idols and icons — that make those shelves a de facto altar to popular culture and the performing arts.

Pictured: A few of the thousand-plus objects from the Sight and Sound altar.

 

Creativity Q+A Video with Dana Falconberry

The May Creativity Q+A focuses on Benzie County artist Dana Falconberry who exhibits Native Plants, a group of painted and stitched canvases, in the Glen Arbor Arts Center Lobby Gallery. This small show runs May 3 – August 29, 2024. Falconberry talks about her tools, process, and her documentation of native plants local to northern Michigan in this recorded interview.

Pictured: Mid-Summer On Crystal Lake, acrylic and chainstitch embroidery on stretched canvas, 16″ h x 20″ w, 2023, Dana Falconberry.

2024 Manitou Music Poster

George Peebles

Grand Rapids painter George Peebles’s panoramic, atmospheric view of Sleeping Bear Dunes bluffs is the Glen Arbor Arts Center’s selection for the 2024 Manitou Music Poster. Aptly titled Empire Bluffs, Peebles’s painting is notable for its brilliant – and characteristic – hues, and breathtaking perspective. He depicted this iconic scene in oil paint.

The brilliant array of color Peebles’s works into his paintings stands in stark contrast to the fact he has red-green colorblindness. Peebles regards this not as a disability, but as a challenge and a gift. He paints in his studio, and – unlike many artists focused on the landscape – paints not from photographs, but memory.

The child of a Traverse City, Michigan native, Peebles’s parents introduced him and his six siblings [Peebles is the youngest] to the Sleeping Bear Dunes before the landmark natural feature was preserved by the National Park Service in the early 1970s. As a child, Peebles and his family “camped on top of the Sleeping Bear Dunes for many summers. It is still a go-to vacation spot for my family.”

Peebles received a BA from Kendall College of Art Design, but his approach to learning continues. He paints with regularity, and approaches learning as a life-long undertaking. He is a chef at Mercy Hospital in Grand Rapids.

The GAAC’s Manitou Music Poster project began in the early 2000s. Now an invitational, the Manitou Music Poster Committee selects original paintings that offer a quintessential view of the Glen Lake region and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. All the past Manitou Music Poster winners may be viewed here. Empire Bluffs is available at the GAAC or online.

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