5 Lesbians Eating Quiche

Clockwise from left: Samantha Chandler, Heather Christopher, Meghan Goodman, Dana Winter and Katelyn Hoffmn, photo courtesy Theater Artists Olympia

Theater Artists Olympia’s 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche might be one of the most difficult reviews I’ve ever written, because I don’t want to give anything away, and this insanely funny romp is so full of surprises that I can hardly say anything without divulging something you should not know before going to see it.

What I can say without spoiling anything is that it is an all-female cast directed by Hannah Eklund, and that it takes place in 1956 in a strange room designed by Michael Christopher and Mariah Smith that is a combination community center and fallout shelter.

Read the complete review on 



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Serrah Russell collages at Feast Art Center

The evening and the evening out

by Alec Clayton

Published in the Weekly Volcano, June 22, 2017

“There's blood in the water but the world could change its heart,” collage by Serrah Russell, courtesy Feast Art Center

Discovering the work of Serrah Russell, first through Feast Art Center and then through the Internet, was a pleasure for which I am grateful. Russell is a Seattle photographer, video artist and sculptor.

As a way of not allowing shock, sadness, anger, fear or confusion from trapping her in a standstill after the 2016 election, she challenged herself to make a new collage every day for 100 days. Selected works from those 100 days comprise her current show at Feast Art Center. Using works from other photographers, she cut, tore and reassembled photographs from magazines into artworks that (I am paraphrasing) brought art from the past into the present to look toward the future.

“I strived to see my source material better, to look within the photos that had been captured by someone else, years prior, and see them for what they were and what they could become. I then sought to transfer that act of empathy to the events transpiring around me,” Russell explains.

“What has been built can still be torn down,” collage by Serrah Russell, courtesy Feast Art Center

There are 58 collages in the show, all the same size, 16-by-30 inches, arranged in two stacked rows along the gallery walls. They carry enigmatic titles that in many instances refer to hope emerging from horrible or depressing  situations.

In each collage, cut-out snippets from magazine photos are put together in asymmetrical compositions on white backgrounds. Many of the photo-collages are either black and white or an intriguing combination of black-and-white and color images.

Many of the images are foreboding or mysterious. Bodies, faces, parts of bodies are combined with partial images of interior or exterior scenes. They are cut into odd geometric shapes with sharp edges. Compositionally the separate images within each collage harmonize and contrast with each other in startling ways. Within each there are disparate images that despite their odd combinations go together because, as a typical example, there is a shape or color in one that leads the eye into the other.

A few examples:

In “There's blood in the water but the world could change its heart,” we see a woman in a pink satin gown, one limp-wristed hand pointing to an arm that hangs down. Beneath and behind this angularly cut section is a picture of rippling water washed with the same pink tone, and in the water there is a reflection of something indefinable that looks like blood pouring from the cut-off arm. The enigma that makes this image so mesmerizing is the combination of colors associated with femininity and love, the hopeful title and the blood in the water.

“The land in protest” pictures a naked woman seen from just below her breast to part of her face. She is holding a candle. It is a color photo in warm tones of yellow. The other two sections, gray tones, depict a stormy sky and a straight, pleated skirt in the dark of night. As in most of these collages, contrasting images are united where parts of one image line up almost perfectly with parts of another, in this case the woman’s torso with the pleated skirt below.

“What has been built can still be torn down” depicts the opposite of the hopeful message from “There’s blood in the water …” The message here is that what has been built is wrong, destructive, but can be torn down. It shows a black man’s fist in a power salute. Around this are soft gray images of clouds and ground cut at odd angles that match the angle of the man’s arm.

It can easily take an hour or longer to study each of these collages and suss out the meaning and appreciate the artistry of Russell’s compositions. It is worth that careful study.

