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The Gift of Insight
Printmaker Barry Cleavin explores
vulnerability and connection.
.Limited
Seated
Dance
Hall_
with
NORMA
FRASER
8pm
Door
9pm
Shaw
W
hen I was growing up in Curry
County, 95 percent of the area was
designated wilderness area. As teen-
agers in Gold Beach, my friends and I threw
ourselves against the sides of the cage and railed
against the injustice of being raised in a town
bereft of big city attractions.
After hightailing it out of Curry County the
day after high school graduation, I could finally
see the degradation of the landscape at large and
knew that my experiences back home had been
special and rare. A healthy environment affects
the mental and physical health of the hwnan and
animal members who live in it, and for this rea-
son amol)g others, the work of New Zealand
artist Barry Cleavin bears the gift_ of insight for
Eugene.
Barry Cleavin's prints are on display at the
White Lotus Gallery through August. They are
one of the no-cost activities remaining for you to
do that will deliver more than the investment
you make in time.
Cleavin is a printmaker who uses many lay-
ers; colors, and viscosities of ink, as well as pre-
cise printmaking techniques, to masterfully ex-
pr@Ss layers of opinion, conviction, questions,
✓ and
feeling. He works in many ways and creates
surfaces with great complexity and range.
As a New Zealand artist, Cleavin allows us a
glimpse of his perspective on his own world, as
· well as -sharing invaluable perspective on our
culture as an as an outsider looking in. He has
participated in prestigious international invita-
tional shows for the past 35 years. He is doing
for us what he and others have done back home:
showing that our will to connect as people
through common challenges is stronger than our
disparate ·communities.
Cleavin shows the similarities between the
impact of human immigration upon New
Zealand's precious ecosystems and animal pop-
ulations and the impact of bad leadership upon
h~an relationships. The common ground in all
relationships is the need to conduct those rela-
.
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tionships without abusing power.
Cassandra Fused, a New Zealand art critic,
notices, "He is not obsessed with the dark side
of our natures, but acutely alert to visual and ,
verbal connection and how these can comment
on hwnan absurdities."
Cleavin does not judge how we conduct
ourselves. He shares with us our common posi-
tion in the world along with humor to manage
s9me of the bitter ,truths. He asks some impor-
tant questions about the wisdom of war and our
interactions with other iluman~ and other
species. And Cleavin does this all successfully
because of his technical mastery of drawing
and print.
One of the critics who writes regularly about
this artist, T.L. Rodney Wilson, of the Auckland
· Museum, comments that Barry Cleavin ad-
dresses "the print as illustrator, the print in com-
bination with words, prints plentiful and acces-
sible, the print as agent of social commentary
~d opinion, in service of science, as descriptor,
as definer .... "
Cleavin creates a mood and authority on his
subject through technical proficiency. He ac-
complishes this by tapping into the tradition of
scientific illustration in print. It is obvious that -
he has an intense love and loyalty of nature. He
sometimes talks about threatened or extinct
species and uses anatomically correct simian
and avian skeletons from musewn exhibits. He
places skeletons and other images in peculiar
ways. The interplay between literature and vi-
sual art is also a central theme in Cleavin's ·
work. He uses word phrases, visual and verbal
puns, palindromes, and literary references to re-
inforce his visual offerings. He tries to convey
something unique about our "location" in time
and history.
· Barry Cleavin is an artist with great insight ·
.onto the ~lnerability of all life. At this time in
history, when resources are dwindling, we
could use some this insight to inform our own
choices.
IIW
www.eugeneweeKLv