MICHAEL SWAN: THIS JUST IN >>>

Mineral gallery tossed the following press release our way a tiny time ago. Tacoma artist Chris Sharp has a new show, TINY, at the Tacoma Dome District gallery except the freaking thing is by appointment until Jan. 3. Those attending the Northwest Wedding Expo at the Dome Jan. 2-3 are SOL unless they phone ahead. Damn holiday-loving gallery owners!

Oh course we kid as Mineral owner Lisa Kinoshita is super rad.

Here is the press release with the operating hours at the end:

Mineral is pleased to present TINY: New Works by Chris Sharp, through February 2, 2010. This exhibit offers a glimpse into the artist's process through a collection of drawings and paintings in various stages of completion. As Sharp writes, "A painting isn't a linear object with a beginning, middle or end. There is no such thing as a finished painting or a complete body of work. My paintings are a living history of my perspective of formalism. It's a vote as to what I think painting should be." Visitors are invited to flip through stacks of Sharp's studies, which are clipped to the gallery walls. 

Sharp is a widely known local artist who, in 2008, received the first annual "Foundation of Art Award" established by the Greater Tacoma Community Foundation. In addition to his fine art, he has influenced the look of downtown Tacoma with work as a painter of original signage, creating classic, free-hand logo art for businesses including Satellite Coffee, the Rosewood Café, the Hub Restaurant, Tacoma Bike, and Blackwater Café.
 

TINY includes figurative paintings and abstract compositions layered with suggestive, fragmented messaging. "Typically illustrative and sentimental paintings weird me out," he says. "I can be sincere in the moment, paint something heartfelt, and for awhile it abides by what I see as being good, but over time the sentiment is lost and the painting feels unfinished and too dependent on that context or that particular emotion that made me paint it in the first place." In that sense, the work in TINY feels more like an open-ended proposal.


In addition to regular hours, a gallery event for TINY will be held at Mineral on January 21. 
Address: 301 Puyallup Ave. - Suite A (that's in Tacoma's Dome District, not Puyallup)
. Hours: Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday noon-5. By appointment only December 22-January 3. 
Contact: 253.250.7745.