Repetition greets many at USU’s Chase Fine Arts Center on Thursday night

By: Kristen Steiner

Observers, admirers, family and friends walked in to the white walled gallery at Utah State University’s Chase Fine Arts Center Thursday night to celebrate and admire the Master of Fine Arts Thesis Exhibit being given by graduate student Shasta Krueger called “Repeated Impressions.”

Krueger's work

Krueger’s exhibit, entirely ceramic based, consisted of a variety of sculpted boxes, pots and wall installations. The collection, cohesive in the fact that similar shapes and figures were repeated throughout the assemblage, displayed each piece on a podium accompanied with a second or third piece that mirrored the design of the original. Even the overall design layout of the wall installations was found in the shapes of the boxes and pots.

“I was playing off the ideas of repetition and multiples,” Krueger said as she stood in the middle of the gallery floor with a look of joyful satisfaction on her face as she greeted those visiting the exhibit. “It came from everyday things like the pattern of roof tiles and bricks.”

Even the use of the continual pattern from the finger imprints on the artwork is used to represent repetition, Krueger said.

After working at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee, Krueger moved to Cache Valley to start her graduate work at USU. Krueger, originally from Seattle, works mainly with clay, but has an interest in wood firing as well.

Krueger working on her designs

“She really enjoyed printmaking while she was growing up,” Allison Krueger, mother of Shasta Krueger said, “but it was ceramics that she held to.”

Now that the show has ended, pieces that were sold will go to their rightful owners and the remaining pieces will need to find a place to be shown and displayed, Krueger said.

More information on Krueger and her work can be found at https://campus.digication.com/shastakrueger/Wilkommen

International Interior Designer speaks to USU students about new book

By: Kristen Steiner

Noriega-Ortiz lecturing
USU student while showing them
past designs

Utah State University interior design students, faculty and staff gathered into the Caine Performance Hall this afternoon at 4:30 to hear internationally acclaimed interior designer, Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz, lecture on his recently released book, “Suspending Reality: Interiors by Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz.”

Thanks to Darrin Brooks, USU’s interior design associate professor, Noriega-Ortiz was the 21st designer to visit USU for the annual interior design lecture series in which he was warmly welcomed.

Noriega-Ortiz entered the stage wearing a very stylish navy suit and bow tie accompanied by his iconic shiny, copper shoes only to then make a lighthearted joke and begin his lecture on his newly released book.

 “I find that reality is a little hard and the work we do as designers should suspend that reality and should take you to a better place,” Noriega-Ortiz said in regards to the title of his new book.

“Making an Entrance,” “Opening Acts,” “Theatrical Magic,” “Staying on Script,” “Mis-en-scene,” “Playing with Illusions” and “Colorful Characters” are the seven-featured topics in his new book that he explained in detail to those in attendance at today’s lecture.

Noriega-Ortiz lecturing
USU students

“There are seven different ideas that have carried my projects for the past 20 years,” Noriega-Ortiz said, so naturally those were made into the book’s chapters.  

The designer spent the remainder of his lecture flipping through slides of pictures of past projects to explain to students the different topics he had come up with for his book.

“His idea of creating a story is inspiration to go forth,” said Becky Harmon, a USU sophomore studying interior design. “He makes you remember why you’re doing what you are doing.”

Noriega-Ortiz grew up in Puerto Rico, but began his career in New York City in 1983 working for the world-renowned interior and product design studio of John F. Saladino, Inc. where he spent nine years of his career, six of which were spent as head interior designer.

Later, in 1992, Noriega-Ortiz opened his own firm and proceeded to travel throughout the world working for high clientele such as Lenny Kravitz and Sean Combs.

Noriega-Ortiz, a trained architect, yet career driven interior designer, is known for his sense of openness and light through the use of color, materials, architecture and integration of fashion.

Highly influenced by the design aspects of Valentino, Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren and Alexander McQueen, Noriega-Ortiz has created countless projects based of their designs.

“Their designs are just spectacular in detailing,” Noriega-Ortiz said.