Serrah Russell: The evening and the evening out, noon to 4 p.m. Saturday, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sunday, and by appointment, through July 9, reception June 24, 6-9 p.m., Feast Arts Center, 1402 S. 11th St., Tacoma, www.feastarts.com 

Little Joan with Mask

I sent Joan a photo of a collage called “Little Joan with Mask.” She had been the model who posed for “Little Joan” 30 years before. She asked me what was the significance of the mask, and I could not come up with a good answer. But now that I think about it, I’m beginning to grasp what was a purely unconscious when I created the collage.

Little Joan with Mask

I was teaching art at the University of Southern Mississippi, and somehow—I don’t know who might have recommended me or how it came about—I was invited to do a one-person who at Itawamba Junior College 200 miles north near my old hometown of Tupelo. The faculty in the Art Department there seemed to like my work, but apparently the president of the college and some others did not. They locked the gallery doors and put up a sign saying that because some of my paintings might be offensive people who wanted to see the show should go to the Art Department and ask to be let in.

There were some nudes in the show. I thought they were rather mild and couldn’t imagine them offending anyone, but we were in the Bible Belt.

A note of explanation: I never gave much thought to whatever meaning or symbolism there might be in my paintings. I was all about color and shape and texture, and if there was any emotional or symbolic content it came from my unconscious and was something that in my mind simply was. Whatever it was.

I thought it was funny that the college administration was upset about my paintings, and as a joke I imagined it would be fun to make paintings of naked people with clothes people could put on them if, say, old prudish Uncle Mike was coming for a visit. Kind of like paper dolls that have changeable wardrobes. It was such a fun idea that I decided to do it. I started asking my friends to pose for me both naked and clothed. Dress in any way you want to, I told them.

Big Joan (naked)

Big Joan (clothed) with artist

I was surprised at how many people were willing to pose in the nude. Two women who lived in our apartment building, my wife, a guy who hung out around the Art Department, the one semi-professional model who posed for figure drawing classes, my studio assistant and an older student named Joan—all women except for the one guy, so I had to do a self-portrait to have more than one male.

Joan was 50 years old at the time, and her fellow students who were in their 20s thought she looked amazingly good for her age. Fifty seemed older then than it does now. I was 42 or 43 at the time, and I also thought she looked great for 50. She was gorgeous.

The “Paper Dolls” were a series of paintings of nudes on Fomecore board with oil sticks. I cut them out to the shape of their bodies and painted separate clothing, also on Fomecore with oil sticks, and cut to shape, that could be put on or taken off. They were each about 15 or 16 inches tall. I also did a few larger than life on the kind of thin board hollow-core doors are made of and cut to shape with a jigsaw. I titled them with the names (first name only) of the models: “Little Joan” and “Big Joan,” Little Debbie,” and so forth. “Big Joan” was seven feet tall. She drew lots of stares when we drove her across campus in the bed of a pickup truck.

I painted a large mirror behind “Little Joan” in which her backside was reflected. On “Big Joan” I made the mirror part of the detachable clothing and painted on the mirror a reflection of the artist (me) painting her.

Approximately 15 years after painting “Little Joan,” I saw a picture of a mask in a magazine and, on a whim, I cut it out and used it to create a collage. I didn’t give any thought to the significance of the mask, but visually I liked the way it contrasted with the figure. Another 15 years went by before I reconnected with Joan via Facebook and she asked me about the significance of the mask. I had never thought about it before, but in all the “Paper Dolls” the clothing was a kind of mask. With clothing, we present ourselves to the world as how we want to be seen, but naked there is no guile, no pretense. My friends as represented by the “Paper Dolls” stood proudly and unashamed in their nakedness. When clothed their true selves were masked. “Little Joan with Mask” is a more literal statement of what all the “Paper Dolls” were. I just didn’t see that at the time I painted them.

