CAW Makes Magic From Metal

A boy frozen in time, submerged after a jump into dark water as if in mid-flight. A short history of an ancestor, and how the magic left the family. A corroded Lady Justice standing on top of the world.

The current exhibition at Creative Arts Workshop, from now until April 2, features work from CAW’s classes ranging from drawing and painting to photography to textiles to sculpture. This also makes it full of pleasures, the thrill of discovery at walking off Audubon into CAW’s airy, spacious two-floor gallery to find yourself both amused and moved.

Among the many highlights are Stephanie Anestis​‘s photographs, Dive I and Dive II, each of which capture the swimmer at the moment he enters the water, not yet recovered from submersion. The positions of the body are unnatural, maybe even a little ominous. But that also adds to the mystique, adding mystery to a common thing (at least in warmer weather).

Lynne Ditman likewise makes water integral to her painting in both form (watercolor) and content (rocks worn smooth by flowing current). The technical execution — at first glance it could be mistaken for a photograph — highlights the connection. Ditman’s saturated brush moved over the image of the subjects in much the same way the actual current moved over the rocks themselves.

Two entries from a class on narrative illustration show how the form can be bent in different directions. Pamela Carley used her time to create a playful version of Lewis Carroll’s famous poem ​“The Walrus and the Carpenter.” In one panel, cabbages and kings cavort with one another. In another, pigs really do fly, with Carley’s style making an angular shadow-puppet play of it all.

Meanwhile, in just six panels with simple, clear illustrations, Sharoda Worby-Selim tells a novel’s worth of story about the history of her family. ​“My great, great, great, aunt was magical. She could heal people and she could see the future,” the text states matter-of-factly. ​“The magic ran in our family, in our blood. She was very important to her people. They respected and loved her. She was a leader.

“But she was sick,” the narration continues, the statement in a panel all by itself.

“The village was full of her ​‘children,’ but she could not give birth to any herself. She worked for her people until she was too sick to move. They made her comfortable, but they hated her pain. When she died, the magic, the sickness, left our family. That’s what I was told.”

Switching media, the metal sculptures have a way of drawing the eye, beginning with Sherry Block’s meticulously constructed owl. On its prominent perch in the center of the gallery, it looks like a fantastical clockwork version of the real animal — as if, with the turning of gears and stretching of springs, it could spread its wings and fly off.

Sherlock Campbell’s dog is similarly lifelike, the metal seeming almost as soft as fur as it captures the subject in mid-stretch. The animated quality of the piece makes it quite moving to see the framing around the underbelly and the paws, as if the dog could come apart if it’s not careful.

Beverly Waters’s repurposing of her grandfather’s tools, turning his craft into her art, becomes a touching meditation on some of the skills that can be lost from generation to generation, yet sometimes rediscovered, too.

And what is an art exhibit these days without a little politics? Near the entrance to the gallery, Jim McNulty’s untitled piece makes its point clearly. Lady Justice, blindfolded as always but here corroded to the point of emaciation, strides across the hapless planet beneath her feet. Her scales aren’t just unbalanced. They’re tipping wildly, as if they’re swinging out of control. Maybe beyond anyone’s ability to stop it.