“Invoking American Spirits” in April

Celebrate the heritage of the Surrealist artistic movement with a new exhibit.

“Invoking American Spirits,” marks the centennial of Dada & Surrealism with a series of assembled objects exploring “the realms of dreams, fantasies, and the irrational.”

French poet/philosopher Andre Breton published the Surrealist Manifesto in 1924, embracing “the creative potential of the unconscious mind.” Surrealists welcomed using chance and unlikely juxtapositions as a method to shock the mind and senses.

Lincoln artist Michael Farrell has been making work inspired by this tradition for more than half a century, but this new work was made in a “fever of activity following a spate of vivid dreams and chance encounters with the materials of their making.”

The works invoke the spirits of American ancestors, both famous and anonymous. “I want to call down a feeling of empathy for the inevitability of the fate that awaits us all. April brings forth new life for those of us who share the stage of this particular moment, but not for all those who lie beneath the greening grass.”

Seeking historic and found photographs, antique objects, tools and items from nature Farrell has assembled contemporary surreal reliquaries, tabernacles, shrines and stelae reminiscent of ancient funerary and religious icons.

See and hear more about these remarkable objects 12-5  p.m. Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays April 5-28 and at the First Friday reception from 5-8  p.m. April 5. Viewing and sales also available by appointment; text to 402-429-3684