Love Letters at Olympia Little Theatre

Real actors and real couples relive a life through letters

By Alec Clayton

Published in the Weekly Volcano, June 15, 2017

Sharry O’Hare and Micheal O’Hara in Love Letters, photo courtesy Lakewood Playhouse

Love Letters by A. R. Gurney presents 50 years in the life of a loving couple, Melissa Gardner and Andrew Makepeace Ladd III, as seen through letters they wrote to each other beginning in the second grade and continuing until maturity. Traditionally the play has been presented with different actors playing the parts on alternating evenings. On Broadway it has been done by Jason Robard, Stockard Channing, Swoosie Kurtz, Christopher Walken, Carol Burnett, Alan Alda, and others. At Olympia Little Theatre, Love Letters will be performed as a staged reading with a different actor couple in each performance.

This production is being mounted in honor of long-time OLT Director Kathryn Beall. Before her death, Beall suggested pairs of actors with whom she had worked or knew to perform this play and every one of them agreed to act in the production. Some of the actors are real life couples, others are friends who have worked together. They are:

June 16 - Susan and Jim Patrick; June 17 – BarbaraAnn Smith and Larry Bonner; June 18 – Ingrid Pharris Goebel and Tim Goebel; June 22 – Andrea Weston-Smart and Jack House; June 23 – Sharry O’Hare and Micheal O’Hara; June 24, Jean Kivi Thomas and Jess Thomas; June 25, Chris and Heather Cantrell; June 29, Cameron Waters and Cori DeVerse; June 30 – Robert McConkey and Silva Goetz; July 1, Jeff Hirschberg and Anita Pirkle; July 2 Michael and Heather Christopher.

Two of the married couples, the Christophers and Goebels, first met when performing at OLT.

When O’Hare and O’Hara played Melissa and Andrew five years ago, critic Michael Dresdner called their performance “a complete tour de force.” O’Hare, who has done the play nine times, says, “Throughout the years we have been so fortunate to re-visit Love Letters and bring these characters to life.  For us, the reading of the letters must be accompanied by the ability to fill in the blanks for the audience to experience who these two friends are beyond the written word. Our greatest challenge is to project what is felt but not said in 50 years of letter writing and making sure that each letter is spoken with spontaneity and freshness as if reading for the first time.”

Heather Chistopher says, “This project is special to Michael and me because we met and eventually married at OLT. After reading the script and connecting with the material, we are both really looking forward to our closing matinee performance.”

At Olympia Little Theatre, directing chores are split between Toni Holm and Jim Patrick. “I look at my role as facilitating their performances in honor of Kathryn, and trying make sure nothing goes off the rails technically,” Holm says. “The set, lighting and script will be the same each night, but the performances should all be different. I think the result will be 11 lovely interpretations of the play. I've had rehearsals of five of my six pairs, and it's been fascinating to see where each comes from and where they go with this very nuanced play. I can see why so many actors want to do it and why audiences love seeing different actors interpreting the role.

Patrick says, “The playwright was very specific about the do's and don'ts in producing Love Letters, no curtain, no music before house lights dim, entrances, no baby talk, no mugging, avoid crying and don’t mess around with the text.”

Gurney said, "Trust what I wrote, perform it as written, and all will be well." And Patrick says amen to that.

It is advisable to see it not just once but as many times as possible.

Love Letters, 7:25 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 1:55 p.m. Sunday, through July 2, Olympia Little Theatre, 1925 Miller Ave., NE, Olympia, tickets $11-$15, available at Yenney Music, 2703 Capital Mall Dr., Olympia, 360.786.9484, http://olympialittletheater.org/

Jeff Pasek: Unlands at the Washington Center

By Alec Clayton

Published in the Weekly Volcano, June 15, 2017

“Attractor,” painting by Jeff Pasek. Photo by Gabi Clayton

Jeff Pasek is relatively new to Olympia. He moved here from Ohio in 2014. The first I heard of him was when I saw a post about this show on Facebook. I was excited by the vibrant color and exuberance of his paint application. So I Googled him and found his website at https://www.jeffpasek.com/, which impressed me even more, especially his works on paper, including a series called “interference.” His combinations of organic and geometric forms in these and his bright but nuanced color combinations are excellent.

When I visited the large exhibition of his paintings, Unlands, at the Washington Center, however, my reaction was mixed. There are some outstanding paintings in this show, but this series of paintings is not as good as the “interference” series and other works on paper posted on his website. I invite readers to visit the site and compare these works, and visit the exhibition and see what you think.

