Continuum
Shell Gallery, Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge
Baton Rouge
Through Jan. 10
The end of the year or the beginning of a new one brings with it reflection about the year that has gone by and changes one wants to make for the year to come. Maybe this year has been great. Maybe for some, it can’t end fast enough. Regardless, end-of-year lists, round-ups are flooding social media feeds and advertising.
In that same vein, the new “Continuum” exhibit in the Shell Gallery features a selection of David Bruner’s collages and portraits that an informational panel in the gallery says “reflect the ongoing work of reconstructing selfhood through art.”
“Continuum,” it continues, “is about what carries forward. It’s about rebuilding from fragments and finding yourself in the spaces between who you were, what you survived, and how to move forward.”
The gallery is laid out with pieces with similar color schemes and styles positioned in close proximity. The pieces aren’t titled, and there isn’t much additional information provided about the pieces outside of a single panel at the beginning of the gallery. But collages bring together worlds that would otherwise never collide. A cover of a book that would have languished in someone’s attic meets contemporary sheet music or contemporary magazine graphics.
Some art looks like it took years of artistry and careful tutelage to do. Other art feels accessible – that makes one say, “I can do that too.” Bruner’s “Continuum” manages to be both. Some pieces are more abstract, making a cross shape with their composition or no discernible pattern at all. Others are more complicated, like the giant, multi-panel painting/sculpture titled "Justice is Blind," which sits in the middle of the gallery.
Regardless, the exhibit presents people with fragmented pieces of a life, not their own, and they can choose to make meaning of it. One piece, for example, depicts someone looking down overlaid with images of medals, a dotted yellow line reminiscent of the yellow center line of a road and a pair of flamingos.
Internationally, flamingos have many meanings including but not limited to not taking yourself too seriously, community, transformation and even mourning. Locally, it brings to mind the historically gay neighborhood Spanish Town, which uses flamingos as its mascot. They feature prominently in the annual Mardi Gras parade. They adorn sidewalks, lawn signs, and other home decor. Around town and all the way into New Orleans, the pink flamingo silently signals people’s ties to Spanish Town. Even people who move away bring the flamingos with them to their new neighborhoods. Bruner did his undergrad at LSU; I wonder if this is his.
“Continuum” is a great show to end the year on because of what it stirs within the viewer. Finding meaning in someone else’s art made me think about what I’ve survived this year and what has carried me forward. Hopefully, it’ll do that for others too.
