Longtime Pottery Guild member opens first solo exhibit

By Victoria Gail-White
Advertiser Art Reviewer

•	'Sketchbook Sampler' Watercolors and ceramics by Esther Nowell Through Oct. 26 10 a.m. — 4 p.m. Tuesdays — Fridays 10 a.m. — 6 p.m. Saturdays bibelot gallery 1130 Koko Head Ave., Suite 2 738-0368

The bibelot gallery is filled with her small, delightful watercolor drawings, inspired from a sketchbook journal of her observations in Hawai'i and her travels through France, China and Japan. Also on display is her celadon-cobalt glazed and raku-fired pottery, which suggests an appreciation of life and a sense of humor.

Nowell has worked with clay all her life. When the Honolulu Academy of Arts began offering art classes for children, she was there, and continued taking classes every Saturday through high school. As an adult, she returned to pottery in 1970 and has been a member of the Hawai'i Potters Guild since 1977. She also teaches ceramics.

Nowell's whimsy is evident in her ceramic teapots, mermaids, angels, cat, fish and raku-glazed Buddhas. The plates (thrown by a friend) reflect Nowell's attraction to surface decoration inspired by Asian patterns taken from textiles.

Her watercolors "Maneki neko," "Cool Cat," "Maneki neko Times Two" and "Three Lucky Cats," were so popular they sold instantly.

"I love to draw, and I take a sketchbook with me everywhere I go," Nowell said. "I have my hand trained — it will do most anything I tell it to." She maintains that if you can write, you can draw. Her original sketchbook is available for viewing upon request.

Joined at the opening by her family, many devoted fans and friends, Nowell glowed. After countless group exhibits, this solo show took her a lifetime to attain.

•	'2x4x8' Through Saturday 11-5 p.m. Wednesday-Thursday 11-7 p.m. Saturday workspace 732-2300

The artists were permitted to add to and change the form and to use as much of the wood as they chose.

In "Stud Shrine," Bradley Capello cut the entire piece of wood into smaller pieces that became wood-burned portraits of porn stars stacked on a table with candles and flowers.

Keiko Hatano said: "I was stimulated by the limitation and inspired by nature." Her three ornately carved organic shapes in "untitled (x3)" are the smallest interpretation in the exhibit.

The plain board in Jon Ikegami's "untitled" uses complex cuts at specific angles which were then smoothly reassembled to trick the eye into believing that his two-by-four was bent with an offset curve to the left. The illusion is convincing.

In "Surface Study," Geoff Lee has connected the wood into a thicker sculpture with a carved hollow. After painting it a soft black, he affixed red glass doughnut-looking shapes.

At one end of a full-sized board, the carved ear in Ian Gillespie's "ear to there" touches the floor.

"Transom" is the sleek, elegant, boat-like shape of Charles Cohan. He kept the size of the lumber intact, and sanded and stained the wood to suggest the surface and grain of another material. "I wanted to take it beyond its identity but maintain the integrity," he said.

Koi Ozu created "Heebeegeebee" by cutting the board in half and then into numerous angles which he then assembled into a sculpture and painted matte black. He also attached red-painted dowel rods.

Eric Belland, a photographer, was "inspired by the sweetness of friendship," he said, "And the sadness in the way you lose people." He took images from old and recent snapshots, then enlarged, projected and traced them onto seven equally sized cut and sandblasted pieces of the board. Titled "Some of my pals III-eric, rick, jennifer, michele, cedar, kim and julia," this work juxtaposes an essence of his subjects (which are not necessarily jovial) with a range of vibrant rainbow colors.

Lynn Mayekawa has wood-burned a pattern (similar to a dress-making pattern) for making a house onto her full-sized "curb appeal."

•	'Gauguin's Zombie' An installation by Debra Drexler Through Oct. 27 Honolulu Academy of Arts Gallery 3 532-8700

The installation is dark — not in its lack of color (because Drexler loves color), but in its hypothetical subject matter: the famous French painter, Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) returns to the present as a zombie (also see story by Advertiser staff writer Mary Kaye Ritz, Sept. 19 at the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2002/Sep/19/il/il01a.html).

Drexler's interpretations, which include the story (substantiated by her authentic-looking faxes, letters and journal entries), linoleum-cut prints, wood carvings, souvenir merchandise, press releases, artist statements, large-scale oil paintings and a coconut-frond hut complete with a self-portrait of Gauguin, chaise, refrigerator (with the phony ad that she placed, "Looking for Paul Gauguin," posted on it) and a palette of paints. The Web site for the installation is www2.hawaii.edu/~drexler.

Drexler, a University of Hawai'i art professor influenced by avant-garde and neo-avant-garde art, stretched her artistic capabilities during the four years she prepared for the installation. To her painting background she added wood carving, linoleum-cut prints, forgery of Gauguin's handwriting and appropriation of his writing style.

The seven large oil paintings and many of the smaller ones adjacent to the exhibit contain cross-referenced images that Gauguin used in his art. The compositions of his paintings such as "Ta Matete (The Market)" have been reinterpreted into Drexler's "Lost in Paris," and his "Two Tahitian Women" into her "The Awakening."

Gauguin's "Spirit of the Dead Watching" and "O Taiti (Nevermore)" are referenced as well as his friendship with Vincent van Gogh. A retrospective book about Gauguin (which serves as a good orientation to Drexler's interpretations) is on the bench in the exhibit.

"I can laugh at myself," said Drexler, "and there is a certain playfulness in this. I equate it with a movie which can be deeper and painful below the surface."

Drexler's installation is a provocative stimulus for discussion and an inspiration for next month's zombie-like holiday.