by Alec Clayton for OLY ARTS
South Puget Sound Community College professor of art Joe Batt creates comically surrealistic ceramic figures of men and women, children and animals. Rabbits that look for all the world like they just stepped away from a Mad Hatter tea party appear to be his favorite creature creation &mash; and children, many strange and wonderful children.
In 2014 and 2015 he turned the art gallery at Tacoma Community College and Salon Refu Gallery in Olympia into created worlds filled with children with cell phones and satellites. The fantasy worlds he creates are not far removed from today’s industrialized and digitized world. He does for fantasy art what George Orwell did with his book, 1984.
Batt will exhibit recent works along with works by some of his students at Capitol Florist during spring Arts Walk. There will be approximately 25 works of art on display. Batt says the mixed-media works will combine various media, including photography, ink drawings, book making, painting, analog and digital collage, decals, plaster, paper and wood. “There are some un-Utopian dwelling pieces,” Batt says, “and there will be a collection of handmade, mixed-media books which graphically depict songs chosen by the students. I will have a couple new clay figures with mixed-media surfaces, which I made at Red Lodge Clay Center in Montana last summer. And I will display one new digital composition.”
What: Joe Batt and students
Where: Capital Florist,
515 Capitol Way S, Olympia
When: April 14 to May 5;
Arts Walk 5-10 p.m. Friday, April 28, and noon to 8 p.m. Saturday, April 29
How much: free
Learn more: 360-709-2678 | Arts Walk