THE GAZETTE
Wednesday, June 11, 2014 o
AUTHOR
Continued from Page B-4 has published a dozen books — 11 novels and a short story collection — since 2004, when her first “Glum and Mighty Pagans,” a comic novel about real estate in Manhattan, came out. Ottenberg does not restrict herself to a single genre. Four of her books are comedies; three are political, two, murder-dramas, and two, science fictionfantasy. “The most natural and enjoyable to write were the comedies. I was laughing out loud as I wrote them,” she said. “But now I’m embroiled in this scifi fantasy series, ‘The Human Struggle,’ which owes a lot to, of all people, [John] Milton.” Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” she noted, “was part of the inspiration for this series as were the novels of Philip K. Dick. Go figure.” “Realm of Shadows” (2013, 696 pages), the first in “The Human Struggle” series, is about the struggle to survive a war of the worlds, and “Zone of Illu-
PAINTING
Continued from Page B-4 that he had a group of photographs which he wanted to recycle, and found that crumpled up they made interesting and arresting compositions. One of the resulting paintings, “Unmanned” is much smaller scale (20” x 16”) but is perhaps even more compelling. Precisely rendered, with a strongly surrealist feeling, the folded and wrinkled paper reveals a face, probably that of the artist, peering out from its dark center. The crumpled photo lays on a set of keys and an envelope, again apparently exploring themes of identity and self-worth. As an already successful emerging artist, who has won other prizes since recently completing his MFA at the Maryland Institute College of Art, Hackett definitely looks like someone to watch. Nevertheless, to my mind Dan Perkins, another young finalist, is at least as strong a painter, but did not win any of the prizes. A recent graduate of the MFA program at American University, Perkins’ large oil on canvas “X Marks the Spot” (90” x 92”) is a luminous composition with a complex iconography. A fantasy landscape, replete with rays recalling the aurora borealis, opens under a tent-like structure that glistens in perspective. The pictorial space in this work, and its scale lure the viewer into what seems at once like a meditation on the
sion” (2014, 569 pages), the second, is about the effort to avert the collapse of an alternate reality. Ottenberg’s influences reflect her education; her bachelor’s and master’s degrees are in general studies in the humanities, with a focus on philosophy and literature, from the University of Chicago. As a media specialist, with a second master’s degree in library science from the University of Maryland, she introduces young children to literature. During her Philadelphia childhood, Ottenberg’s affinity for writing stories and Charles Dickens were evident early. Both her parents, a musician and a psychoanalyst, she said, “were always very intellectually curious, and this had a big effect on me.” When she started writing “in earnest” during high school, her attempt at a modernist novel was a “fiasco.” In college, she wrote short stories and more realistic fiction, and favored reading European writers. Post-college, Ottenberg
Romantic theme of the sublime in nature, or a surrealist dreamscape. Perkins was represented in the show with two other very small works that did not have the same punch as the large one, but they do show that the artist is fascinated by the juxtaposition of architectonic forms and landscape, as well as the natural with the improbable. Second place was won by Philip Hinge, another young painter whose crudely painted expressionist canvases with disco and pinball iconography have been featured in three issues of the “New American Paintings” publication, and is already represented by an important gallery in Washington, D.C. Ryan Carr Johnson took third place with works that exist in an equivocal status between painting and sculpture. Carr deconstructed an apparently large number of paintings he deemed unsuccessful, and re-used the wood of the stretchers to create the series he calls “Vector-ViceVersa.” Looking something like corrugated cardboard, the wood is glued together to form vshaped reliefs to which the artist applies up to 300 layers of latex paint, sanding each one before applying the next. The result is a mottled but smooth surface that looks something like faux marble in different colors. In his presentation, the artist referred to them as “the blue one, the purple one, the green one,” etc., suggesting, quite rightly, that their repetitive minimalist objecthood is the only thing of in-
Silver Spring author Eve Ottenberg’s “Zone of Illusion.” AMERICA STAR BOOKS
worked at The Village Voice in various capacities: deadline proofreader, copy editor, book
ANASTASI
DAN PERKINS
Dan Perkins’ “X Marks the Spot” lures the viewer with its Romantic imagery. Perkins attempts to reinterpret the sublime in nature with surrealist and symbolist additions. terest about them despite their layered surfaces. Johnson’s is certainly an unusual technique, and the works are provocative in this setting because of their challenge to the definition of a “painting” — something that might be seen to have been answered some time ago with the appearance of shaped canvasses
portrays Carmen Ghia — an assistant to the director — on stage while playing the role of an actual producer off stage. This is the first time both Kopp and Kauff have worked with the Sandy Spring Theatre Group. “I’ve produced a number of shows in the past with other theater companies,” Kopp said. “When I get involved in anything, whether it’s theatrical or otherwise, I like to get involved as much as I possibly can.” Although it’s been difficult at time getting everything just right for “The Producers” at the Arts Barn, Kopp said working with everyone associated with the show and Sandy Spring Theatre Group has been a great experience. “Everyone works very, very hard,” Kopp said. “We work as a team to try to solve some problems, like putting a big show like ‘The Producers’ on a smaller stage … which, creatively, is a lot of fun to do. I love the concept of taking a giant show and trying to scale it down.” Kauff said he hopes audiences take away a better appreciation for Brooks and his works.
