Though we're immersed in the dark depths of winter cold, the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD) is set to illuminate the city's art scene during the year's first Gallery Night & Day. The Jan. 16-17 Winter Gallery weekend will feature exhibits by MIAD instructors and graduates, a variety of print shows and a "Sculptures on Ice" contest beginning at 10 a.m. Friday.
MIAD's Frederick Layton Gallery presents "Personal Culture: New Art from Latin Americans," featuring five Latino artists who challenge our ideas about Latin America and its cultural identities. These artists include Victor Cartagena, Milwaukee's Santiago Cucullu, Mirta Kupferminc, Tatiana Parcero and Wisconsin's Rafael Francisco Salas. An opening reception Friday, 5 to 9 p.m., offers an opportunity to explore Latin America through the eyes of these exceptional artists.
The Elaine Erickson Gallery features MIAD's printmaking professor Rina Yoon in "Sympathetic Fibers." Yoon's exotic rice-paper prints and drawings, often delicately detailed with hand painting, illustrate the human form in large-scale images of complex colors or pale neutrals. The Erickson Gallery, open Friday until 9 p.m., hosts an artist's reception on Saturday, 1 to 3:30 p.m.
Next door at Grava Gallery will be the prints of recent MIAD graduates Jon Raleigh, Karin Haas and Violet Gutierrez in the exhibit "Movements in Printmaking." While Raleigh etches human portraits in black and white, Haas portrays flowers and feathers with decorative patterns on colored papers. There will be a reception Friday until 9 p.m. and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
At the second-floor Cedar Gallery, housed above the Third Ward Starbucks, MIAD instructor Shane Walsh exhibits "Shipwreck Paintings." Walsh's watery blue and ebony paintings explore both the exhilaration and the terror of the unknown. Opening reception: Friday, 6 to 10 p.m.
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North of the Historic Third Ward, the Armoury Gallery presents another ambitious exhibition, "Western States," which opens with a reception from 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and noon to 5 p.m. Saturday. The show features MIAD instructor and installation artist Colin Matthes along with nationally recognized individuals from west of the Mississippi River, including Aili Schmeltz, William Hundley, Gavin Bunner, Colleen Sanders and Adrianne Watson.
The White Whale Artist Collective presents two recent MIAD graduates in a partner show, "Strings, Mounds, Lines & Sounds." Emily Siegel Belknap and Julia Schilling offer multiple mediums-including paintings, carved limestone and sound boxes-that compare the natural order to manmade arrangements. A reception takes place 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and noon to 5 p.m. Saturday.
Other exhibits of interest include more than 50 lithographs by Marc Chagall at the David Barnett Gallery, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday; "Nicholas Grider: Men in Suits," at the Portrait Society Gallery, 6 to 9 p.m. Friday; and the premiere Harambee Gallery Night event at ArtWorks for Milwaukee, where posters and prints made by ArtWorks apprentices will be displayed as part of an interactive public art event at 1421 N. Water St., 5 to 8 p.m. Friday.