The paintings look great from a distance, and the layout of the three-floor gallery space in the Washington Center provides for excellent opportunities to view the work at a distance, but seen up close the paintings become overly harsh; colors and shapes clash.

“Crystalline,” painting by Jeff Pasek. Photo by Gabi Clayton

Despite the jangle and clash, however, what I do like about them is a trope he Pasek employs in approximately half his paintings where he superimposes over rough and highly expressive landscapes very precise geometric forms, either thin lines or circles or boxes or similar shapes so meticulous they could have been drawn using mechanical drawing tools. Some of these are highly transparent and in brilliant colors, and some are flat and opaque. In some instances, they vary or transition between transparent and opaque. In some of the paintings these mechanical shapes seem to hover over the landscape, and in some they weave in and out between being on top and underneath.  This device adds mystique and an interesting bit of spatial play to what would otherwise be common and dull paintings.

The landscape elements range from slightly abstract to completely non-objective. Sometimes there is only the break between sky and ground to elicit the feel of landscape. In others, mountains and streams are clearly recognizable. They are painted with a heavy build-up of paint and often in rugged and jagged clumps of color. 

One painting stands out as perhaps the best in the show. It is called “Attractor.” There is a heavy turmoil of stormy purplish-gray sky above green fields and a mountain stream the same color as the sky. A single fairly realistic tree stands on one side, and in front of everything are two thin yellow lines. The colors are softer and not so harsh as in most of the other paintings, and there is an otherworldly quality to the to thin vertical lines. 

Stop by when you have a chance and take your time studying these paintings up close and at a distance, especially from the upper levels looking down to the lower, in order to take advantage of the distance and see the paintings in their less jarring aspect.

Jeff Pasek: Unlands, by appointment (Monday through Friday noon to 4 p.m.), or to ticketed patrons an hour prior to an event, through June 26, The Washington Center for Performing Arts, 512 Washington St. SE, Olympia, 360.753.8585

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance at Tacoma Little Theatre

Photo- from left Jacob Tice as Ransome Foster and Nick Butler as Jim “The Reverend” Mosten, photo courtesy Dennis K Photography.

By Alec Clayton

From left Jacob Tice as Ransome Foster and Nick Butler as Jim “The Reverend” Mosten, photo courtesy Dennis K Photography.

Longtime and much celebrated Tacoma theatrical director David Domkoski directs his last show in Tacoma before moving to the East Coast. The play is The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. This modern classic set in the Wild West in 1890 is based on a short story by Dorothy M. Johnson. It is best known as a 1962 movie directed by John Ford and starring James Stewart and John Wayne.

I saw the movie when it was first released. I remember nothing about it but the title. I never before saw the play. I’m glad that I have now, and I’m especially glad I saw this version with these actors and this wonderful set by Blake York and direction by Domkoski.

This play is gritty and realistic. It is simple and straight-forward with nothing fanciful and nothing superfluous (except, perhaps the use of a narrator, as the story would have held up as acted with exposition).

About York’s set: it is dark and dirty looking, the interior of the Prairie Belle Saloon in the Western town of Twotrees (we don’t know what state it is in, just somewhere in the West). On the rough, unpainted walls are wanted posters and photos of dance hall girls and a flyer for the opera. Above these are trophy animal hides and horns. It looks as authentic as any Western saloon in the movies and more authentic than many.

Ransome Foster (Jacob Tice), Hallie Jackson (Jill Heinecke) & Bert Barricune (Chris James), photo courtesy Dennis K Photography.

Into this saloon comes Ransome Foster (Jacob Tice) unconscious, half dead and carried over the shoulder of Bert Barricune (Chris James) a rough cowpoke who is in love with the saloon owner, Hallie Jackson (Jill Heinecke). Bert revives the severely beaten Foster whom he had rescued after he was attacked by a trio of ruffians. There’s no proof, but everyone knows the men who beat him almost to death were Liberty Valance and two of his gang (two unnamed ensemble actors who wear masks and never speak). They call the Marshall Johnson (Ben Stahl) who says he can’t do anything because there is no proof it was Valance.

