{"id":96399,"date":"2025-09-23T11:51:30","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T18:51:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=96399"},"modified":"2025-09-29T08:51:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-29T15:51:15","slug":"lost-and-found-at-poor-yorick-studios","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/lost-and-found-at-poor-yorick-studios\/","title":{"rendered":"Lost and Found at Poor Yorick Studios"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Exterior<\/a><\/p>\n

So well-ensconced is he in the corner of the D-wing, you might think Paul Vincent Bernard has always been there, that he was already resident when the cinder blocks were first stacked around him and the steel girders laid above him to form this warehouse on a dead-end street in the shadow of the South Salt Lake water tower, that he has been toiling away, carving and wiping and pulling his prints, as one business after another has come and gone, that he has been listening to his scratchy vinyl and muttering odd phrases of Italian to drown out, first, the rattle of diesel trains and then the humming blur of electric commuter rail, that he has been nibbling away at his sushi while the building stood empty and ghosts of garment workers fluttered among the rafters and pulleys, all the while waiting for the space\u2019s true purpose to be revealed, for the skylights to puncture the ceilings, the drywall to divide the square footage and for this patchwork of vacuous industrial space to come into its own as Poor Yorick Studios. But you\u2019d be wrong.<\/h4>\n

Bernard isn\u2019t even one of the earliest residents at one of Utah\u2019s longest-standing and best-known studio complexes. Yes, he\u2019s filled his corner lot with furniture, books, records, plants and a press or two, filled it with so much stuff that there\u2019s only just enough room to walk around it all so that, like a tech titan taking over Maui, he has had to push his way into the neighboring studio to show off his wares during Poor Yorick\u2019s bi-annual open studio event (which happens this Saturday, September 29, 4-10 pm), but Bernard\u2019s a relative newcomer to the likes of Ryan K. Peterson, the phantasmagoric anatomist over in B wing\u2014his studio is down a couple of\u00a0 <\/span>turns and past the bathroom so you\u2019d almost miss it, unless you came along the street, where he has his own entrance, through which, when opened, daylight threatens to turn some of his fantastical creatures of the night into dust\u2014and Bernard’s a newcomer compared to that chaser of light and shadow, plein air painter Thomas Aikins over in D wing, as well as over in C wing\u2014the low lying Chunnel that connects these [heterogenous] warehouse spaces, (anyone who has been to the Open Studio only once\u2014and some who have been more than once\u2014will say yes, it has a bit of a rabbit warren feel and once you\u2019re in you\u2019re never quite sure where you\u2019ve been and if you\u2019ve seen it all)\u2014where the honor of OG, goes to the mild mannered master of the uncanny, Grant Fuhst.<\/h4>\n
\"\"

Printmaker Paul Vincent Bernard has made himself at home in the D wing of Poor Yorick studios.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"White

If you get lost, don’t worry, Poor Yorick sends out the art patrol to do a final sweep before closing up for the night. If you’re in the narrow confines of the C-wing, Grant Fuhst’s work (pictured here) will lead you toward the Common Area and the D wing. Walk\u2014or run\u2014away from them if you’re headed to B and C wing.<\/p><\/div>\n

Top honors, of course, go to Brad Slaugh, master creator and original Adam, the wizard of this Oz, blown out of the University of Utah for his stubborn desire to paint things as they appear, or almost appear\u2014more like as they are remembered, slightly askew, but either way part of that Utah school of painting that came up around David Dornan and Paul Davis and which at a certain point in the early aughts became pass\u00e9 at Utah\u2019s top university\u2014who occupies, with his wife Tracy Strauss, a space so palatial\u2014completely enclosed, 16-foot ceilings, an adjoining office, utility room, en suite bathroom and a balcony (it\u2019s good to be the king)\u2014it could be its own wing. And sort of is. It\u2019s the center of it all during any open studio, where thousands come for the chance to peek into these 40-odd studios and see the artists in their natural habitat. When he\u2019s not busy teaching at the community college, or rooting around his easel tray for the perfect piece of pastel, Slaugh is, like a paterfamilias from the seventies, adjusting the thermostats, mediating disputes and posting signs about which bathroom to use (it\u2019s not a gender thing: some are for cleaning your brushes, others for cleaning yourself) and which doors to close.<\/h4>\n
\"Framed<\/a>

Those who do their business standing up can appreciate work by Cat Palmer in the A-wing bathroom.<\/p><\/div>\n

There\u2019s turnover at Poor Yorick, but not much, so it\u2019s hard to get in. There\u2019s a waiting list for those both out and inside the complex. Many will take the first studio to become available, whether it be too big or too small, hoping for that Goldilocks one to be vacated (intimidation tactics to force out a neighbor are verboten, however, and most keep their headphones on and their zoom calls to the wee hours).<\/h4>\n

Ben Childress works out of a small space in the A wing, where he paints on a daily basis in the company of his Great Dane while he waits patiently for a bigger space. He\u2019s prolific. If you haven\u2019t seen him recently at SLCC, BDAC or that hard-to-find pop-up warehouse show last Gallery Stroll,\u00a0 you\u2019ll be able to see him at two solo exhibits, at Finch Lane Gallery and at The Gallery at Library Square, in the next six months. He must have a storage space to hold everything he\u2019s been producing. Show up Saturday to snatch up something before he becomes too big, even if his studio remains walk-in-closet size.<\/h4>\n

