For shame if you've never visited the
mighty Mississippi, particularly in the
areas where it forges south to the Gulf,
neatly dividing our state from Iowa and
Minnesota. It is a river both broad and
revealing, a river both intimate and
seductive. Here a watery expanse, there
a bend.

Twenty-one pieces by Carl Bork depict
the Mississippi's many moods, and
certainly the mood of the painter. This
past summer was bountiful for this
young Milwaukee artist who graduated in
2003 with a BFA from Columbus College of Art and Design, in Columbus, Ohio. Bork frequently
works in the plein-aire mode, which is to say that he sets up his easel and paints, primarily with oils
on canvas, on site.

Some might say that plein-aire painting, particularly landscapes, is too sweet; that the impression left
by the artist on the canvas has nothing to do with real art and is best left to little old ladies and
gentlemen clad in painter's smocks out for a Sunday lark.
Bork's work is of a different stripe relaxed rather than forced, and lovely in a believable kind of way.
He seems to totally enjoy painting and the paint, and he thoroughly explores both while moving brush
across canvas.

The land doesn't get any flatter than that around Lincoln, Nebraska, where Tim Klunder, a current
resident of Rhinelander, Wisconsin, received his Fine Arts MFA. He seems to revel in uncluttered
landscapes, exemplified by two of his acrylic paintings which are rooted in observations made while
traveling by Amtrak across Illinois.

The exhibition is rounded out by four paintings by Sheboygan artist, Otto Finger, that capture the
essence of Wisconsin landmarks: Peninsula Park, Gills Rock and the Terry Andrae Dunes.

- Judith Ann Moriarty

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