presents

Art Croquet and Other
Recent Works by Bill Gorcica

Opening Saturday, August 30, 12:00-4:00

Maiden Rock, Wisconsin

Swan Song Contemporary Arts presents the fifth special exhibition of its 2008 season in Art Croquet and Other Recent Works by Bill Gorcica featuring quirky new digital drawings and two nature-based viewer interactive projects, including a fully playable croquet game created by the artist. On view through Sunday October 5th, the exhibition will open with a reception for the artist on Saturday August 30 from 12:00-4:00P.M. (Gorcica’s art croquet will be set up for play on the lawn adjacent to Swan Song Gallery during the opening reception and Saturdays and Sundays from 10:30-1:00. Swan Song’s regular gallery hours are Friday, Saturday and Sunday’s from 10:00-5:00)

Bill Gorcica is a multimedia artist who fuses traditional art mediums (painting, printmaking and sculpture) with new media art forms (electronic, digital imaging, computer technologies), creating projects that engage viewers directly with images from (and issues related to) the natural world. He has long worked to create a bridge between art and science, often seeking collaborative ventures or unusual venues for the display of his work. Through a recent public art project at Walker Art Center’s Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, Gorcica was invited to create one hole for an artist’s mini-golf course. In response to this invitation and in celebration of Minnesota’s natural history, Gorcica designed and built an ice fishing house (golf hole) bedecked with hand-carved and painted Minnesota fish.

For his exhibition at Swan Song Contemporary Arts Gorcica presents three distinct bodies of work. In Art Croquet, Gorcica offers a fully playable, outdoor game, sporting handmade wickets topped with carved and painted fish, birds, animals and insects. Concept drawings for the wickets will also be on view, giving the viewer insights into the artist’s creative process. Gorcica’s playful approach and accessibility of his art adds a dose of fun to considering more serious questions about preserving the natural world. Also featured is Flora and Fauna of Maiden Rock, an interactive kiosk (designed and piloted by the artist at Swan Song) that, with the click of a mouse, randomly arranges Gorcica’s computer illustrations of species indigenous to Maiden Rock, Wisconsin. Framed archival digital prints related to this project will be on view and gallery visitors will have the opportunity to print one-of-a-kind digital prints as souvenirs of the exhibit. The exhibition also presents Microbes and Diatoms a series of seemingly naïve digital drawings yielding strange, even subterranean images and raw emotions that, for the artist, reflect the trials and tribulations about being human on Planet Earth. (For more examples of Bill Gorcica’s work and information about related projects visit www.billgorcica.com)

Bill Gorcica received his Master of Fine Arts degree from Rutgers University and a Bachelor of Science in Biology from Virginia Polytechnic Institute. The excellence of his work as an artist has been acknowledged through a variety of grants and awards including a Bush Foundation Visual Artist Fellowship and a Fulbright Scholarship. Gorcica lives and works in St. Cloud, Minnesota where he serves as a professor of New Media and Design for St. Cloud State University.

.... ....
CLICK ON IMAGES TO SEE LARGER VIEW

Swan Song Contemporary Arts is an ecoarts gallery on the Mississippi flyway presenting an ongoing schedule of exhibitions of contemporary art related to our appreciation for and relationship to the planet Earth. Swan Song also houses a gift shop featuring multiples, collectables and original art by 29 artists of regional and national and international reputation. The gallery is founded and directed by artist Cynde Randall who also serves as artistic director of the Minneapolis based non-profit called Bird x Bird (www.birdxbird.org), an artist collective devoted to the stewardship of avian species and the ecoliteracy of human beings. Randall is also known for her work at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts where she was involved, for more than two decades, with the production and presentation of exhibitions of contemporary art in a museum context. As a retail gallery Swan Song actively promotes BxB’s mission and commits a percentage of its profits to projects devoted to the protection or restoration of wildlife habitat along the Mississippi flyway.

Swan Song Contemporary Arts is located on the Great River Road, the east side of Lake Pepin, in Maiden Rock, Wisconsin, just 1 hour southeast of the Twin Cities. Gallery hours are Friday thru Sunday from 10:00-5:00 through January. Swan Song’s special exhibits run every 5 weeks, from March through January. For more information call Swan Song gallery director Cynde Randall at (612) 250-9222 or email at cynderandall@centurytel.net