Everyone knows that sooner or later somebody is going to shoot Valance. No spoiler here, the title of the play gives that away. The mystery of who shoots him is only a minor part of the play. What is more major is the love triangle that develops between Bert, Hallie and Ransome, and a look into the hearts and minds of these apparently simple people as they struggle with issues of love, hope, honor and revenge. Thrown into this mix is a harsh and unsparing look at the issue of racism at a time shortly after the Civil War. Jim Mosten (Nick Butler) is the only Black man in town and best friend of Hallie since childhood. He is called “The Reverend” because of his phenomenal ability to memorize and recite passages of scripture. Ransome teaches Jim to read and write and believes he can become a great man.

I will not go into how all this plays out but will only say it is a strong, meaningful and emotionally engaging story that is well acted and is totally believable. It presents issues and characters that might seem simplistic on the surface but are much more complex than they appear. You’ll come to love Hallie and Jim, despise Valance, understand the weakness of Marshall Johnson, and greatly admire both Ransome and Bert.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday, through June 18, $24 adults, $22 seniors /Students/Military, $20 12 and younger, pay what you can performance Thursday, June 15, Tacoma Little Theatre, 210 N “I” St., Tacoma, 253.272.2281, tacomalittletheatre.com.

Uplandos Art of Bruce Bickford

Legendary animator at Spaceworks Gallery

By Alec Clayton

Faces cut into leaves by Bruce Bickford, photo courtesy Spaceworks Tacoma.

Tacoma’s own Bruce Bickford, the legendary animator famous for his work on the Frank Zappa movie Baby Snakes, has his first Tacoma art exhibit at Spaceworks Gallery, and it’s a doozie. The show includes two animated videos, still frames from many of his animated films, sculptures of clay and of cardboard and paper, drawings executed directly on the gallery walls, and even faces cut into leaves.

To back up a bit: born in Seattle, Bickford started experimenting with clay at the age of 12 or 13 and began making his first animated films at 17. His animation sequences in Baby Snakes won first prize at a French animated film competition. And, as they say, the rest is history.

There are two continuously running films in this exhibition. Prometheus Garden is done in clay animation, and Comic That Frenches Your Mind is done with intricate line drawings made with a fine-point mechanical pencil. Both are surrealistic and comical, with rapidly morphing figures.

His line drawings employ broken lines that are connected in the mind’s eye of the viewer. In some of these drawings the lines break apart so severely that they look like flames blown by wind as the figures appear to vanish in air. His human and animal figures and houses and vehicles (especially sleds; he seems almost obsessed with sleds) are stylistically a lot like the underground comics of the 1960s, and some of his faces remind me of Beavis and Butthead.

The first wall of still frames is a series picturing a man and woman embracing, her legs wrapped around his waist. As they embrace, she reaches for his hip pocket and steals his wallet (or cell phone, it’s hard to tell which). Typical of animation frames, the changes from frame to frame are so minute that at first glance the 32 drawings look identical. Viewing this presents a good lesson in the patience and precision required of cell animation.

Inside the main gallery space are many glass or Plexiglas display cases, and inside of them a series of shelves made of cardboard. On these shelves are hundreds of figures, houses, castles, and fantasy environments, all cartoonish in style, all wildly inventive, and all sculpted in clay or cardboard and paper. Among these is a set of figures of the same man lying on his back with each figure a tiny bit smaller than the one before until the last one is an almost microscopic dot. At this point I should point out that some of his Bickford’s line drawings and clay sculptures were used in animated films and others were not. If this diminishing man was used in a film, we can see how as he gets smaller and smaller he would appear, on film, to be getting farther and farther away.

