“WOOD & YOU KNOW IT:  EARLY WORKS BY JAMES ELLIS” 

Kala presents “Wood & You Know It:  Early Works by James Ellis,” a col­lec­tion of hand­made fur­ni­ture and wood acces­sories cre­ated to com­pli­ment mod­ern liv­ing while pay­ing homage to early 20^thcen­tury arts and crafts ideals cre­ated by artist James Ellis.  The exi­hi­bi­tion opens with an Artist Recep­tion on Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 3, 2012 from 6PM to 8PM and con­tin­ues until March 2, 2012.  

Ellis uses tra­di­tional fine wood­work­ing hand tools, but incor­po­rates usage of mod­ern machin­ery for rel­a­tive afford­abil­ity.  Ellis show­cases his objects’ join­ery as dec­o­ra­tive ele­ments and finds inspi­ra­tion in nature, such as occur­ring spi­rals in trees.  Ellis seeks to show­case the wood’s nat­ural grain and color, jux­ta­pos­ing both domes­tic and exotic woods fin­ished in nat­ural oil or clear fin­ishes.   His choices of wood species are per­sonal, such as the use of maple and cherry sym­bolic of his per­sonal growth.  “His­tor­i­cally, the Cherry tree sym­bol­izes death, rebirth and new awak­en­ings while maple sym­bol­izes bal­ance, promise and prac­ti­cally,” replied Ellis. “When I look at where I was 5 years ago, I see a com­pletely dif­fer­ent per­son, my life has direc­tion; I am pas­sion­ate about my work.”

 UPCOMING SHOWS:

JEWELRY TRUNK SHOW
March 8, 2012 3:30PM to 7:30PM
Fea­tur­ing the unique jew­elry designs of three local artists: Peggy Carter, Julie Ciof­fo­letti and Michelle Shield.

2 WAYS WITH WOOD, 2 WAYS WITH CLAY
April 27, 2012 — May 24, 2012
Artists Recep­tion, Fri­day, April 27, 2012 6:00PM to 8:00PM
Wood Artists: Ronno Cooke, Steve Nog­gle
Clay Artists:    Court­ney Long, Hamil­ton Williams

WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA CONTEMPORARY ART GLASS EXHIBITION
June 11, 2012 – June 30, 2012
Open­ing Recep­tion Sat­ur­day, June 16, 2012  5:00PM to 7:00PM
A col­lab­o­ra­tive show fea­tur­ing 14 west­ern North Car­olina Stu­dio Glass artists, with
works dis­played at Kala Gallery, MESH Gallery and Burke Arts Council’s Jail­house Gallery.

YUMMY MUD PUDDLE STUDIOS – JOHN RICHARDS
August 10, 2012 — August 31, 2012
Artist Recep­tion:  Fri­day, August 10, 2012  6PM to 8PM
Music by Hot Duck Soup Nov­elty Jazz Band from 7:30PM to 8PM

NEWS:

KALA GALLERY WINS 2011 TOP RETAILER AWARD

Bal­ti­more, Md. (July 19, 2011) — Kala Gallery of Mor­gan­ton, N.C. was named the Best New Gallery in the Nation by NICHEmagazine’s 2011 Top Retail­ers com­pe­ti­tion.  Win­ners were announced in a cer­e­mony at the 2011 Buy­ers Mar­ket of Amer­i­can Craft on July 12, 2011 at the Bal­ti­more Con­ven­tion Cen­ter in Bal­ti­more, Md.  The annual Top Retailer Awards pro­gram rec­og­nizes craft retail­ers who are com­mit­ted to fair busi­ness prac­tices and to grow­ing and strength­en­ing the North Amer­i­can craft community.

 

For fre­quent updates on what is hap­pen­ing at Kala, fol­low us on Face­book.  Read Kala’s lat­est email newslet­ter.