Crossroads Arts District

Kansas City's Creative Neighborhood

Slushies for Swifties

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City Barrel likes to do some dancing and singing while working, so we are adding some Taylor Swift radio to our playlist 7/7/23 and 7/8/23.

We are embracing the festive mood, and we a series of slushies inspired by T. Swift this weekend. So, “shake it off” and get down here! These are limited batches so once gone, that’s it.

Frozen Now:
Enchanted Mojito
Be Fearless Bellini

Up Next:
Red Margarita
Folklore Mango Froze

Linda Jurkiewicz — WHO WILL HEAR MY PLEA?

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WHO WILL HEAR MY PLEA?

The artist continues to explore the roles of women in her latest installation, “Hear My Plea,” as she works with images of saints, martyrs, and goddesses. Using the figure she delightfully calls BAH!, which first came to her in a dream, she explores the limitations, bravery, passion, zeal, and compassion of figures related to the Catholic church, paganism, and other cultures.

Using imagery from the Renaissance and Middle Ages as a reference, a time when the general population could not read nor write, and utilized this imagery as their “lesson,” the artist observed only small differences between a woman’s life then and now.

Whom might women call today?

What messages might these images from the past offer to women today?

Who might possibly hear today’s women in their plea for help?

Bio

Linda Jurkiewicz lives in Kansas City and began working with fiber in 2005. She credits her upbringing as a first-generation Ukrainian-Croatian for her “make-do” attitude and her delight in upcycling repurposed materials, especially “woman’s work” such as dish towels, household items, and clothing. Her consequential fiber work incorporates soft sculpture, wordplay, idiom, embroidery, wall hangings, plush form, sequential dioramas, and installations which delve into the cultural roles of women in America over the last century, roles that are changing and roles that she pushes viewers to reexamine, to trade nostalgia for empowerment.

Jurkiewicz’s work has been shown in two solo shows in Kansas City galleries in 2022. Her work has been juried into numerous exhibitions locally. Nationally, her work has been included in Woman Made Gallery 24th International Exhibit, Chicago, Illinois (2023), Intersect Art Center Blue Hour, St. Louis, MO (2023), Amarillo Museum of Art Biennial-600: Textile/Fiber, Amarillo, Texas (2019), Raw – The Exhibition at Indiana University (2018), Sacred Threads in Herndon, VA (2017 and 2019), The Blue Show at the Core New Art Space (2017) and The Engaged Object at the Foothills Art Center (2016), both in Denver, Colorado, and Welcome to My World: Mental Health Awareness through Art at the MIRI Gallery (2016). Salt Lake City, Utah. Jurkiewicz is a member of the Kansas City Artists Coalition.

Rediscovering the Desert — Holly Swangstu

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The dyed fabric compositions are journal page expressions about time and place. The textile paintings that I produce are tributes, poems, love letters, prayers, and meditations. Creating this work provides peace, helps to heal hurts, and feeds my energy. The subject’s intention is always one of honor and gratitude. 

My plein air and oil painting practice was initially provoked by the desire to grow artistically. This activity was also inspired by the need to feel closer to family. Working in the elements seems to make time stand still. Although I find it terribly challenging, painting in the field heightens all senses and strengthens visceral memory. The imprint of experience is then used as an intuitive tool (in conjunction with formal photo documentation, color studies, and notes) to create textile paintings and installations. 

Studying the colors, textures and diversity of the Sonoran Desert has been my daily joy for the past eleven years. All of the work for Rediscovering the Desert was created within the past two years and celebrates the natural world where I resided in Southern Arizona. The Tucson Mountain/Saguaro National Park West area is especially dear to me and is often the subject of my landscapes. My work is also informed by multiple trips to San Carlos/Guaymas, Sonora and Cabo Pulmo National Park in Baja California Sur in Mexico. 

Although I anticipate creating art about my beloved desert for the rest of my life, I just relocated to the Southernmost part of Texas to research for a new body of work. During this self-imposed, temporary residency I will shift from “Where the Desert Meets the Sea”, to “Where River meets the Sea”. Living and learning in the sub-tropical climate and remaining natural habitat by the Rio Grande River by the Gulf of Mexico. I look forward to seeing how my work will be affected by this new adventure. 

Bio​
Born in Wisconsin and then raised in Bettendorf, Iowa, Holly holds her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Kansas City Art Institute and is an Ewing Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurship graduate. Holly has exhibited her textile paintings in numerous group and solo exhibitions. Holly currently lives in the Rio Grande Valley with her husband.

Allen Halsey: “Tracing Her Lines — Precise Abstractions”

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Join us for our first solo exhibition in the new Firehouse Gallery #8! Allen Halsey brings his large scale carving/paintings to our humble space this First Friday and through the months of July and August.

Influenced by Japanese woodblock prints, art nouveau, stained glass, and more; Halsey presents a surprising contemporary twist on classic vintage styles.

In the words of the artist:

By the time I complete something, I often forget why I started, or the focus may shift
throughout the process. My mind races off in many directions and I try to wrangle my thoughts
to make sense of them – to see how they connect. Sometimes I pull back and relax, only to have
new thoughts come pouring into the vacant spaces. My paintings are the same. I try to
squeeze as many different ideas into one space as possible until it’s too much, then I edit. The
process is a roller coaster of ups and downs, a pushing and pulling between concise and
abstract ideas. Loose and painterly brush strokes are overlapped within precise boundaries.
The whole may seem to make sense from a distance, but the parts themselves are often
incongruous and undefined, an impressionism of sorts.

Painting to me is like verbalizing a dream, or replicating a memory – it exists in layers and can’t
always be explained. Some parts are defined, others are out of focus. Maybe it never makes
sense, or maybe only part of it does. Sometimes it’s a feeling trying to be captured in shapes
and colors. Some memories are only a snapshot, like a painting. The Bernie Taupin lyric from
Your Song comes to mind – He remembers the eyes were the sweetest but can’t remember the
color – an obvious detail is forgotten for the sake of the greater whole. It took me a long time to
understand that. And maybe it’s a misinterpretation on my part, or I’m overthinking it. I’m not
sure it matters. Anyway, it’s only one line from a much larger whole of a song.
When starting out to create these paintings, I wanted to involve computers and machinery in
the process – a compromise between the impending AI takeover and old-fashioned physical
painting. They begin as traditional drawings and paintings of mine that are fed into a program,
which simplifies them into a form that can be machine carved into wood. Literal negative
spaces, to expose the wall, and postcard borders are added. Then the images are routed into
the surface and painting begins. Sometimes the colors are well thought out, and other times
they are allowed to come together spontaneously… and then changed and augmented (it’s all
about the journey). Each piece follows a slightly different path to completion. They mean
different things to me at different times. I urge you to discover your own interpretation.
Neighborhood Tourist Development Fund
Crossroads Community Association

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