Doug Baulos will christen the SCAC’s new art gallery with this immersive installation.
All artists have a way of breaking down perceptions and helping us view the world with a different perspective. They can use the simplest of objects and materials to create incredible and beautiful imagery. Artist Douglas Baulos uses handmade papers and natural dyes to express a multitude of elements in his work, such as grief and mortality, nesting, mending and memory, to name a few.
His next immersive installation, “Root, Branch, and Star,” will be the first gallery exhibit at the Shelby County Arts Council’s new EBSCO Fine Art Gallery. These unique installations are created using natural fibers and constructed with found materials. “Although I work with emotionally heavy conceptual themes like loss, mortality and the power and delicate nature of memory, my work is a reflection of my attempt to live my life in fragile exultation,” Baulos says. “I merge the abstraction of narrative with the physicality of objects.”
Baulos says writers of southern literature, such as Harper Lee and Carson McCullers, have been influences in his works. “I mirror their interest in the subliminal, unremarkable and overlooked within exquisite emotional landscapes. I express the oscillation of hope and despair while exploring the boundaries and intersections within the nature of identity.” Not only is Baulos a professional visual artist, but he is also the assistant professor of drawing at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and the curriculum director at Studio by the Tracks – an art center that provides free art classes to emotionally conflicted children and adults with autism spectrum disorder or other mental illnesses.
Baulos’s work has also been featured in numerous galleries around the world. The exhibit “Root, Branch, and Star” opens at the Shelby County Arts Council in Old Mill Square on Friday, Sept. 20 at 6 p.m. More of Baulos’s work can be seen at Dougbaulos.com.
Returning to the SCAC’s Black Box Theater is Alabama native Damon Johnson on Friday, Sept. 13. Johnson has spent many years on the rock ‘n’ roll scene playing with bands such as Alice Cooper, Brother Cane, Black Star Riders and Thin Lizzy. He joins us in the new Black Box Theater for an intimate acoustic solo performance. Check out Johnson’s latest album, Memoirs of an Uprising, and then see him live on Sept. 13. Doors open at 7 p.m., and the show starts at 7:30 p.m.
Also coming to the Black Box Theater on Oct. 5 is Paul Thorn. Thorn’s Americana, blues and southern rock sound is influenced by his childhood growing up as the son of a preacher and being introduced to music at a young age. He now joins us in the Black Box Theater for one incredible show. The doors open at 7 p.m., and the show starts at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets for all Black Box Theater performances and all SCAC event information can be found at Shelbycountyartscouncil.com.
