Elizabeth Birge
Staff writer
The bright flowers of spring are five months and a few snow storms away.
But for the rest of this month -- in the galleries of the Northern Indiana Arts Association in Munster -- you'll find several reminders of why we look forward to warmer weather.
Now through Dec. 1 Bruce Cegur of Hammond is showing a collection of paintings -- all flowers -- in the Annex Gallery of the NIAA, at the Center for Visual and Performing Arts.
Next door, in the William J. Bachman Gallery, the works of sculptor John Mishler of Goshen, and painter Magda Vitale of Media, Penn., are on display rounding.
Cegur painted the flowers, including primrose and hydrangea, based on those he nurtured in his own garden, or photographed while walking at the Lincoln Park Conservatory, Garfield Park Conservatory and the Chicago Botanic Garden.
"Primrose Lane," one of the paintings in the exhibit, is a series of six flowers, side by side. Matting separates each flower, but the six are in a single, long green frame.
"A lot of people might assume I did one (painting) and printed the other five," said Cegur. But he didn't. He painted six identical flowers.
"I wanted people to really look at the primrose. They're looking for differences in each picture," he said.
"I call it 'Primrose Lane' because you can equate it with a street of new track homes. Each one is the same but each one is different."
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Also in the show is a close-up of a hydrangea flower and called "Every Mother's Day."
"I do try to show people that when they walk through a garden they may miss something" like the ball on a hydrangea flower, he said.
Mishler's work is also connected to the outdoors: His sculptures often appear there.
"Dream Walk," a large, red, sprawling mass of sculpture looks a little like an outdoors Japanese letter.
A lot of his work tends to extend vertically, but Mishler said "...this one spreads out...It looks like something walking."
Mishler said his work is influenced both by his dreams and the American Indian.
"When I was growing up I wanted to be an American Indian and read books about them," he said. Now, shapes and images commonly used by and associated with the Native American community turn up in Mishler's work, like arrows and lightning bolts.
"It also comes out of my interest in how the elements and nature influence our lives," he said.
"We had a flood that came pretty close to our house," a few years ago, he said, which also helped introduce nature's images, like clouds, into his work.
The paintings of Magda Vitale, the sculpture of John Mishler and the paintings of Bruce Cegur will be at the Northern Indiana Arts Association galleries through Dec. 1 The NIAA is located in the Center for the Visual and Performing Arts, 1040 Ridge Road, Munster.
Admission is free. Gallery hours are 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday; 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday; noon to 4 p.m. Sunday. For more information, call 219-836-1839.
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