Continued from Page B-4 him to take his place. Like any good friend, he did and ended up marrying the girl sometime later. The book tells this and many other stories about Anas-
tasi’s time growing up in Maryland. He explained that he had wanted to write the book because he and John had so many “fun experiences together.” “I would write a little bit and then I would remember something else and go back and add a little more,” Anastasi said.
studies languages — excelling in Spanish, Russian and French, and dipping into four others. Ottenberg chose to self-publish her books because breaking into commercial publishing was so difficult. “PublishAmerica, now America Star Books,” she said, “is a step or two up from selfpublishing. True, they use printon-demand technology and they do not put any money into advertising or promotion, but … they do not charge authors to publish them.” Ottenberg wouldn’t divulge what she is working on now. “Somehow that saps the creativity,” she explained. But for the future, she hopes her books will “gain some modest recognition. Ideally they’d do so well that I could retire on them, but I’m not holding my breath for that. There are so many of us novelists out there!” Eve Ottenberg’s books are available on amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com.
RYAN CARR JOHNSON
Continued from Page B-4
SANDY SPRING THEATRE GROUP
reviewer, criminal justice reporter. She wrote features about local politics and covered the
Housing Court, which led to a regular column titled “Hard Times,” about the politics of housing in New York City. Subsequently, Ottenberg wrote book reviews for The New York Times and Vanity Fair, and served as an editor at The Soho News, Standard & Poor’s and The New Jersey Law Journal. When she and her family — her journalist husband and two of their three children — moved to Maryland in 1990, she worked on the copy desk at Congressional Quarterly. Ottenberg’s credentials as a journalist gave her credibility as a fiction writer. “Since I never took creative writing courses, I didn’t have a support system, or people to encourage me. It wasn’t until I was a known journalist that people began responding to my fiction,” she said. Working as a media specialist and writing fiction in “a very serious way” have complemented each other. She writes in the summer, and edits and rewrites through the school year. In the rare spare time, she
“Vector-Vice-Versa Pu1” is a three-dimensional painted relief by Ryan Carr Johnson, winner of third. The “Pu1” in the title refers to the color purple that dominates this piece in the series.
PRODUCERS
Mara Bayewitz stars as Shirley Markowitz in Mel Brooks’ “The Producers” at the Arts Barn in Gaithersburg this weekend At Right: Bill Spitz plays one of his many characters in the play.
Page B-7
The title is a reference to letter writing, but also to Anastasi’s proclivity to pulling pranks on anyone and everyone while attending the all-boys Gonzaga College High School and eventually the University of Maryland. Anastasi majored in English
in the early 1960s. The Young Artist award, for an emerging artist under 30, was given to Ali Miller, the winner of the top “Best-in-Show” prize in this competition in 2012. Miller is also a narrative painter, with a complex sense of iconography that often seems to border on the surreal. She is also rep“Just the appreciation and brilliance of what was written there,” Kauff said. “His ability to not be [politically correct]. The ability to laugh at things that seem rough… anything that Mel Brooks has touched, nothing is PC. And that’s how I live my life. You can make fun of anything.” For Kopp, any opportunity to attract a younger audience is great. Teenagers and college students who are used to going to see shows such as “Bye, Bye Birdie,” and “Oklahoma,” with their parents might walk away from “The Producers” realizing how much fun it is to do musical theater. “[I hope they see] it’s fun, it’s edgy, it’s humorous, and that we on stage and everyone associated with Sandy Spring Theatre Group and the Arts Barn is having a good time,” Kopp said. “My hope for this show is to try to get more people involved. Community theater is a wonderful thing. It’s the most time-consuming extracurricular activity you can have, but it’s by far the most rewarding. “It’s like a never-ending softball league.” wfranklin@gazette.net
at the University of Maryland and went on to become a sports writer covering boxing and everything in between. When the paper he wrote for went out of business he went to work for the government writing speeches and press releases among other things. Although he said he’s not
resented with one very big (6’ x 8’) panel and two very small accompanying works. Also a graduate of MICA, Miller’s technique is a fascinating combination of smooth representative areas and bold active brushwork that results in a dizzying, hallucinatory effect in the large work (“To Help You See”), but achieves a darker, dreamlike feeling in the more abstract and much smaller “It Can’t All Fit” — a work that recalls the surrealist landscapes of Giorgio di Chirico and Salvador Dalí. Si Jae Byun is another finalist who deserves mention although she did not win a prize. A native of Korea, Byun earned an MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Her works
are a combination of extremely delicate ink drawings and acrylic colors on cut silk. The flowing graphic of these paintings, with long looping strokes of the pen, combine with the colors to suggest plant forms or even landscapes that allude to the traditions of Asian art while remaining abstract compositions. Bethesda Painting Awards, to June 28, Gallery B, 7700 Wisconsin Ave., Bethesda. Gallery hours are noon to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday; opening reception from 6-9 p.m. Friday, June 13. For more information, call 301-215-6660.
THE PRODUCERS n When: 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays, June 13-29 n Where: Gaithersburg Arts Barn, 311 Kent Square Rd., Gaithersburg n Tickets: $16, $18 non-residents n For information: 301-258-6394; sandyspringtheatregroup.org
sure whether or not he’ll write anymore books he did jokingly entertain the idea of a sequel entitled “P.S.” “I remember I would write to my friend John and I loved that,” Anastasi said. “The title of the book is ‘The Last Personal Letter,’ because everything is emails now
there are no personal letters. You used to have letters written by famous authors, we don’t have that anymore, you get junk mail and you get emails.” “The Last Personal Letter: Pranks for the Memories” is available on amazon.com.