We Have an Issue: At Night the Art Comes Out to Play: Inside Ion Art’s neon wonderland, the “Surreal Garden” exhibit at Zilker Botanical Garden – Columns

I wouldn’t explain listings editor Wayne Alan Brenner as obtaining an especially jaundiced look at of the environment, but I did chortle out loud when he reported this to me yesterday: “The a lot more I see art and evaluate art, the a lot more I am unwell of it and artists.”

Context is important below: Brenner was conversing to me about why he was drawn to profile Ion Art, the subjects of this week’s cover story. A modest shop established by spouse-and-spouse workforce Greg and Sharon Keshishian, Ion Art is responsible for some of the most iconic neon signage in city (which include the Chronicle‘s individual I-35-experiencing one particular, a pinkish-crimson beacon because the early Nineties). Brenner was lamenting how snooty the art environment can be, dismissive of neon as a medium. “‘You know, it is bars and strip joints, which is what that is,'” Brenner explained, mimicking artwork elitists. “They [Ion] have to get the job done in opposition to that stigma.”

In reporting his story, Brenner put in some time at Ion Art’s style and design-establish studio, marveling at the get the job done-in-development pieces for their forthcoming “Surreal Backyard garden” interactive artwork show at the Zilker Botanical Back garden. (He was our gentleman with a digital camera, far too Brenner shot the studio photos, when John Anderson took the deal with portrait and more photographs to be located on the internet with this story.) Pointing to Ion’s facility with not just neon but also glass and wooden and steel, not to mention the engineering know-how expected to make it all zing, Brenner drew a thematic line back again to the Shaker ladder-back chair – a further beautiful intersection of artwork and craft.

Consider that, artwork snoots.

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