Downtown Colorado Springs’ Arts Alley is going to be filled with sin — the seven deadly sins, to be exact. SIN — yes in all caps; these are the big ones, after all, the heavy hitters that have taken down empires — is an upcoming exhibition at the Bosky Studio, featuring collaborative works by 13 of the most notable artists in the Springs and beyond. And on First Friday June 6, SIN is going full alley takeover for a festive bacchanal to open the exhibition.
Under the direction of Bosky Studio, six painters and seven photographers from Colorado, New Mexico and Utah paired up last winter to develop collaborative work responding to one of the seven deadly sins — pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth — with varying degrees of horror, humor and titillation. The resulting original compositions are mainly photographs and oil paintings but include cakes and fashion apparel as well.
The opening reception will include the unveiling of the SIN art show with live music and sinful cakes at Bosky Studio. Across the alley, the perfectly name-paired Shame & Regret will be offering special Seven Deadly Sins-themed cocktails. And just down the alley, Lucky Devil Tattoo will be offering Seven Deadly Sins flash tattoos for walk-in inking.
“I especially want readers to know how playful this show is,” says local artist Claire Swinford, one of the co-creators behind SIN. “This show has been a bright spot for each of us, and I think that comes through in the work you’ll see on the walls. You may end up having some deep thoughts about the nature of transgression and righteousness, and that’s fine, but mostly we just want you to join us in poking at these powerful concepts in a way that deflates them a bit.
“All of the artwork produced for this show feels very human, very much a normal part of the experience of being a person. You may see yourself in these images, and that’s all right — there’s fun in being naughty, and there’s relief in realizing we all feel this way at some point or another.”
Exploring Themes of Sin
Themes of sin and virtue have inspired artists for centuries. And that was true in a discussion over cocktails at Cork and Cask between local artists Swinford, Brett Andrus, Lauren McKenzie and Grace Gatto as they brainstormed ways to collaborate together.
“We had this idea of, ‘Hey, let’s take the seven deadly sins, you know the old ones, and let’s make seven new ones. That’d be kind of fun. Let’s see if we can invent seven new deadly sins that we see in modern society,’” says Brett Andrus, painter and owner of Bosky Studio.
It was harder than it sounded. Andrus says the discussion got heated as one person raised an idea as original and another pointed out its ancient roots. The more ideas they came up with, the more they realized all the “new” bad behaviors traced back to the originals.
“As we started doing that, we just realized that these are all just the seven deadly,” Andrus says. “There’s just something about it that regardless of the spot on the historic time scale, these are seven opportunities that humans are just programmed to do poorly.”
Andrus says he is not a religious person but points to the themes of vice and virtue as universal.
“Every religion has got a version of their seven deadly sins,” he says. “The core elements of us as humans at our worst tend to live in one of these seven things, so it’s always an interesting place to start a dialogue.”
The artists involved in SIN come from a wide range of viewpoints on religion, and each had full discretion in how they approached their sinful subject matter, as long as they worked collaboratively with their partner.
“I grew up in a conservative religious community, and while I don’t identify with that community anymore, I still consider myself a person of faith,” Swinford says. “As my understanding of my own religious beliefs evolved, I really resonated with the idea popularized by Catholic writer James Keenan that ‘sin is the failure to bother to love.’ It suggests to me that we do the most harm — to ourselves, to others, to the planet — when we let our own busyness or distraction or convenience get in the way of making an intentional choice to act from our better nature.”
“A lot of my work already has religious themes in it, so this show was really exciting for me to be a part of,” says Springs-based painter Nicole Beck.
Regardless of the beliefs or backgrounds the artists were coming from, it became a common theme to re-examine or reinterpret the sin they had been assigned.
“I wanted to get away from a modern misunderstanding of sloth as just demonizing people for being lazy or [practicing] self-care or resting,” Beck says. “So looking back at the historical connotations of it, sloth actually has less to do with resting or laziness and more to do with neglecting responsibilities, particularly in regard to people who rely on you — children, vulnerable people that you have a responsibility to. So I wanted to bring that into the piece.”
An unexpectedly juxtaposed grizzly bear proved to be the conduit in her painting, an animal often dismissed as sleepy but one that can be very dangerous — much like sloth.
Swinford was interested in ways that the deadly sins are engendered, so she loved that her artistic partner, Jesus Rodriguez, created a series of overtly feminine photographs to portray wrath in contrast to its masculine stereotypes.
