An Exhibition for Our Times
Higher ratings for the 24-hour cable news networks suggest that the long, protracted Democratic primary race between Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton stimulated more than normal interest in this year’s election campaign. To put it bluntly, more of us have become political junkies, hungering for the latest dispatch about our favorite candidate’s movements as the parry-and-thrust gets under way leading toward November.

And for all these ready-and-able fans, the Norman Rockwell Museum has the perfect show. It’s called “Raw Nerve! The Political Art of Steve Brodner.” And the exclamation point in the title is no exaggeration, for Brodner clearly is able to strike more than one nerve in the American psyche.

The Brooklyn-born Brodner is a caricaturist in the grand tradition of such political illustrators as James Gilray and Thomas Nast. Wryly describing himself as “an equal opportunity offender of all politicians, political parties and creeds,” personally Brodner obviously is far from neutral in this contest, and visitors to the Rockwell these days will not find it difficult to perceive some of his feelings through more than 100 original Brodner artworks.

The show anticipates the big forthcoming election between Obama and his Republican opponent John McCain, and reflects other political history over the last 15 years, offering humorous and insightful evaluations of American society and its leaders—Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and Bill and Hillary Clinton are among the prominent subjects. And, of course, Brodner does not allow the current incumbent of the White House, and those who surround him, to escape his observant and peppery pen.

Brodner is The New Yorker’s official political illustrator for the 2008 Presidential campaign, and his work also is immediately familiar for readers of The Nation, Esquire, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, Sports Illustrated and other periodicals.

In a fascinating comparison of the changes of times and attitudes, the museum has included examples of Norman Rockwell’s more benign treatment of political figures during his period of illustration alongside Brodner’s more trenchant views of the contemporary scene. The museum also plans several ancillary events during the show’s run, including lectures, concerts and a theatrical event recalling the Lincoln-Douglas debates.

Some of Brodner’s latest musings are offered on a computer touch screen linked to his illustration website www.drawger.com/stevebrodner on which the artist posts daily drawings and commentary. A video installation also displays live-action and animated works created by Brodner and producer/director Gail Levin, reflecting his current New Yorker assignment, called “The Naked Campaign.”

“For me, caricature is part of what goes on in illustration,” explains Brodner, “finding essences that are useful in storytelling. The exaggeration is not the destination, but rather the train you take to get there. What will you find to help you make your point?”

Manifesting Nature Through Illustration
With little opportunity for personal observation, it is difficult for most individuals to visualize nature’s many wonders gathered throughout the world. Illustration is one manner of clarifying this largess of natural flora and fauna, and one of the current shows at the New York State Museum in Albany accomplishes this for its visitors.

“Focus on Nature X: Natural History Illustration” offers 94 pieces, the work of some 83 illustrators from the United States, Canada and 10 other nations on four continents. The organisms on display are diverse, ranging from mammals endemic to the artists’ home countries—numbats from Australia and the crystal orchid from a single remote mountain in China—to the ancient Roman lemons from Italy, rediscovered by an illustrator.

The works being shown, including several by New York State artists, were selected by a five-member jury, based on each illustration’s educational value and artistic quality, according to Patricia Kernan, the exhibition’s curator and the museum’s scientific illustrator. “Natural history illustration has a story that parallels that of science,” she explained. “From the beginning, it has been an integral part of the research process, and the most efficient and effective means by which investigators communicate their research results. Today, illustrators have available the tools of developing technology, as well as the traditional media.” She added that many of the illustrations are created for field guides, textbooks science articles and presentations, and that a color catalog for the show will be available.

Sculpting Dialogue, Negotiation
Olafur Eliasson, the Icelandic artist renowned for his sculptural environments that transform simple natural materials and phenomena—light, water, mist and temperature—into a cognitive and physically immersive experience for his viewers, this month is unveiling a challenging new piece on the campus of Bard College, the academic oasis in Annandale-on-Hudson that seems to thrive constantly on challenge.

“The Parliament of Reality,” commissioned by the school’s Center for Curatorial Studies, is intended to push the viewer’s encounter with his art a step further by creating a space designed to inspire and physically accommodate the exchange of ideas through dialogue and negotiation, according to Eliasson.

It is being placed in a field near the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Frank Gehry’s adventurous structure that provides a focal point for the school’s performing arts program.

The sculpture consists of a circular pond approximately 135 feet in diameter, surrounded by a ring of 24 planted trees. Nestled in the pond’s center, a circular island is paved with individual stones that inscribe a 12-point pattern derived from the median lines of nautical charts and the compass.

A stone bridge covered by a steel lattice work tunnel allows access to the island. As visitors cross the bridge, the tunnel’s design, through a series of ellipses, appears gradually to shift, providing a symbolic temporal experience evocative of the work’s overall conceptual goals. Seating is provided on large smooth boulders situated in two rows around the island’s outer rim.

“The Icelandic parliament is called the Althing, meaning a space for all things,” Eliasson explains. He said he envisions this project as “a place where students, teachers, and visitors can gather to relax, discuss ideas or have an argument,” adding that it “emphasizes that negotiations should be at the core of any educational scheme. It is only by questioning what one is taught that real knowledge is produced and a critical attitude can be sustained.”

Browsing
“Vocal Colors at the Clark,” a concert series offering a multi-disciplinary exploration of visual art and music presented by the Berkshire Opera, Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA, July 16, 23 and 30, 1:30 p.m. . . . “Covering the Bases: The Science of Baseball,” an interactive exhibition exploring hitting, pitching and running, Schenectady Museum & Suits-Bueche Planetarium, through Sept. 20 . . . Sculptures are hitting the streets in two areas: “Sculpture Now in Lenox 2008,” the work of 21 artists, Lenox, MA, through Oct. 31; “Sculpture in the Streets” in downtown Albany includes 20 works by 14 sculptors from the Capital Region, Massachusetts and New York City, through Apr. 2009 . . . “In Full Bloom: Artists Design Garden Gates,” outdoor exhibition, Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge, MA, July 5-Sept. 7 . . . The Colonial Theatre Assn. and Barr & Barr Builders have received Paul E. Tsongas awards for the historic preservation of the Colonial.

Last Chance
“Framing Colonial Albany,” Sterling & Francine Clark Institute, concludes July 6 . . . Doug Clow oil on linen paintings, Hudson Opera House, concludes July 12 . . . “Emily Driscoll: Works,” concludes July 13; “Julie Mehretu: City Sitings,” concludes July 27, both at Williams College Museum of Art.