Edition Announcement #191 - Ricky Allman

Happy Tuesday collectors! It's Sara, moving on from a serious case of the Mondays. We've lined up some gorgeous new editions and hope that you'll join us as the week unfolds. Tomorrow we'll feature a new guest-curated set from Web Wonder Woman, Gina Trapani.

Today's 20x200 artist, Ricky Allman, was born and raised in the middle of the country, surrounded by Mormons and the Rocky Mountains in Utah. There, as he put it, he was subject to "weekly earthquake drills at school and lessons about the apocalypse and the 'evils of the world' on Sundays." While he made a break for other lands both far and near later in life, the geography and ideology that suffused his formative years made a lasting impression on his work as a painter.

In False Memory and Disco Peak, the jagged edges and intimidating outlines of the high Rockies are omnipresent, serving as both subject and background. Stylized and vividly colorful geometric boxes intersect with the organic environment, highlighting Ricky's interest in architecture and nature as well as a foreboding sense of false security. The walls of these structures, weighty as they are in their precision, are either transparent or emanating colors, belying their soundness. It is the questionable characteristics of these walls that lead me to a discussion about the nature of religion.

Like Ricky, I have spent some time in Mormon country and will digress for a minute to share two stories:

The 1989 VW Jetta I drove in college broke down twice on cross-country road trips, first in Salt Lake City, Utah and, for the second and last time, in Boise, Idaho.

When my timing belt went out and I slid down the off-ramp in Utah, a truck immediately pulled up behind me and the driver emerged from his seat with tow ropes in hand. Turned out the kind fellow happened to know the only foreign car specialist in town and happily lugged my sad car to his friend's garage. Nothing short of a miracle! Even more remarkable, I was charged a reasonable fee and returned to the road before the end of the day. LDS pamphlets were left on the passenger seat for my perusal but as I headed west, I vowed never to pass judgment on Mormons again.

When the Jetta's transmission went out a year later, just east of the Washington/Idaho border on I-84 and miles away from the nearest big city, I held the clutch in gear, in fourth for as long as I could muster, then in third, and was crunching along in second at a speed rounding up to 20 MPH as I passed Boise's LDS Temple en route to a friend-of-a-friend's mother's house. The car ground to a halt in her driveway. I was well taken care of by my friend's friend's family, sold the Jetta for $250 and flew home. Things could have been a whole lot worse.

The moral of the story: you don't have to be a Mormon to be saved in Mormon country, or anywhere for that matter. Really, what you have to be and should be, is a good person; do unto others as you would have done to yourself (or something like that). What goes around, comes around. I think this golden rule is the one we should all strive to live by, within or without the glowing walls of a church. And I think that is what Ricky is getting to in these paintings; religion may be a centerpiece in many people's lives—not to mention fodder for some entertaining television—but people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. So, live by the golden rule, whether you are inside or outside of that glass box.

Previous Newsletter : Edition Announcement #190 - Emily Shur