Page 25 - the NOISE September 2012

A CIRCULAR PHILOSOPHY
STORY & PHOTOS
BY SARAH GIANELLI
BY SARAH GIANELLI seeking God in Nature ... And in Art
New galleries are popping up in Jerome like August sunflowers. The latest on the scene is Zen Mountain Gallery, an art boutique whose contemporary sophistica- tion matches that of neighboring 527 Gallery and nearby Pura Vida.
The meditative wind-song of a shakuhachi bamboo flute greets me as I enter the space, adding to its air of serenity. It is the second clue — after the gallery’s name — to the uni- fying principle of proprietor Christopher Mull’s personal artwork and his vision for the collective itself.
The name is a tribute to Zen Mountain Monastery in upstate New York, and specifically to its late founder Ab- bot John Daido Loori, a nature photographer, author and monk who was highly influential in his contributions to Zen-based art. (It is also a humble bow to the mountain Jerome sits upon, where Mr. Mull has found the essence of many Zen qualities).
“He was an amazing figure in bringing Zen and the arts together in a way that people could really experience both and find one in the other,” says Mr. Mull. Like Abbot Loori, who studied photography and meditation under luminary Minor White, Mr. Mull also came to Zen through photog- raphy.
“A big thing for me has been learning to slow down and look deeply,” he says, words that come back to me re- peatedly in the weeks following our interview. “We live in a world that’s ‘go, go, go, more, more, more.’ For me, the photographic process is a form of walking meditation. It’s about learning to see things directly. So much today is so conceptual. People today are so conceptual. We’re so locked into our stories of who we are and what we do and how we present ourselves to the world. I’m interested in stripping away the stories, stripping away the concepts. Just seeing what’s in front of us for what it is — right now.”
Mr. Mull has spent years combing the junkyard treasure trove of Gold King Mine with his camera, highly attuned to his breath while contemplating and capturing an image. The photography he is currently showing consists mostly of abstracted close-ups of rusted metal. But in the abstrac- tions, imagery coalesces and dissolves right before your very eyes, into landscapes, moons, and the sea.
“Some people see the cosmos or outer space,” he says, standing in front of Meditation 13 in which a naturally occur- ring swirling spiral could be a hurricane or far away galaxy.
“I’vealwayssaid,‘no,it’snotaboutouterspace,butinnerspace.” His work draws upon two Zen concepts that resonate deeply
with him: the ensō, or circle; and wabi-sabi, a Japanese philoso- phy that roughly translates into finding beauty in the aged, im- perfect and transient. All of his work contains themes of trans- formation — the transformation of “junk” into art; the alchemic transformation, however illusory, of one medium into another, and the fundamental transformation of perception.
In Meditation 24, a black circular mark on old metal has the look of sumi brushwork, a Zen exercise intended to bring the practitioner fully into the present moment by completing and perfecting a circle in one stroke, one breath. Hanging in the inte- rior of the old wooden ice cooler from the building’s days as the
Jerome Market (now a creative office space), two close-ups of pink, pocked and scarred metal illustrate wabi-sabi better than words. By shifting our perception, Mr. Mull has transformed rusted metal into ravaged skin and back into something beauti- ful — both visually and conceptually.
Mr. Mull traces his artistic impulse and nascent inclination toward eastern religion back to his childhood, before he had a name for it. Growing up on a large farm in Indiana, guided by a highly artistic mother (whose lovingly hand-woven pine needle baskets are on display in the gallery), he would dig clay out of the streambeds, process it, and make pottery.
“I remember her telling me as a young child, ‘go sit in the woods, you could be closer to ...’” He starts to choke up, taken aback by the sudden upwelling of emotion. Taking a deep breath, he con- tinues: “She would say ‘go sit in the woods, you can be closer to God sitting in the woods than anywhere else.’ She planted that seed in my heart as a child; this is how it’s manifesting now.”
How it’s manifesting is as an astoundingly eclectic mix of modern, contemplative art, jewelry, pottery, glass, woodwork and textiles, all chosen with a discriminating eye and cohesive purpose.
“I want to experience Zen through other art forms,” Mr. Mull says. “I want this to be more than a gallery. I want it to be a space of community for contemplative-minded people and artists. I want that intent to be realized here.”
Mr. Mull is awed by the two dozen artists he has chosen to showcase — too many to list and give credit to in the space al- lotted here — predominantly Verde Valley artists but also a few top name artists from around the country, because, as he says,
“we deserve to be shown alongside the best.”
Jerome is represented by the earthy paintings of Sally Mur-
phy, Brice Wood’s collage prints, and the paint-drooled ab- stracts of Tom Ogburn. In addition to Mr. Mull’s photogra- phy are dreamy landscapes and prismatic interiors by Marty Smith and stark black & white desert still lifes by Wayne Nor- ton.
One of a kind jewelry includes copper pendants and ear- rings by Gene Sabia mirror the colors seen across our valley; the urban yet organic pieces by Prescott Valley mother-daugh- ter team Arizona Graffiti; ethnic museum-quality necklaces by Candace Copeland; and the more delicate silversmithing of Camp Verde native Matagi Sorenson. In the pottery de- partment are Luna Patterson’s hand built, pit fired ceramic vessels, some worked until they are smooth and heavy as a stone egg, others inlaid with bits of copper and adorned with feathers; and the functional, glazed pottery of Greg Wenz and Deanna O’Donnell. Also featured are Robert Brunner’s free-hand Mandala drawings and painted gourds, alongside the vastly different gourd creations of Bill Colligan. There is also blown glass by Susan Moody; and woodwork ranging from Shermane Frei’s hand-turned painted bowls (so de- tailed at first they appear to be woven), to Don Vance’s high gloss, embellished mesquite pieces, to the more rough hewn woodwork of Chad DiCaprio.
Ranging in price from $8 to $3,000, at Zen Mountain there is truly something for every taste and every budget.
At the conclusion of our interview, I am drawn back to Bod- hi, an image of Mr. Mull’s in which the scuffmarks in the metal unmistakably suggest a tree under a partially clouded moon.
“It really comes back the idea of perception,” Mr. Mull says, standing beside me. “You could walk by that and see a piece of junk, trash. Or you could stop and see a tree and a moon; you can see Bodhi, the tree of enlightenment. I think that’s a metaphor for life. One you can take into the whole world — with the things around us, the people in our lives. Everything. What we find is up to our perception. And that’s the Zen of it for me.”
During First Saturday ArtWalk on September 1, featured art- ist Sally Murphy will conduct a painting demonstration from 6-7:30PM followed by an auction of the completed work.
| Sarah Gianelli is more than meets the eye.
sarahgianelli@hotmail.com
thenoise.us • the NOISE arts & news magazine • SEPTEMBER 2012 • 25