This Friday, Representative Becky Edward’s bill HB 134 to name Spiral Jetty the “State Work of Art” will be heard in the Senate Economic Development and Workforce Services Committee.At 8:00 am on Friday, March 4, HB 134, State Work of Art, will be heard in the Senate Economic Development and Workforce Services Committee. The bill began as a school project and Edwards will be arguing why the bill  “makes sense and is important for Utah and for the arts, tourism, and scientific community.”

On Friday evening, the joint exhibition by Jody Plant and Frank McEntire that opens at Finch Lane Gallery (6-8 pm) may provide material support for the bill. In Double Vision the two artists use assemblage to combine an exploration of the four classical elements of earth, wind, fire and water with an evocation of a fifth, a transcendent, fleeting element conjured up in the studio. One work on display is Plant’s “The Conversation,” inspired by Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty and accompanied by the following poem.

The conversation continues

a soul retrieval mission

ten miles on a dirt road

completely off the grind

out there only vast solitude

gulls fly in DNA formations

other murmurations occur too.

The Spiral Jetty is otherworldly

a walking meditation,

stonehenge, woodhenge

shape shifters appear and disappear

ghosts of time and salt.

On the playa underfoot

mostly concealed

veins of lightning struck crystals

glimmer a mirage of wonders,

fractal spiral spellbound.

We call in the elements

from the four directions

bidding our ancestors

a stones throw away abyss

souls take flight.

A time travelers incantation uttered

we are lost and found in silence

divided between worlds

we know the jetty will keep us

we know where to disappear.

Double Vision, featuring assemblages by Jody Plant and Frank McEntire opens at Finch Lane Gallery Friday, March 4th, 6-8 pm, and continues through April 15. Plant will be the subject of our Artist Profile in the March edition of 15 Bytes.

15 Bytes