“In the shot I used for my painting, she looks like she’s giving this primal scream, and it’s glorious,” Swinford says. “To me, what she’s expressing is not a sin at all — it’s this beautiful thing: externalizing something that so often we’re told to stuff down to our own detriment…. It’s an evocation of the beauty and power of wrath, especially when it’s expressed by someone who’s expected not to.”
Levels of Collaboration
Another unique aspect of the SIN exhibition is its pairings of artists, which provided a way for them to work outside of their normal processes.
“I find it fun and fascinating because most studio artists — we tend to be very solitary creatures who sit in our studios and just make things by ourselves. It’s one of the few art forms where that’s how the art is made,” says Andrus.
By contrast, he compares it with musicians and dancers performing in bands and dance troops. “So visual artists either love or hate the opportunity to pair up and make something, but it’s always an opportunity for them to see an aspect of how they make their art. I personally love it.”
He and photographer Lauren McKenzie took a highly collaborative approach to their work on the sin of gluttony, working closely together throughout the process.
Other pairs, such as painter Dorielle Caimi and photographer Alisha Light, who are based in Santa Fe and Denver respectively, worked more independently on the deadly sin of lust. While there was some dialogue, Light primarily created photos then handed them off to Caimi.
“I’ve worked alone for so many years, and to work collaboratively, there were challenges, but there were also some delightful surprises,” Caimi says.
Perhaps the most accomplished and widely lauded painter in the lineup, Caimi says her normal creative rule of thumb is to dismiss the first five ideas that come to mind when approaching a new subject because they have most likely been considered many times in the cultural conscience. To be given photographs with another artist’s symbols and representation stretched her creatively.
“How can I use all of these things and still make it feel like something I would paint?” she asked herself. The answer was to infuse an element of humor to humanize lust.
“My angle with my work is always to try and get the more adult, mature and heavy side of women’s lives to come back to more innocent, childlike roots and to create more of a fleshed out version of womanhood,” Caimi says. “So I like the idea of her being lustful and therefore simple, but really, truly understanding that she’s just a human being who wants what everyone else wants: ‘to be truly loved for who I really am.’”
A Standout Show
Without a spoiler, you’ll have to attend the exhibition to see exactly how Caimi accomplished that. But overall, Springs art lovers will be treated to compelling work that accomplishes an exploration of age-old themes with a lighthearted depth.
Caimi regularly exhibits her work in New York and Los Angeles but says Colorado Springs is a great place to show her work and teach students, which she does at Bosky Studio.
“People are very receptive and open, and the artists there are are very hardworking and open to growing and becoming better at what they do,” she says.
As one of the Springs’ leading painters, Andrus exemplifies that ethos. The seasoned artist and instructor has curated about 325 shows during his 17 years of gallery ownership. As he nears completion of his two paintings in this show, he says he has put in more than 300 hours on each of them. And he describes his painting on gluttony as “probably the most. ambitious piece I’ve ever done.”
“As a painter, I always want to challenge myself. I just want to try to get better at each painting,” he says. “That’s always the goal — and to tell a good story and to make something beautiful. This was a really fun vehicle to do that. And the painting is coming out. I’m pretty happy about it, and I don’t usually say that.”
SIN First Friday Opening
The June 6 opening reception at Bosky Studio will feature SIN-themed art, music, cocktails, refreshments and tattoos throughout Downtown’s Arts Alley (midblock south of Bijou Street between Tejon and Cascade):
• SIN art show and live music with sinful cakes from Alyce in Flourland at Bosky Studio, 6-10:30 p.m.
• Seven Deadly Sins flash tattoos at Lucky Devil Tattoo, 12-10 p.m. ($150, walk-ins only)
• Seven Deadly Sins-themed cocktails at Shame & Regret, 4 p.m. – 1:30 a.m. (prices vary)
Contributing Artists
Brett Andrus, oil painter, Colorado Springs
Nicole Beck, oil painter, Colorado Springs
Dorielle Caimi, oil painter, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Matt Chmielarczyk, portrait photographer, Colorado Springs
Grace Gatto, wedding photographer, Denver
Stevie Granger, photographer, Denver
Natalie Gray, editorial photographer, Denver
Phil Lear, oil painter, Colorado Springs
Alisha Light, portrait photographer, Denver
Lauren McKenzie, portrait photographer, Colorado Springs
Jesus Rodriguez, fashion photographer, Salt Lake City, Utah
Elizabeth Selby, oil painter, Colorado Springs
Claire Swinford, oil painter, Colorado Springs
