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PrintAn Entree for Every Taste
Jackson Hole’s creative character echoes the grandeur of the surrounding mountains
Crow Warrior #1 by Wouter Deruytter, at Oswald Gallery.
After the riotous rainbow of summer’s nature and the tawny fire of fall, winter brings to the valley colors of white, grey, and evergreen. The hushed hues outside provide a dramatic foil for the color wheel turning within the Tetons’ indoors art scene.
While untracked powder often takes a tip to uncover, local arts require only the will to wander and discover (for any given week, the “Stepping Out” section of the weekly Jackson Hole News&Guide is a good place to begin the search).
Take, for example, the understated prominence of the National Museum of Wildlife Art. Though the bull elk bugling at its turnoff on Highway 89 arrests many, the museum’s nearly camouflaged exterior belies the wonders within. Recently honored as the National Museum of Wildlife Art of the United States by the White House, the museum celebrates the stunning spectrum of its holdings—from a 1496 engraving by Albrecht Durer to six pieces by Andy Warhol—in “The Choice is Yours: 10 Years of Collectors Circle,” an exhibition that hangs through May 31.
Meanwhile, the museum hosts “Fragile Nature,” a visual documentation by National Geographic photographer Joel Sartore of the human disregard for the environment and its wild inhabitants, through January 11. And the wildlife museum continues its popular Tapas Tuesdays, with extended hours every Tuesday—from 5:30 to 9:00 p.m.—to welcome culinary and art aesthetes (www.wildlifeart.org).
Palates and palettes, formally paired during the Fall Arts Festival, mingle in the map of downtown as some thirty galleries partner with food stores and chefs (for a map, visit the Jackson Hole Gallery Association’s website, www.jacksonholegalleries.com). The commingling climaxes with the Gallery Association’s holiday Art Walk from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. on December 27, as galleries serve hors d’oeuvres and drinks.
The core of the Western art market used to fly south for the winter, but the migration has slowed. In one sense, it has been localized, as downtown galleries move from the Town Square in search of alternative spaces. Take for instance, Western art mainstay Trailside Galleries. After thirty-one years on the northeast corner of the square, Trailside remodeled the larger, vertical expanse at 130 East Broadway and moved in last May. Its new contemporary interior is at once sleek and inviting, an ambience that complements its collection.
Throughout December, Trailside Galleries hosts a holiday wildlife and landscape show, a panoply of sizes and styles. In February, Trailside will stage its annual Wildlife Discovery Show of works by twenty top wildlife artists, with a focus on Nancy Glazier, whose wildlife portraits exude expressionistic details. Come March, the gallery will offer another annual event, the New Horizons Landscape Show.
In the downtown shuffle, another gallery changed its name and location: Diehl Gallery, formerly Meyer-Milagros, moved two blocks west of the Town Square to a modern makeover of 155 West Broadway. The gallery’s contemporary breadth ranges from the blowtorch delicacy of Richard Painter to the jaunty animal bronzes of
Jim Budish, who the gallery will spotlight in a solo show from December 20 to January 11, with an opening reception during the holiday Art Walk on December 27.
In the wake of movings and closings, two galleries maintain their decisive positions on Center Street. Amidst its superior collection of contemporary photography, Oswald Gallery will spotlight “Crow Warriors,” the starkly modern portraits of American Indians by Wouter Deruytter, from December through March. The large black-and-white photographs of Crow warriors’ reenactment of the Battle of the Little Bighorn—an annual event in southeast Montana—transcend romanticization to present bold, layered images (www.oswaldgallery.com).
On the same block, New West leader Mountain Trails will present a miniatures show, “The Creatures are Stirring,” featuring the menagerie of local artist Amy Ringholz’s imagination, from December 18 to 31. Overlapping, Mountain Trails hosts a pair of complementary cowboys: Denver, Colorado, native Duke Beardsley and Montana-based Gordon McConnell. From December 26 to January 7, Beardsley’s color-saturated cowboy silhouettes contrast with McConnell’s post-pop, monochromatic drama inspired by classic black-and-white westerns.
