They marched in one-by-one and two-by-two, and occasionally six or seven at a time. They are elephants, and The Back House Gallery - tucked into a closet-sized space at the rear of Heebe Jeebe General Store in downtown Petaluma - is now hosting a whopping 57 of them. ? Fortunately, they’re small.? Elephant’s Memory is the latest community art show to grace the slender domain of the Back House Gallery (formerly the Boomerang Gallery). Several weeks ago, 70 small vinyl elephants were distributed to local artists, who were then assigned the task of painting, adorning, melting, mounting, dissecting, enhancing and otherwise transforming their pint-sized pachyderm into a work of art.
The results are now on display through June 11.
The sight of all 57 creations, lined up in rows on a long low shelf, carries a powerfully whimsical punch. Some pieces, such as Andy Rado’s elegant, lime green elephant with eyes proclaiming “not a worry in sight” - it’s titled “Lost and Found” - are relatively simple. Others, like Kristi Quint’s “Fly” - in which her elephant has been decapitated, its head now floating above its body, all of it decoupaged with words cut from a newspaper - are more elaborate. The latter deserves lengthy study, as its body contains heavy, earth-bound words (“fault,” “worry,” “hurt”) while its flying head boasts more lofty verbs (“soar,” “wake,” “free,” release”).
Some pieces are cute. Some are scary. Some are art for art’s sake. Others carry a powerful or insprational message.
Possibly inspired by the fact that elephants are amongst the most threatened species on the planet, Erica Reisig’s gently unsettling art piece is titled “Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerant?” Latin for “Where are those who were before us?” Painted in shades of gray and black - with the dark night of extinction dominating one side of the elephant - its head is emblazoned with a multi-colored double-helix, suggesting the enormous genetic loss to the planet should elephants become extinct.
Or maybe it’s just an elephant.
That’s the fun of this kind of community-wide project. Each piece is open to interpretation.
They are also all for sale.
The blank elephant forms were donated to Heebe Jeebe by The Burningman Elephant Project - which encourages creativity by distributing the elephants to organizations seeking to inspire and educate. As such, a portion of the sale of each elephant will be donated to Alchemia Gallery and Studio, which offers a place for adult artists with developmental disabilities to express their creative sides.
Though some of the pieces have already been sold (their new owners able to pick them up at the end of the exhibit), most are still available this early in the display. Suggested prices tend to run between $25 and $100.
While Elephant’s Memory is certainly not the first, or the last, such community art show to grace the tiny Back House Gallery, for its sheer joyous exuberance and meditative power, it’s certainly a show one will not soon forget.
Heebe Jeebe General Store is at 46 Kentucky St. in downtown Petaluma
(Contact David at david.templeton@arguscourier.com)
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