On view Th-Sat May 4-27 noon to 5pm

Beginner’s Mind is an installation view into the wide variety of work Michael Farrell created in the three decades of the 1960s through ‘80s. 

K’s Heart Box, 1968

Michael Farrell began producing his signature assembled box constructions while a student in the late 1960s. After becoming a filmmaker, moving to Nebraska in 1972 and working professionally in public television he continued to pursue a very personal, private, and idiosyncratic artmaking practice largely hidden from public view. That changed when he had his first public exhibition in 1991. The next year he won a coveted Nebraska Arts Council’s Visual Artist Fellowship and that launched his career as a serious artist.

Shit Creek Saga, 1972

The variety and complexity of that inward-looking early work offers insight into the development of this artist’s mind. In addition to the familiar assembled objects viewers will see Jungian inspired collage, deeply personal diaristic photography, plans, drawings, and sketches for conceptual art pieces, never seen before objects and the highlight of the show: a one of a kind artist book titled Space Man is Dream Boat.

Lewd & Lustful Man, 1979

Join us for a First Friday celebration with refreshments and music from 5pm on at the gallery at 17^th & Sumner. Music at 7pm by Perseid Winds (see below for details).

Magikist Series, Eros Matrix, 1971

About the 7pm music for our opening reception:

Perseid Winds is a Graduate wind quintet based at the Glenn Korff School of Music, formed in the early Fall of 2022. This group is made up of flutist, Rose Khorsandi, oboist, Joey Schrotberger, clarinetist, Emily Rose, bassoonist, Natale Francel Stone, and horn, Bradley Greathouse. Their newest project was in collaboration with many of the composers of UNL, both new and old. The call for compositions created a program of pieces outside of traditional quintet repertoire, which then begged the idea–“what if we create a concert setting outside of traditionalist means?” The culmination of these  efforts will be heard in the background of WallSpace-lnk’s newest showcase, Perseid Winds looks forward to seeing you there! 

First Strike’s Coup Stick, 1981

featuring photographs by Michael Farrell and poems by Twyla M. Hansen.

We’re extending the exhibition through April due to great audience response, a sold out first edition of the companion book and a lot more work to be shared.

Reception with the artists Friday, April 7, 5-8 pm
with refreshments and acoustic music by Duo Brazil at 5pm

Brief remarks and a poetry reading around 6pm

House Without a Dreamer
 
The farm house a family once inhabited
with its front porch and upstairs dormers
 
where a child, a girl, perhaps, witnessed
the moonrise from her tall bed,
 
fell asleep to the rise and fall of wind
through cottonwood leaves and ferns,
 
snowball bush blooms and common
ditch-lilies that fold up their orange
 
business for the night. She tucks
her turtle-neck under the covers,
 
protected, lonely, dreams of what
the word elsewhere might promise.

 – Twyla M. Hansen

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Companion Book in Second Printing!

A signed and numbered second edition of the companion book will be available for purchase as well as signed image poem/pairs suitable for framing.

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Large scale prints on view!

This month we’ll be featuring museum scale prints of some of the images not previously seen and which will showcase the very high quality inherent in the 8×10 view camera. Don’t miss this chance to see these images at 40″x50″!

Photographs by Michael Farrell and poems by Twyla M. Hansen

For about three years beginning in 2019 I made frequent trips to Otoe County, Nebraska looking for photographs using two large format cameras, a 5”x7” and an 8” x 10”. One nice thing about this county is that it has a lot of minimum maintenance dirt roads. I drove all of them, some many times. Later I asked my friend Twyla Hansen, our former state poet who has roots in rural Nebraska, to look at the pictures and respond with a few poems. She responded beyond my dreams with over 30 heartfelt poems. While these photographs and poems were inspired by rural Otoe County they could have been made in many of our nation’s rural areas. The issues and scenes we find here in the heart of the heartland are also found throughout.

Michael Farrell

A limited edition book with 30 poems and 60 photographs will be available at the gallery for purchase. Unframed prints and poem pairs will also be available for purchase.
Show dates March 2 through April 1, Th -Sat, noon to five or by appointment.

Plus new portrait sessions information…

Do you desire to be awake? Truly awake–tasting and seeing like you never have before?

The exhibition, “Awake, My Soul” is a series of photographs captured by Lexi Fields, Megan Wilberger and Emily Frenzen. “When brainstorming what we wanted this exhibit to be about, we came across a common thread that hit a strong chord in all of our hearts–being truly awake. The awakened sense comes with walking with Jesus through grief, joy, love, pain, wonder, surrender, and truth…”

This collection is full of diverse photos from the walks of these 3 individuals, each accompanied by stories and words expressed from their hearts. The exhibit is inspired by Ephesians 5:14, “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

Wayfaring Strangers style portrait sessions in February

Michael Farrell is going to be scheduling new Wayfaring Strangers style portrait sessions through February. These will be at the home studio. Get in touch via email at mfarrell.1st@gmail.com for more information, pricing and to schedule a session. Singles, couples & small groups welcome.

“Keeping Time,” Michael Farrell’s new collection of boxes is on display in January 5-28 at WallSpace-LNK, 1624 S. 17, Lincoln. A First Friday opening reception runs from 5-8 p.m., Friday, January 6. These three dimensional still life assemblages offer meditations on the concept of impermanence, tinged with nostalgia, eroticism or wit. The collection was created over the last several weeks since Farrell’s seventy-fifth birthday.

“Sometimes life events cause one to reconsider everything. The counters reset to zero and you start over again. Many of these boxes had been sitting in an unfinished state in my studio, sometimes over decades, waiting to be paid attention to. Others just sprung to life fresh once I started working this way again,” the artist stated.

With titles like Nymph, Satyr, Herm, Kouros and Jeune Fille these objects remind us of the bittersweet fragility of life, the fruitlessness of ego, and the comedy of the human condition.  This tradition in western art dates back to the foundations of our European culture. But perhaps it is more appreciated in the Japanese idea of “wabi sabi,” the beauty found in the worn out, decayed or broken.

Michael Farrell has been making assembled objects for over five decades. His exhibition spanning his box making career, “Inside the Box”drew large attendance and sales last year at WallSpace-LNK. Noted art critic L. Kent Wolgamott observed Farrell’s “subtly stunning” work “continually reveals new ideas and emotions. That’s a primary function of art.”