He is also known and recognized for his signature draping, saturated color rooms and feather décor. Beyond his design, Noriega-Ortiz, with artist husband Steven Wine, created a lighting line in 2007 that has done nothing but enhance his company.

For more information on the designer and his work, visit http://www.bnodesign.com/

Internationally known saxophone quartet to perform with USU jazz groups

Kristen Steiner

Utah State University music department presented “Big Bands” featuring the USU Jazz Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble with special guest saxophone quartet FOUR tonight at 7:30 at USU’s Caine Performance Hall.

“We are playing tunes that are great fun for the members in the band,” said Gregory Wheeler, director of the ensemble group. “The audience was treated with a terrific program.”

Many of the pieces played tonight were jazz standards, such as Dizzy Gillespie’s “In the Land of Oo-bla-dee,” however, FOUR also introduced some new pieces.

I always look forward to playing new song written by our soprano saxophonist Mark Watkins, said Jon Gudmundson, USU’s Jazz Orchestra director and FOUR quartet member. “He always writes music that is very challenging and very rewarding to play.”

“Our group has been together for ten to eleven years,” said Sandon Mayhew, FOUR’s tenor saxophonist, “and we rehearse and perform as often as we are able to.”

FOUR is an internationally known quartet comprised of Brigham Young University-Idaho’s Professor Watkins on soprano and alto saxophone, BYU-Provo’s Professor Ray Smith on alto sax, big band leader Mayhew on tenor saxophone and USU’s Professor Gudmundson on baritone saxophone.

The quartet has traveled worldwide to places such as England, Austria, Thailand and Germany. In 2006, the group released their first CD, “With Friends Like These.” Their second album, “On a Warm Summer’s Evenin’,” was released in 2010.

The group plans to tour Europe during this coming summer, so every opportunity to perform together is welcomed, Gudmundson said.

“I’ve been looking forward to the high level of musicianship of the students and the opportunity to perform and interact with the musicians in your community,” Mayhew said.

More information on the quartet can be found at http://www.fourjazz.com/FOUR_Home_Page.html

The Fry Street Quartet and opera duo lead audience to a standing ovation after a moving performance

Kristen Steiner

Audience members left impressed and stunned as they exited the Caine Performance Hall this evening at Utah State University after a stirring and moving performance from the Fry Street Quartet and opera singers, Kelly Markgraf and Blythe Gaissert, in the chamber opera, “As One.”

“It was really cool how they brought everything together,” said Ariel Haubner, a recently graduated USU music student. “It was all about love and acceptance and finding yourself.”

“As One,” a chamber opera written and composed by Laura Kaminsky, Mark Campbell and Kimberly Reed, follows Hannah, the young transgender protagonist, as she learns and grows, and through many life experiences, finds out who she truly is.

Viewers walked into the small, but beautiful concert hall to find three of the four quartet members warming up on center stage backed by tiers of white sheets which were to later serve as the back drop screen for the projected visuals to enhance the touching performance.

As the performance started, missing violist Bradley Ottesen joined the rest of quartet and was shortly followed by baritone singer Markgraf as he began to sing the opening piece, “Paperroute.” As videos and images of cycling appeared on the white backdrop, fellow mezzo-soprano singer Gaissert joined Markgraf where they continued to sing about the challenges faced by an adolescent who was trying to discover her identity.

Markgraf, playing Hannah before, and Gaissert, playing Hannah after, shared the part of the transgender protagonist showing the inner conflict and struggles many face during their long years of identity crisis. However, in the end, after many years of uncertainty, self-doubt and ridicule, Hannah finds, through an unexpected trip to Norway, how to achieve happiness and become the woman she has always longed to be.

“As One” premiered on Sept. 4 at BAM Fisher in Brooklyn, New York and is expected to be shown in venues throughout the nation, said Robert Waters, first violinist in the Fry Street Quartet.

“It's been a joy to be part of such a simple, beautiful message,” said Rebecca McFaul, the second violinist in the Fry Street Quartet. “Everyone searches for their own, authentic identity. It manifests more obviously in our protagonist who needs to transition, but the reaching for that authenticity is universal.”

More information on the opera can be found at http://www.operaprojects.org/AsOne