I’m standing in one of the galleries housing the exhibition with Freeport Art Museum Executive Director Jessica Modica. In front of us is "At the World’s End: Only Evil Will Travel in a Straight Line," a painting by Dan Brinkmeier.
At first blush, it’s a farm family having a picnic. But then you notice the bleeding lamb, people flying or wearing animal masks and, like a scene from “The Wizard of Oz,” a house in the air. Modica says the artist admits that the picture is chock-full of symbols.
“But the symbols are ones that he arbitrarily made up. So there’s a little bit of tongue-in-cheek going on here. But they do refer to these notions of ritual. You know, they have this kind of foreboding undertone to them.”
There are more than 40 pieces in the show, winnowed down from more than 200 entries, Modica says. Farther along the wall are a couple of boxes by artist Paul Nitsche. In one is what looks like a pretty little Victorian paper doll. But, as Modica turns a crank on the box’s side, we find out there’s more to the picture.
"You see this mask that the doll is holding above her face. And when you turn the mechanism, the mask is drawn down and you see the face behind it is bandaged. It’s called the “Wounded Child.” So kind of revealing the wounded child below the surface.”
In another room, there's even more variety:
- A large painting, golden and awash in glitter, like some kind of extravagant wrapping paper mounted on the wall.
- What looks like a small medieval reliquary, but with modern carving on the front.
- And jewelry that combines fine metals and found objects, like electrical cord.
Modica says this exhibit and others like it, such as the Regional Survey of Art at the Next Picture Show in Dixon and the Rockford Art Museum’s Rockford Midwestern, are opportunities for area artists to show their latest work to a broader audience. But she says it also highlights that you don’t have to travel to New York, Los Angeles or Chicago to find art of the highest caliber.
“A lot of people don’t think of the rural areas as having artists that are living and producing quite a number of works every year. So that’s another great reason that we do this show, is to show that, yes, this fly-over region does have artists. We live here, we work here we create some wonderful pieces of artwork.”
Right here, right now. The show runs at the Freeport Art Museum through January 15.