“Spring Evening a Comic Strip by Edvard Munch” is a line drawing depicting the character from Munch’s “The Scream” on a bridge where street artists are at work and a loving couple walks by arm-in-arm. A town is seen in the background, including a church with a giant steeple that looks like a dunce cap. The sky above is a take-off on van Gogh’s “Starry Night.”

Next to this one is an untitled drawing of a training camp for mercenary soldiers with print that describes the mercenaries as “rich, pampered, arrogant ignorant brutes.”

On the wall behind the monitor playing Comic That Frenches Your Mind is a set of 24 frame drawings from the film, and filling two entire walls are frames from a not-yet-produced film called Vampire Picnic.

This is one of the more astonishing art exhibitions you’re likely to see this year. The artist will be in the gallery on closing night, Third Thursday Art Wall, June 15.

Uplandos, 1-5 p.m., Monday-Friday and 1-9 p.m. Third Thursday, through June 15, Spaceworks Gallery, 950 Pacific Ave., Tacoma.

The Pirates of Penzance

By Alec Clayton

Published in The News Tribune, June 2, 2017

GARY CHAMBERS (The Major General) and the Pirates from the Lakewood Playhouse Production of The Pirates of Penzance, photo by Tim Johnson

I reviewed “The Pirates of Penzance” at Lakewood Playhouse 10 years ago. Now it’s back with a new and quite different production with an all new cast and director. The earlier production was directed by Barry Johnson, a director with extensive experience directing opera. It was produced in a classic style with an emphasis on the operatic aspects of the Gilbert and Sullivan musical.

This newer version is directed by John Munn, who has a broad theatrical background including acting in and directing comedies, dramas, and musicals – even including “Pirates of Penzance.” Munn’s version weighs in more heavily on the comic aspects and the physicality. Not that the singing isn’t good, it is, but it is less operatic and more like “Monty Python” or a Warner Brothers cartoon, which is pointed out in the promotional material. 

There are also sly references to “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)” and to other plays and pop-culture icons, some of which only some folks will get and others of a more personal nature that nobody would get, such as pirates climbing a ladder into the audience in tribute to Tim Burton whose version of “Pirates” the director saw in his youth.

In addition to directing, Munn plays the Pirate King. This was not his intention. He did not want the burden and huge challenge of both directing and playing a lead role, but circumstances made it necessary, and he is so good in the part that I can’t imagine anyone else in the role. His commanding presence, his comic timing, his singing, and his acrobatic physicality are astounding.

(L to R) FUNE TAUTALA (Fredric) and ALLYSON JACOBS-LAKE (Mabel) from the Lakewood Playhouse Production of  The Pirates of Penzance, photo by Tim Johnson

Also outstanding are Gary Chambers, a veteran of many Lakewood Playhouse performances, as the loveable Major-General Stanley and Fune Tautala in his Lakewood Playhouse debut as Frederic.

Standout performances are also turned in by Kathy Sawrey as Ruth and Allyson Jacobs-Lake as the love interest, Mabel. Both Sawrey and Jacobs-Lake sing clearly and sweetly, and each plays her part as a complex and multi-faceted character.

Derek Hall as the police sergeant is a comic treasure. He looks like Ringo Starr and moves like Charlie Chaplin. All of the policemen are amazing in their almost gravity-defying movements (choreographed by Amanda Jackson). The same can be said of the rest of the ensemble cast, the pirates and the many daughters of the Major-General. These ensemble groups are great singing in chorus. The choral singing, in fact, outshines most of the solo singing. The groups of policemen and pirates move almost as a single entity, and yet each policeman and pirate and daughter is a distinct individual.

Ruth, at 47, is the only woman 21- year-old Frederic has ever seen. He believes she is beautiful because she says she is. And then he sees the many daughters and discovers real beauty and falls in love with Mabel. But he can’t have her because he is indentured to the pirates until his 21^st birthday, which will not arrive until he is 64 because he was a leap year baby. It might be the most absurd plot device ever devised, but it’s funny, and that’s what matters.

This version of “The Pirates of Penzance” is a musical laughathon.

