Published January 12, 2007

Art show features world’s rainforests

By GARY HENDERSON
the Spartanburg Journal

The destruction that ravages the flora and fauna of rainforests around the world seems to pause briefly in an exhibit that opens Jan. 15 at the Spartanburg County Museum of Art galleries.

Visitors who view the 66 paintings and sculptures in the exhibit titled “Art of the Rainforest” are given a rare look into and beneath the 130-foot green canopies that cover the most diverse environments on the planet.

Scott Cunningham, museum manager and curator, said a visit to the exhibit will provide a rich educational experience.

“This is because of the nature of the show,” Cunningham said as paintings waiting to be hung for the exhibit leaned against the gallery walls. “For (art) students, it’s an opportunity to touch and learn texture.”

As he spoke, Cunningham held a painting of a kinkajou by Indianapolis artist Mark Kelso. Kinkajous are relatives of racoons.

“Look at the detail in the fur,” Cunningham said. “And the eyes, too.”

Though depletion has reduced the earth’s cover of rainforest from 12 percent to only 5 percent, no other environment can claim as many birds, mammals, amphibians, fish, insects, reptiles and plants.

For example, the Amazon, which comprises about half of what’s left of the world’s rainforests, is home to more than one-third of all living species.

And Greenpeace reports 25 percent of all medicines contain ingredients found in rainforest plants. Yet, the report states, only one percent of the world’s rainforest plants have been tested for their medicinal qualities.

Rainforests are the special subject matter for almost all the artists featured in the show in Spartanburg.

Sculptor Bart Walter, whose work will be shown, was chosen to commemorate the 2000 Gorillas on the Edge National Geographic Premiere at the United Nations. He was also the designer chosen for the Jane Goodall International Conservation Award.

Other artists whose works are included in the exhibition are Gamini Ratnavira, who paints rainforest imagery of his homeland of Sri Lanka and Asia; Carel Pieter Brest Van Kempen, whose portfolio features Africa; Richard Sloan, whose work features Central and South America, and Mary Helsaple. Her art and film of rainforests has been seen on ABC, The Discovery Channel and PBS.

Spartanburg’s Museum of Art is one of four gallery locations throughout the United States where “Art of the Rainforest” has appeared through 2006.

A curriculum guide for the show is available for grades 6-12.

“Art of the Rainforest” will be shown in the Milliken and Parsons galleries.

During the same period, Burwell Gallery will feature “Celebrating 100 Years of Art,” a showing that celebrates the Spartanburg County Museum of Art’s 1907 purchase of “The Girl with Red Hair” by Robert Henri.

The painting was the museum’s first piece in a permanent collection that now tops 300.

Nine sculptures that Tucker Bailey from Belews Creek, N. C., designed for the North Carolina Zoo will be on display at the rainforest exhibit.

“At a lot of shows I’m there for the openings, but don’t get to see the public,” Bailey said.

Spartanburg was to be the last stop of the rainforest show’s tour. But Bailey said the tour has been extended to include Detroit and Los Angeles before it ends.

Bailey traveled to Colorado recently to see the exhibit when it appeared in the town of Parker, outside of Denver.

“I’m eager to see it again,” Bailey said from her home. “I felt really lucky to see the exhibit.”