New SoFA Gallery exhibit explores human bodies

Visitors will find something a bit familiar lined along the walls of the School of Fine Arts Gallery this month. The newest gallery exhibit is not of landscapes or abstract thoughts. Instead, the pieces that fill the gallery explore our very bodies. "Human Measures" is a look at eight contemporary American painters who work primarily with the human figure.\n"These are some of the best figurative painters in the painting field," said public relations coordinator Erin Devine.\nThe featured artists -- Michael Ananian, John Dubrow, Ann Gale, Philip Geiger, Tim Kennedy, Eve Mansdorf, Scott Noel and Katherine Schneider -- have varying styles and approaches to their work, but together each artist has begun to discover and develop the figurative tradition.\n"(The exhibit) examines the human figure and how it can communicate on a personal level," Devine said.\nWhile the exhibit is inclusive, artists have their own take on their work. Artist Michael Ananian described his own take on the theme.\n"I hope that I convey through my use of proportion that humans are awkward creatures; they are not particularly graceful in form or thought," he said.\n"Ringing" by Ananian shows a simultaneous cause and effect situation where a nude man is running out of bed, while below a nude woman lies calmly in her bed waiting for him to answer her phone.\n"I find this human awkwardness so beautiful that I must celebrate it and make it the thesis of my life's work," Ananian said.\nThe exhibit's gallery opening was from 7 to 9 p.m. Friday with its usual SoFA opening elements of appetizers, wine and beer and visitors thoughtfully surveying each piece. However, this night, there was an addition to the schedule of events. In the back of the gallery, visitors squished their bodies together in order to see performance artist Isabela Prado. Her piece titled "Banho" lasted about fifteen minutes while she carefully covered her body in layers of oil and sea salt.\nThe room was thoughtfully laid out, with a block in the center of the room, which stood about half a foot above the ground and held four medium silver bowls filled with an oily liquid and sea salt. Prado entered the performance space with a white drape around her and then dropped the drape and stood in a larger bowl sitting behind the smaller four on the elevated block. She began by conscientiously covering each part of her body with the liquid. Once she was completely covered, she raised the bowl of remaining liquid and poured it over her head. Gracefully, she continued this same process with the sea salt to end with her walking off the block, her eyes covered with salt and draping herself again with the white cloth.\nFrequent gallery visitor Julie Finn came specifically for Prado's performance. Finn lives in Bloomington with her family and attends exhibits when she can.\n"I think they are definitely an insider's secret," Finn said about the SoFA gallery openings.\nPrado's performance was the nude figure in action, while the gallery's walls were covered with the realism of nude figures caught on canvas.\n"Anytime you work with a figure on a personal level it really strikes you," Devine said. "All the artists capture the human figure of today, portraying everyday life, while creating an interesting truth on the canvas"