Chris Bauder: “The Gathering”
Clark County Government Center Rotunda Gallery, 500 S. Grand Central Parkway, Las Vegas, NV
Monday, March 14 - Friday, May 6, 2016

Reception on Friday, March 18 from 6-8 pm with artist talk at 6:30 pm

Chris Bauder's “The Gathering” installation will celebrate a familiar yet under appreciated symbol of the desert southwest --the tumbleweed. The artwork will be on view from March 14 through May 6 at the Clark County Government Center Rotunda Gallery, 550 S. Grand Central Parkway. A reception will be held from 6 to 8 pm on Friday, March 18, with an artist talk at 6:30 pm.

"The Gathering” is an installation composed of a 40- to 50-count mass of tumbleweeds the artist collected over a six-month period while traversing the stretch of high desert from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. Bauder says, “These weeds are given free range to travel like nomads throughout the desert, spinning through the flats, settling wherever the wind takes them.” The installed accumulation in the rotunda gallery will reveal clues to the backstories of these emblematic travelers. Nestled within the mound of weeds, the viewers will find some of the artists' hybrid sculptural objects fashioned from latex paint. “The idea that tumbleweeds both collect and disperse objects fascinates me on many levels,” says Bauder. The installation will animate this rarely glimpsed germination through the desert plains of the artist's mind.

Chris Bauder earned a Bachelors of Fine Arts from the University of Nevada, Reno and Masters of fine Arts from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He has exhibited in numerous local solo and group shows, including, most recently: Skull, Donna Beam Fine Art Gallery, La Vegas, NV; Life is Beautiful Festival, Las Vegas, NV; MAS Attack, Vast Space Projects, Henderson, NV; The Male Mind, Brett Wesley Gallery, Las Vegas, NV.