Brent Sommerhauser

Artist Statement
There are thin, quiet places where invisible forces and visible material collide. The surface of an empty page approached by a pencil and a thought, or a little wind meeting the world; nudging, persuading, diverting.

I believe there is potency there at that barrier. Where, saddled with fuzzy lucidity, you might still lasso a daydream or tug at moments each afloat in their own way. There and not there, everything and nothing. Both, at once. a “tangle of matter and ghost,” as Leonard Cohen mentioned a time or two.

I combine unspoken narrative and practical objects to merge two types of memory – the subtle mental process and that familiar record left upon physical material. As if preserving a glimpse of a situation as a prop to experience. In coercing material to bend to both memory and structure, the imagined is made tangible while romancing the real.

Education
2001-03 Master of Fine Arts, Glass, The Ohio State University – Columbus, OH
1993-97 BFA (Glass)/ BS in Psychology, Emporia State University – Emporia, KS
1991-93 Associate of Arts/Associate of Science, Butler County Community College – El Dorado, KS

Selected Exhibitions
2010
Let’s Talk About Love, Baby, traveling invitational project curated by Chido Johnson

2009
On, Of or About: 50 Paper Works, invitational exhibition, Gallery I & II, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX

Solo Exhibition, the wind would find it out, Greg Kucera Gallery, Seattle, WA

International Drawing Annual 2008 exhibition-in-print (catalogue), Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center, Cincinnati, OH

The 10th International Shoebox Sculpture Exhibition, invitational exhibition (catalogue), University of Hawaii at Manoa Art Gallery, Honolulu, HI

Clark County 2009 3D Invitational, Clark County Government Center, Las Vegas, NV

2008
EMU as Muse, Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, MI

After Tractatus: Art in Amazonia, traveling invitational exhibition to five venues throughout Brazil, Columbia and Peru (catalogue)

Solo Exhibition, Amidst: An exhibition of recent coercions, Donna Beam Fine Art Gallery, Las Vegas, NV

2007
Solo Exhibition, Structuring the Invisible, Clark County Government Center, Las Vegas, NV

3dementia, invitational sculpture exhibition, Contemporary Arts Collective, Las Vegas, NV

Architecture/Structure in Contemporary Craft, invitational, The Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston, MA

LVAM 56th Art Roundup Juried Exhibition, The Las Vegas Art Museum, Las Vegas, NV

Home sweet home: Ross Salyers, Brent Sommerhauser, and Laura Ward, SOIL, Seattle, WA

Telegraph Collective, Meadowbrook Art Gallery, Oakland University, Rochester Hills, MI

2006
Review Studios Group Exhibition, Review Inc., Kansas City, MO

Me Bike Project (collaboration with Christian Tedeschi,) Gallery Chiellerie, Amsterdam, Netherlands

ArtChicago/Stray Show, The Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL

2005
In, Around, and Through: Observations and Interventions in the Built Environment, Urban Culture Project, Kansas City, MO

Kansas City Flatfile Invitational, H & R Block ArtSpace, Kansas City, MO
NOVA Young Art Fair, Chicago, IL

2004
Toronto Alternative Art Fair International, Gladstone Hotel, Toronto, Ontario

Arts in the City, presented by Detroit Synergy/Detroit Artists Market, The Detroit Club, Detroit, MI

Windsor Biennial 2004, Art Gallery of Windsor, Windsor, Ontario

Solo Exhibition, Threshold, Front Street Gallery, Urban Institute for Contemporary Art, Grand Rapids, MI

unCAGEd, Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit, Ann Arbor, MI (honoring the residency of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company)

2003
Actual Size Biennial, detroit contemporary, Detroit, MI

Solo Exhibition, This is not now…, MFA Exhibition, Hoyt L. Sherman Studio Art Center, Columbus, OH

Awards
2008 Honorable Mention Fellowship Award, Nevada Arts Council (2008 and 2007)
Cirque du Soleil Community Support Grant for the Visual and Performing Arts, Las Vegas, NV

2007 Jackpot Grant Award, support of the solo exhibition, Structuring the Invisible, Nevada Arts Council

2006 Commissioned drawing, published advertisement for Boulevard Brewing Co., Kansas City, MO

2005 Selected Entry, Jutta Cuny-Franz Memorial Award, Düsseldorf, Germany

New Glass Review 26, Corning Museum of Glass Corning, New York, Work selected as one of one hundred innovative works in glass worldwide

2004 Distinguished Alumni Award for Excellence in Professional Career, Butler County Community College – El Dorado, KS
Public and Corporate Work

2004 DaimlerChrysler Global Supplier Award, Assistance in fabrication under the direction of designer, Ericia Bartels-Dawkins, Detroit, MI

Healing Garden for Children and Labyrinth, Participated in the design and creation of a memorial garden, tiled wall and 40’ diameter labyrinth,

The Ohio State University, The Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute, Columbus, OH

2002 Contributed to “Another mile of tile” project, Mosaic tiled wall (ceramic and glass) Penland School of Crafts, Penland, NC

1998 Project foreman, architectural glass installation, for the Arts project, Copeland Hall, University of Nebraska, Kearney, NE
Commissioned set elements for the theater production “The Daily Grind”, El Dorado, KS

Artist-in-Action, commissioned glass and steel totem, Smoky Hill River Festival, Salina, KS

Bibilography
Onward from Lynda Benglis: what is poured, puffed and curled on the floor, Regina Hackett, Another Bouncing Ball, July 13, 2009

International Drawing Annual 4, Manifest Press, Cincinnati, OH, August 2009

Artists’ answers are blowin’ in the wind – Kristen Peterson, Las Vegas Sun, June 20, 2008

Detroit:Telegraph – Lynn Crawford, Editor, Issue 2, published by the Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit (MOCAD), Winter 2007

Nervy and Modern, Glen Bergers, thedetroiter.com, March 12, 2004

Sequence of Reversals, Hesse McGraw, REVIEW Architecture Annual, September 2003, Kansas City, MO

International Glass Art – Richard Yelle, Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 2003, New York, NY

Collections
H & R Block World Headquarters – Kansas City, MO
Cam Ocagi (The Glass Furnace), Istanbul, Turkey
Penny Berk and Phillip Attneave – Seattle, WA
Dean Geleynse – Honolulu, HI
Dr. J.F. Gross, Ph.D. – Tucson, AZ
Greg Kucera and Larry Yocom, Seattle, WA
Tim Mast – Detroit, MI
Ron and Phyllis Nolan – Kansas City, MO
Linda Shields – Las Vegas, NV