Stacy Phillips is just down the hall from Childress and she too has been busy. She just opened a show at Finch Lane Gallery but still has enough work to fill up her corner studio, with its floor-to-ceiling north light, as well as the hallways. She and studio neighbor Shawn Rossiter disagree about who should have dibs on wall space in the halls (Veera Kasicharernvat, also an A-lister, pretends to not understand what they\u2019re saying during these discussions), but Rossiter, as anyone will know, is a kind and generous individual who believes in respecting his elders. He\u2019ll have his own work up in his studio and whatever hallway space Phillips has left him. He\u2019s best known as editor of 15 Bytes, but despite misapprehensions by family and friends alike (his mom is still under the impression he used to paint pretty landscapes but now spends his time as a mountain bike coach or ski instructor, depending on the season), he continues to knock over things in the studio and glue them together and call it art. He\u2019ll also have some items available from 15 Bytes: a few works by the late Francis Zimbeaux available for purchase as well as copies of the 15 Bytes publication, Utah\u2019s 15<\/em>, and its “Go Art Yourself” t-shirts.<\/h4>\n
\"Entrance

Don’t be confused. This is not our office. Though it once was. Studio A1, with its own entrance, is now occupied by Danielle Waters.<\/p><\/div>\n

Among the newest arrivals at Poor Yorick is Hunter Bailey, who creates paintings and mixed-media works that use the discarded remnants of American life\u2014crushed cars, abandoned mattresses, scraps of steel and fragments of architecture\u2014as metaphors for social, economic, and cultural decline (see a 15 Bytes review by Geoff Wichert here<\/a>). He\u2019s in the studio formerly occupied by Matalyn Zundel, in the open space you first access from the main parking lot (Poor Yorick has four public entrances\u2014two from the main parking lot, and one each on the west (D wing) and east (A wing) ends\u2014as well as a few individual studio entrances). It\u2019s a no-man\u2019s land, not really part of C or D wing (though technically C), known in the Poor Yorker parlance as \u201cthe common area\u201d and has a tendency to fill up with stuff people are getting rid of\u2014sometimes junk, but sometimes gems. Bernard keeps his plants there, beneath the south-facing windows. 15 Bytes keeps a bookshelf there, from which you can pick up free copies of books by Utah authors. (If a book changes your life, keep it; otherwise, return it when you come to the next open studio.)<\/h4>\n
\"Interior

The Common Area, not some studio of some artist trying to charm his or hers art into the warm embrace of a collector, is the appropriate place to catch your breath. Steve Duncan, in studio C1, will be well known to the Poor Yorick aficionados. Hunter Bailey, in C2, is opening his doors for the first time.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"

A lime green door that looks like it’s been here longer than any of the artists opens the way to the B wing, where you’ll find the work of relative newcomer Greggory Wood.<\/p><\/div>\n

Past the common area fridge and just in the D wing is Nina Aerin Miller, a New York artist who recently came to Utah after her undergraduate studies in Boston. This will be her second open studio. Her paintings are full of gestural energy, vibrant color fields, and layered mark-making that balance chaos with lyrical order. In B wing, Greggory Wood was also a newcomer at the March open studio.\u00a0 <\/span>From the \u201cDog Town\u201d part of Cedar City, Wood (aka rustedsaltphotography) is a self-taught photographer whose current works are layered, textured, and timeworn, echoing both memory and history. They feel like artifacts \u2014 suspended between documentation and dream \u2014 where perception blurs into abstraction.<\/h4>\n

These are only a few of the 40 artists who will be on exhibit Saturday, including guest artists like Steve Larson, who will be squatting in B1 with his luminous, layered abstractions that drift between landscape and dreamscape<\/b>. Google Maps will get you to 126 W. Crystal Avenue, but won’t do much to help the directionally-challenged once inside. Getting lost, however, won’t be a bad thing.<\/h4>\n

Technically, the Poor Yorick Open Studios Saturday, September 27, 4-10 pm, is a private event (if you know you know). But it\u2019s easy enough to get an invite. Visit pooryorickstudios.com\/contact<\/a>.<\/h4>\n
\"Alleyway

Pro-tip: the red door in the shadows here on the east side of the building is one of the four public entrances to Poor Yorick Studios (it leads to the A wing). And if there’s available parking here on the night of the Open Studios, have at it, but not on any other day\u2014these are highly coveted spots reserved for the Artists of the Month.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So well-ensconced is he in the corner of the D-wing, you might think Paul Vincent Bernard has always been there, that he was already resident when the cinder blocks were first stacked around him and the steel girders laid above him to form this warehouse on a dead-end […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":96400,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[1646],"class_list":["post-96399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-visual_arts","tag-poor-yorick-studios"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/IMG_1499-scaled-e1758652587296.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-03 16:33:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96399"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96416,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96399\/revisions\/96416"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}