Art Walk, the long-anticipated display of art of all kinds, entertained UNLV students, faculty and the larger community on Nov. 3. The event brought together ballet dancers, museum curators, silkscreen artists, wine connoisseurs, chocolatiers and literary artists to present at their various pop-ups.
In the Marjorie Barrick Museum is A4 Zine Club’s workshop on how to make zines that capture emotions. A zine is a do-it-yourself, self-published magazine that can be modified to include various art styles, poetry, photos, collages and more.
Walking out of the Black Mountain Institute hosted a pop-up, “The Poetry Kitchen,” where attendees created literary art at three stations. Poetry could be made at various stations. One of the stations had attendees create poetry out of lines from other poems. At another station, attendees could create erasure poetry by taking pages out of cookbooks and crossing out lines. The words that are not marked out become the words of the poem.
Near the John S. Wright Hall was UNLV Film’s pop-up. They simulate what it’s like to film a car scene. Attendees can be “actors” in the film and film a scene in a stationary car. Outside the car are two bright lights on either side. In front of those lights are mirrors, which are rotated to look like passing streetlights.
In the Ham Fine Arts building, attendees can be seen waiting for their turn to drag ink across the silkscreen for the first time. Guided by experienced silkscreen artists, attendees brought in blank t-shirts or tote bags to print, or selected from white or red t-shirts or red tote bags. Among the attendees waiting for the silkscreen press was Dave Rowe.
Rowe, a professor in the College of Fine Arts, put together this event, sharing, “We’ve been planning this since the summer. It’s been led by the dean’s office and the rest of us participate. Each unit has their own thing. We do something different each year, like this silk screen. Whenever you can make-and-take, everybody’s really hot for that … It’s really exciting to see how people get into it and it’s okay that artmaking is fun. It’s perfectly fun. It should have a degree of enjoyment. That’s why we do it; we’re able to express ourselves visually … It’s a way to really connect with the community too because a lot of the people coming in aren’t necessarily affiliated with the arts.”
Featured in Art Walk was “Is it Art?” Directed by Louis Kavouras, the chair of UNLV’s dance department, the performance brought in all types of actors, dancers, composers, visual artists and designers from the College of Fine Arts. “Is it Art?” consisted of six characters standing in a gallery in front of an empty pedestal. The mix of characters include: a tour guide on their first day of work, a pedestal salesperson, a brooding artist, an influencer, a professor that is too reliant on artificial intelligence, a nerdy writer and an art thief. Throughout the dance, they were trying to figure out whether the pedestal is the art itself or if there is no art. “Is it Art?” brought a comedic voice to the confusing, abstract world of contemporary art that audiences find themselves in now.
A 2023 recap will be posted to the College of Fine Arts website, and Art Walk is an event that will be hosted again next year.
