The Post and Courier, 8/6/2009

“The Halsey Institute for Contemporary Art at the College of Charleston announces the award of an $80,000 program grant from the prestigious Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts for this year and next. Established in 1987 in accordance with Warhol’s will, the foundation’s objective is to foster innovative artistic expression and the creative processes that support artists and their work. The foundation values the contribution that organizations like the Halsey Institute make to artists, audiences, and to the community as a whole, explains Rebecca Silberman of the Halsey Institute. ‘We are thrilled that the Warhol Foundation will be partnering with us on our next two years of programming,’ remarks Halsey Director Mark Sloan. ‘On their site visit last spring, the Warhol program officers were quite impressed to see such ambitious programming generated by such a small staff. This funding comes at a critical time for us, as state funds and individual giving have been in decline since October 2008. In a very real sense, this grant is a life-line.'”

During the Spoleto Festival USA and its little sister Piccolo Spoleto the visual arts take a back seat. The big festival is out of the visual arts business. The Gibbes Museum of Art usually does something that may or may not be particularly profound. The Halsey Institute for Contemporary Art gallery at the College of Charleston always has something cool and fun, but that’s the way it operates year round.
Exhibitions put on by Piccolo, which is run by the city of Charleston Cultural Affairs Office, are hit and miss – usually miss. This year there are hits all the way around: “Hair on Fire,” at the Halsey Institute; “Prop Master” at the Gibbes Museum of Art; and last but also first “Contemporary Charleston 2009” at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park.

“Hair on Fire” brings together some artists with a Charleston connection (Loren Schwerd taught at the college for several years and Caryl Burtner showed her collection of toothbrushes and other items at the college a decade ago) as well as others from across the country. They’re all women and they all make art of, or closely connected to, hair.

In the most scientific terms, hair is just protein filaments that grow outward from follicles deep within the skin. It spans most of the body’s surface area, proliferates most visibly from our scalps, and serves a number of biological purposes, most notably heat regulation.

Why, then, have these strands of keratin remained such a subject of intense aesthetic, societal, and mythological fascination over the course of human history?

This is the quandary that the new exhibit at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art, Hair on Fire, seeks to explore, and ultimately does so quite successfully. Mark Sloan, the curator of the show and Halsey director, has once again brought together a talented cast of multimedia artists, all female, who each brings her own regional and cultural experience, as well as artistic proclivities, to the question of hair.

Every year, the Halsey surrenders its walls to the CofC’s Studio Art Department. Any current student is eligible to submit work, and the results always reflect a variety of styles and working methods.

Juror Brian Rutenberg is an alumnus and a celebrated painter now based in New York. He is adept at capturing moods with abstract landscapes in lush, deep colors, so it’s no surprise he’s chosen some striking oil paintings for this diverse and entertaining show.

Stacy Pearsall has never been good with words. What she saw in Iraq during two tours only makes them harder to come by. She knows what John McCain meant by leaving “with honor,” but feels Vietnam has little bearing on the War on Terror.

A former combat photographer who retired from the Air Force in August, Pearsall is now director of the Charleston Center for Photography, a new local nonprofit. Her work has been used by The New York Times, Newsweek, GQ, and CNN. And she was twice named military photographer of the year, the only woman to achieve such distinction.

Words aren’t her forte, but Pearsall has her pictures. She hopes the work on display at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art, one of Charleston’s most high-profile venues, will tell the story of what it felt like to be “down range.” There’s no better time than now.

Some art shows are thrown together, others are carefully woven. Curated by Mark Sloan, director of the Halsey Institute, Mend is held fast by a seam symbolizing the fragility of life in general and the female body in particular.

The show’s focal point is an installation called “Pentagram of Loss.” It’s an attempt by artist Pinky/MM Bass to come to terms with the deaths of five close friends and relatives in five years. She uses the five sides of her pentagram to mark each person’s passing.

What is it? A vast collection of the world’s finest art. In miniature. Organized by the Halsey Institute and exhibited at the Addlestone Library, the work has been preserved and displayed by students at the Clemson Architecture Center in Charleston. McMahan has been creating these diminutive nuggets for 18 years. In a great big world, it’s nice to appreciate the small things. Here’s to McMahan’s curious trade: We predict a huge reception.