Local Art

Over the past few weeks we have studied various different types of art works. I attended Guillan 35 located in Lytle, Texas, which is a privately owned art gallery. The gallery along with the art pieces belongs to Anthony Guillan. I was very privileged to meet the artist because he gave me his inside feelings about the art pieces. Guillan displays around two hundred art pieces that are composed from anything he can get his hands onto. Most of his art pieces are oil and water color medium. Other art pieces are made with chairs, eye glasses, sheets of metal, wood, water hoses, and so forth. The two pieces that I chose to write on have not been giving names. Guillan informed me that neither pieces are done but, until he gets the material to finish them he put them on display.


The piece of art that impressed me the most is composed of metal from a Volkswagen. It is a painting as well as a sculpture. This art piece is very colorful and immediately catches ones eye. I was drawn to this piece of art because of its overall look. The art piece is an illustration of an opened mouth. Within the mouth, he painted teeth which included cavities and all the thousands of germs. Guillan stated that this piece of art is his interpretation of the Rolling Stones. The first thing that caught my eye was the bright red lips and tongue. Within the red lips the value is both light and dark. Once focusing on the piece, I noticed that it is asymmetrical. The bottom lip is thicker than the top lip and the painting is not equally divided in the middle. I would consider this piece of art three-dimensional because the tongue protrudes out away from the painting.
The whole art piece is flat except for the tongue. I would also consider the art pieces a little rough and a little shiny. It is a type of art piece that the contrast between the colors is obvious. My overall impress of the piece of art is that it is absolutely beautiful. I don’t care for art that much but, I would buy this piece. The way he put the pieces together shows us that it has the sense of making it visionary. While making this piece the artist used a lot of imagination. The message I got from this piece was that the mouth contains lots of germs.


The second piece of art is made with blue jean pants and jackets. It is a painting that has a free formed frame. It does not catch the audience’s attention right away. After taking several minutes to view the piece, I realized that it is an illustration of the United States reversed. Guillan explain that the reason he put the United States backwards was because of a comment he heard on television. It was an interview of a foreigner and he stated that “You American will never understand us can you don’t see yourselves from the inside out.” I found it really striking that the art piece was made out of clothes. Guillan placed the clothing in a certain form and combined them together with glue. He used cement ties not to hold it together but, to represent the binding of keeping the United States together. The colors used in this piece are all naturally light colors except for the outlining border. This piece of art is asymmetrical because the right side of the painting is bigger than the left side. I consider this piece three-dimensional because the pants are full pants with the pockets and zippers and because he also uses wire. The texture of the art piece is rough and dull. Using natural colors gives the dull look to the painting. The contrast is subtle between the colors. My overall impression of the piece is that it is amazing how he uses the pants and jackets to make this. I feel it is a peacefully piece of art because it ties all the states in the United States together.

I didn’t see any disadvantages of viewing the art pieces in person. The advantage of seeing the art pieces in real person is that I was able to meet the artist. By doing this he gave me all the background information behind each piece. Another advantage is that I was able to see every little detail in the art pieces. While viewing them online you can’t enlarge the picture so I missed some of the elements in the paintings. Another disadvantage of viewing them online is I have dial up so it takes about an hour for one page to display. But on the other side, the advantage of doing it online is that it saves me time and gas to go to a gallery.