Starting tonight, the work of artists from around the country and some from right here in Southeast Missouri will be on display at Arts Council of Southeast Missouri's National Girardot Juried Exhibition, its only national juried competition.

The show, which runs until July 31, features 47 works by 27 artists from nine states outside of Missouri, including California and New York.

"It's going to be a really good show this year," said arts council director Becky Fulgham.

Ninety entries were received in slide form, and it was the job of juror David Gross to whittle the number down to the 47 that would be on display, as well as choose the exhibition's winners.

Gross is an artist who lives in Kansas, but grew up in Gordonville and attended school in Jackson. His plein-air paintings were exhibited last year at the arts council. Fulgham said an out-of-state juror is chosen for the Girardot exhibition because "we really want a different flavor to this exhibition than what we normally do."

Gross said about three or four pieces immediately stood out from all the other entries. "It's about the impact of the piece," he said. "I feel that any piece of art has to be felt and these works did this."

This year's first place was awarded to Edward Shmunes of Columbia, S.C. for his photograph "Out to Dry," second place was awarded to Brenda Townsend of Arlington, Va. for her raku fired clay box "Pagoda 3" and third place was awarded to Steve Turner of St. Louis for his acrylic painting "The Gossip's Over."

Gross chose Shmunes' digitally altered photograph of a rooftop skyline for first place because it has great composition and makes a great visual impact. "It stuck in my mind completely," Gross said of "Out to Dry."

"To this day, I still remember that image in my head."

Just looking at the top three winners makes apparent the diversity of the mediums represented in the show.

The Girardot Exhibition is one of Fulgham's favorite arts council shows because it brings in such a variety of work. "When you get works from artists all over the country, you get things that are very different from each other," she said.

However, this year's show features more local artists than usual.

One of those local artists is Robert Grable, who has two pastel pieces in the exhibit, "Beauty of the South" and "Mandarins." Grable's artwork also will be displayed at the arts council's co-op exhibit and featured in the front window during July.

Grable said having two pieces accepted into the Girardot Exhibit is quite an honor, especially because this is the first national exhibition he has entered. A self-taught artist, the retired Grable began working with watercolors about four years ago before switching to pastels, a medium he said he likes because it is more forgiving and allows for rich tones.

Those rich tones are on display in "Beauty of the South," a close-up of a magnolia. "It looks like you can just smell it or pick it, it has depth," Grable said of the piece. True to its name, "Mandarins" depicts a bowl filled with the fruit. "One lady said it was sophisticated. I think it's serene," Grable said.

Another local artist whose work was accepted into the Girardot Exhibition is Jake Wells, who received an honorable mention for his oil painting "Rusty Cave," one of a series of pieces he has created around the cave motif. Wells' oil and ceramic work "Cave Representation" is also featured in the exhibition. Not surprisingly, caving is a hobby of Wells'.

"The cave idea is something I've been kicking around for a year and a half. I started off in ceramics and it worked into my paintings," Wells said.

While "Cave Representation" incorporates painting and ceramics into a somewhat three-dimensional work, Wells added a great deal of texture to "Rusty Cave" so it would not be a flat two-dimensional painting. With both pieces Wells said he "didn't want to push the realism too much, but I want people to realize it's a cave."

In May, Wells graduated with a bachelor of fine arts degree in painting from Southeast Missouri State University and is now planning to attend graduate school in fall 2005 to further his art studies.

Like Grable, the Girardot Exhibit marks the first time Wells' work has been accepted into a national juried show.

"Hopefully, it's the first of a long list of national shows I can put on my resume," Wells said. Having your work in one of these national juried exhibits "shows to clients that you're active in your field and you're trying to get your work out there," he said.

Art is something Wells grew up surrounded by, as both sides of his family had people with artistic talent and he said his parents were very supportive of the arts.

Wells' grandfather and namesake served as director chairman of the University's art department in the late 1970s and painted the mural inside the Kent Library. He also designed the bicentennial mural at Fountain and Broadway.

"I grew up looking at his watercolors. He was my No. 1 influence," Wells said.

kalfisi@semissourian.com

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