One other note of interest: There is a recessed orchestra pit in the middle of the stage, and actors move all around the three-piece orchestra, two pianos and a drum set, with Musical Director Deborah Armstrong playing one of the pianos and occasionally – and hilariously – breaking the fourth wall to direct and interact with the actors. This is something I’ve never seen anywhere. It brings down the house.

Opening night was sold out and tickets are going fast, so get yours as soon as possible.

The Pirates of Penzance

WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday, through June 25

WHERE: Lakewood Playhouse, 5729 Lakewood Towne Center Blvd., Lakewood TICKETS: $25-$30

INFORMATION: 253.588.0042, www.lakewoodplayhouse.org

Student Art Exhibit at SPSCC

Photo: “Not My Home,” digital photo by Ashley Meyers, courtesy South Puget Sound Community College.

By Alec Clayton

Published in the Weekly Volcano, June 1, 2017

“Not My Home,” digital photo by Ashley Meyers, courtesy South Puget Sound Community College

As a former college art teacher, meaning as someone who has at least a little knowledge of what might reasonably be expected of college art students, I think the overall quality of the 12^th Annual Student Art Exhibition at South Puget Sound Community College should be better than it is. There are a lot of ceramics in this show, much more than I would normally expect to see in a student show, and while some of it is excellent and a lot of it is clever, funny, inventive, much of it is clumsily executed. There is also some excellent photography and a few good drawings, but overall the drawings are the weakest part of the show.

A few exceptions:

There is an untitled charcoal figure drawing by Casey Costello that stands out. It is a standing female figure that is impressionistic with soft gray charcoal modeling in large planes with just enough sharp line drawing to delineate the figure in its dynamic pose. It is simple and nicely done.

Next to Costello’s standing figure and between it and another Costello figure drawing (which is clumsily drawn), hangs a reclining nude by Lou Dagle with strong and emphatic line work.

Also worthy of note is a Greek-style stoneware wine jar by Suzanne Petrie. It is a large jar that stands approximately three feet tall with a rounded form. The outstanding thing about this wine jar is the glaze, which looks like a gritty abstract- expressionist painting with swaths of overlapping transparent slashes of olive green and gray accentuated with sharp darts and squiggles of line. There is something about this piece that reminds me of the great ceramic sculptor Peter Voulkos, although it doesn’t have the rough and broken quality of a Voulkos and is more classic in form.

There is a stand with a group of hand-made artist books. My favorite of the bunch is one called “Monster” by Skillet, a book of moody poems illustrated with dark and brooding photographs and drawings by Terry Winland. Yet another charcoal drawing by Costello stands out. It depicts a large group of people crowded shoulder-to-shoulder in an interior setting with two hands framing the scene in the foreground. The empty square formed by the touching of fingers and thumbs is startling because the space between the fingers through which the background figures should logically be seen is solid white. The way Costello brings the small background figures right up against the larger foreground hands in defiance of normal perspective is dramatically effective. 

The most inventive and beautifully executed photograph in the show is “Tug of War on Drugs” by Jason Appleby, in which flat black cut-out figures play tug-of-war with a white string in front of a stack of bright-orange pill containers. There are many possible interpretations of this image, all of which are disturbing. The colors and the composition are strong and in-your-face.

Next to Appleby’s photo are two by Ashley Meyers, one of a news box on an urban street with the newspaper inside showing a headline article about the 2016 presidential election. The other one, called “Not My Home,” pictures a row of houses either being built  or repaired — siding or painting in progress. The houses look cheap and shoddily built.

One other thing worthy of note is “Chia Pets,” a class project by students of Colleen Gallagher. It is a shelf with many odd and funny student-built ceramic Chia Pets.

I can’t highly recommend this show, but it is worth seeing for the few pieces mentioned here and a few others.

Student Art Exhibit, Noon to 4 p.m., Monday-Friday, through June 16, South Puget Sound Community College, Kenneth J Minnaert Center for the Arts Gallery, 2011 Mottman Rd. SW. Olympia