Yanashot and Ciocca’s Art Exhibit

A painting featured at the Madelon Powers Gallery Art Exhibit. Photo Credit / David Nostrand
A painting featured at the Madelon Powers Gallery Art Exhibit. Photo Credit / David Nostrand
A painting featured at the Madelon Powers Gallery Art Exhibit.
Photo Credit / David Nostrand

BY DAVID NOSTRAND

SC Copy Editor

From September 3 to October 4, the Madelon Powers Gallery, located in the Fine Arts and Performing Center, ran an exhibit featuring the works of Denis Yanashot (sculpture) and Mark Ciocca (print).

Yanashot, hailing from Scranton, Pennsylvania and graduate of Marywood University and Wilkes University, started his artistic endeavors in painting, focusing on airbrush, touch-up, and production line spray gun techniques.

However, visitors to the exhibit will find his works featured are sculptures, specifically in mixed media (bone, rope, steel, and wire) and stone.

According to his artistic statement, Yanashot took inspiration for his mixed media sculptures from flight, aiming to depict it in different variations, from man-made inventions to the natural flight of birds.

One sculpture is shaped like a helicopter, with a cow’s skull serving as the vehicle’s body as a set of bones attached to the top act as rotor blades.

Site specific mixed media sculptures were also displayed, which were constructed to evoke a sense of rigid structure.

These massive pieces hung from the mezzanine and descended to the ground in the exhibit’s center.

Also on display were Yanashot’s stone sculptures, most depicting plant forms in various stages.

Several works feature an look inside the plant showing the seeds resting in their pods. These smooth marble works were purposely chosen because of how they contrast with the earthy, dirtier bone structures. When taken together, Yanahot’s contributions to the exhibit show both life in its inception and death, though Yanashot hopes that using the bones of dead animals as an artistic expression will give them new life.

Like several other exhibits at the Madelon Powers Gallery, this one features both two and three-dimensional works. Mark Ciocca provides the two-dimensional art with his linocut and watercolor prints. Ciocca also works out of Pennsylvania. A graduate of Kutztown University, he teaches art for the Pocono Mountain School District.

Ciocca’s art is a reflection of his social and political observations; most prints featured in the gallery carry a political message. He takes inspiration from Francisco Goya, Thomas Nast,

Rockwell Kent, and Fernando Botero, who used their art to make statements in times of social unrest, which Ciocca believes is applicable to the present.

The artist reception, held on September 8, was well attended by faculty, including President Welsh, and friends and families of the artists.

The next exhibit, opening October 9 and ending November 15, will feature work from 29 different artists, both regional and national. The artists responded to a call for art in any media related to the theme “Marks.”

A reception for the artists will also be held on October 9 from 4 PM to 6 PM, and Ajean Ryan, traveling from Colorado, will give a gallery talk at 5 PM. The Madelon Powers Gallery is open for free to the public. Its hours are Monday, Tuesday, and Friday 11 AM to 4 PM, and Wednesday and Thursday 11 AM to 7 PM.

Email David at: 

dnostrand@live.esu.edu