Meanwhile, other galleries hold their Town Square stands. Legacy Gallery houses foremost living and deceased Western artists in its outpost on the northwest corner of the square. All winter, Legacy will continue to hang new works, in particular one of many collectors’ favorites, Robert Coombs. In Jackson, Coombs generates a flurry of interest; past new works have been sold by draw from a pool of thirty to forty earnest buyers. Visit www.legacygallery.com for images of the latest Coombs in stock. Kitty-corner, Astoria Fine Art hosts many artists found on the walls of the National Museum of Wildlife Art, including Bart Walter, whose elk grace the museum’s entrance.
In the recent past, several contemporary galleries have led the way in securing singular spaces. Two summers ago, JH Muse Gallery transformed an Italian eatery at 62 South Glenwood into a loft-like space befitting its acclaimed local and national contemporary artists, and suited to its current mission of animating art as an experience, rather than a static showing. New Orleans artist Nicole Charbonnet’s textured palimpsests trace memories of popular culture in “Avatar and Heroes,” a show that hangs December 8 through January 8. Then JH Muse highlights the curious abstractions of Mike Piggott, who transforms everyday scenes—a day at the beach, for instance—into intriguingly distant studies of color, form, and technique. His “Objects and Things” is up from January 12 through February 16, with a January 15 opening.
In an old repair shop on Jackson Street, Lyndsay McCandless Contemporary found a home for its eclectic gathering of contemporary artists. The vanguard gallery has channeled the arts districts of cities to coin “SoBo,” an arts-rich area South of Broadway. Beyond geography, the gallery redraws aesthetic boundaries by hosting monthly parties that blend art and awareness. These First Friday events happen (surprise!) the first Friday evening of every month, a regularity that aligns with the gallery’s motto of “art has no off season.”
Equally unexpected are three galleries on the edges of downtown. In its second winter, the RARE collection continues to build with blue-chip artists including Ansel Adams’ first portfolio. Coexisting with a real estate office at 485 West Broadway, RARE Properties has propelled itself onto the national art scene by representing such artists as the hot Michael Karish and rising A.M. Stockhill. And Trio Fine Art, north of the square at 155 North Cache, ponders western scenes through the singular styles of local co-owners September Vhay, Lee Riddell, and Kathryn Mapes Turner. Finally, a quintessential hole-in-the-wall, Teton ArtLab sits on the seemingly shuttered alley of 135 Cache. The arts nonprofit, committed to local talent, will stage a juried show of works on paper aptly titled “Wallpaper” after its medium focus and salon-style hanging. Wallpaper closes with the arrival of the New Year; to include as many pieces as possible, ArtLab director Travis Walker envisions the small space covered floor-to-ceiling with paper artwork.
As some galleries change spaces, the two-year-old Center for the Arts acts as a creative hub. One of its resident nonprofits, the Art Association, heralds vanguard visiting and local visual artists in its ArtSpace and Theater galleries (www.artassociation.org). Through January 19, Brooklyn-based video artist Shannon Plumb riffs on a runway show in her silent film, Paper Collection, shot on Super 8 mm film. With deadpan physical humor and an empathy for the awkward, she plays all roles—dueling fashionistas, a frantic photographer, prancing models. The ArtSpace installation includes the paper couture Plumb stapled together and kraft coiffures sculpted by an haute hairstylist.
Jackson artists fill the walls of the Loft and Theater galleries: photographer Seth Turner’s images of imprints left behind by humans in Antarctica, on view through December 30 in the Loft gallery; and the plein air oil and watercolor paintings of local landscape luminaries Jim Wilcox and Greg McHuron in the Theater gallery through January 15.
Performing arts take center stage at Center Theater in the Center for the Arts (www.jhcenterforthearts.org). Off Square Theater Company presents the holiday classic Scrooge, a staging hinged on the incandescent performance of Terry Schwab as the title character, through December 21. Musically, Center Theater hits a wide range by hosting guests including nine-time Grammy-winning country swing band Asleep at the Wheel on January 7, and the idiosyncratic instrumentals of ScrapArtsMusic on January 16.
On February 28, Center Theater hosts Wonderboy, the empathetic tale of a kid superhero, as told by the Joe Goode Performance Group of San Francisco in collaboration with master puppeteer Basil Twist. The San Francisco group will also bring its high-octane dance-theater for a residency at Dancers’ Workshop.
Those keen to spontaneous expression should keep their eyes peeled for “random acts of art,” roving installations that carry the torch of ArtSpot, a public art venue temporarily vacated from its perch outside an old Chevron station on West Broadway. ArtSpot founder Bland Hoke Jr. has been commissioned by the Center of Wonder and Rocky Mountain Bank to keep the public-art spirit alive through these Jackson-specific happenings. (In October, the first flurries of the season inspired Center of Wonder executive director Carrie Geraci to imagine an ArtSpot parade of three hundred snowmen up the slope of Snow King Mountain.)
On the way to or from Teton Village, the snowbound (or slope-sore) can pause in the creative community of CIAO Gallery, an artist cooperative that last May moved from neighboring Teton Valley, Idaho, to 1921 Moose-Wilson Road. During winter months, CIAO will host a couple of juried shows: “Holiday Miniatures and Fine Artisan Exhibition” hangs beginning December 20; and the bare human form will inspire the “2nd Annual Naturally Nude,” which fittingly opens on Valentine’s Day. While the themes may be straightforward, the juried results rarely are.
Like the hunt for visual arts, sonic sleuthing can span town, Teton Village, and even the scenic outpost of Moose. The Grand Teton Music Festival, in high gear during summer months, stores its winter energy for three chamber music concerts that bring back festival musicians for workshops in area schools and public performances in majestic Walk Festival Hall in Teton Village. All three concerts feature quintets: strings on January 30, woodwind musicians on March 13, and strings again on March 19. All concerts begin at 7:30 p.m.; to make them more accessible to families, the festival has lowered ticket prices to $10 for adults and free for students. On February 20, the Music Festival will host a free concert by the U.S. Heartland of America Band’s Brass in Blue. Visit www.gtmf.org for information and tickets.
For apres-ski entertainment in Teton Village, the Mangy Moose Saloon is a surefire source of live music, and even karaoke. Voted “one of the 10 hottest apres-ski bars in the world” by Forbes Traveler last winter, the Mangy Moose invites local and legendary acts alike to perform under its stuffed mascot suspended from the cathedral ceiling. Apres-ski music is free. Upcoming nighttime gigs include Nashville country sensations John Bohlinger and Megan Mullins on New Year’s Eve, and the Drew Emmitt Band, headed by Leftover Salmon’s lead singer (and picker extraordinaire), on February 11 and 12. Visit www.mangymoose.net for information.
In town, the Wort Hotel’s Silver Dollar Bar anchors its live-music lineup with local bands, while also booking visitors (all shows run from 7:30 to 11:00 p.m.) Bluegrass Tuesdays star the infectious sound of Bluegrass Flyer, a local band with popular songstresses the Miller Sisters. The Dixieland stylings of Jackson Six will ring in the New Year, and Colorado musicians The Unknown Americans and the Spring Creek Bluegrass Band will play January weekends (January 2 and 3, and 16 and 17, respectively). Visit www.worthotel.com for more details.
Copious shamrock celebrations deck downtown for St. Patrick’s Day. The Silver Dollar hosts an Irish band and serves stew and corned beef and cabbage, while merriment will also fill the newly renovated hall of Snake River BrewPub and other town drinking holes.
For a singularly panoramic yet cozy setting, visit Dornan’s Bar in Moose. The Hootenanny, a folksinging pillar of Jackson, fills the wood-paneled bar with fast picking at 6:00 p.m. every Monday in December. Dornan’s also hosts acoustic concerts throughout the snowy season, including Jackson’s own Anne and Pete Sibley on December 9. Winter months will also bring Teton Valley, Idaho, bluegrass baron Ben Winship and “Zen Cowboy” Chuck Pyle. Visit www.dornans.com for information.
The ski season closes with a weeklong bash at the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort. The Jackson Hole Music Festival, from March 24 through 31, will peak with a big-name performance; last year, the resort welcomed the enlightened sound of Michael Franti and Spearhead.
“Everyone Deserves Music,” indeed.
