(melodic music)
Stay tuned to PBS39
as we put the focus on arts
in the latest edition
of our monthly series,
First Fridays on Focus.
The ordinary
becomes extraordinary
in the care of this
Bethlehem-based artist
who uses ancient techniques
and an exquisite eye for details
to bring life
to his paintings.
Plus, a new school year begins
in a new school building
for the Lehigh Valley Charter
High School for the Arts.
We tour the newest arts venue
in South Bethlehem.
These stories and more
coming up right now
on First Fridays on Focus.
(dramatic music)
Focus is for our community.
(Grover)
Focus showcases the people.
The places.
And the issues
that matter to you.
(Grover)
Focus on what matters.
(Brittany)
You never know what
you're going to see
when you tune in to Focus.
(female announcer)
Support for Focus
is provided by:
(melodic music)
Thanks for joining us,
I'm Laura McHugh.
In this episode,
we turn our focus to the arts
as we do the first week
of each month.
Our first story features
a nationally-renowned artist
based right here
in Bethlehem.
For more on this
local treasure,
here's Focus reporter
Grover Silcox.
Thanks, Laura.
Douglas Wiltraut
loves the passage of time
and its effect on people,
places, and objects,
particularly those
in his own life.
He savors the fleeting
shaft of life
streaming through time
and space.
His paintings capture that light
and the corresponding shadows
in a signature way
that has earned him recognition
throughout the country.
Here's more on Doug
and his art.
(soothing music)
When most of the world
goes to sleep,
Doug Wiltraut
goes into action.
(Doug)
I find the things that I'm
gonna paint during the day,
and execute them at night when
it's totally peaceful in here.
(Grover)
In a small studio
on the second floor
of Bethlehem's
Banana Factory,
artist Doug Wiltraut
leans into his work,
surrounded by the images
of people and scenes
he's captured in time.
(Doug)
I really love
the passage of time,
the effects of nature
on manmade things,
and on us ourselves.
(Grover)
Doug, an award-winning artist,
exalts the everyday people,
places, and things in his life
through his paintings.
(Doug)
This is a portrait of my father
titled "Family Man."
He raised five kids,
built his own house.
He was painting
on his garage that day.
When he stepped out
into the sunlight,
it was another
"presto" moment.
"Pop, don't move."
He just symbolized
the family man to me
at that moment.
(Grover)
Twenty years later,
Doug captured his dad, Richard,
a U.S. Navy veteran,
in yet another defining moment
in a painting
called "Old Salt."
(Doug)
That's where that momentary
shaft of sunlight comes in.
It just will elevate
the commonplace
to the extraordinary.
(Grover)
Doug's sense of detail
gives his paintings
the illusion of reality.
(Doug)
Details within the shadows
is what really makes it
believable
because in real life,
it doesn't matter
how dark an area is.
If you look there,
you still see things.
(Grover)
When painting a portrait,
Doug begins
with a subject's face.
Once he gets that right,
he completes the scene.
This painting
of his son Jonathan
serves as just one
of many examples.
(Doug)
He just sat down
on this big stone sill
of the doorway
to cool off.
The sun was setting
over the Lehigh River.
I just thought,
"This is a beautiful scene.
It's my son,
the sun is setting.
I'm gonna title it
'Setting Son.'"
(cheery music)
(Grover)
Doug paints primarily
in watercolors,
and to achieve his style,
in the ancient method
of egg tempera,
combining egg yolk,
water, and paint.
(Doug)
It goes back to the Renaissance.
It's a fantastic medium
for portraying light and shadow.
(Grover)
The process begins
with a real egg.
(Doug)
I have a single yolk
which is good
because sometimes
you'll get a twin
and it makes it
more difficult.
(Grover)
Gently sliding the yolk
from palm to palm,
Doug's careful
not to nick the sac.
He continues this process
till all the white is gone
and only the yolk remains.
This is where you pinch
the edge of the sac
and lower your hand,
and you can actually hold
the egg sac.
(Grover)
As Doug proceeds,
one can imagine
the ancient Egyptians
or Renaissance masters
using similar techniques.
(Doug)
And then you put it
over your dish
and pinch it
and let all the egg yolk
just drain out...
...'cause you don't want
to use the sac.
That is what we use
to paint with.
Now this will get mixed
with 50 percent water.
And this is what they call
a natural emulsion.
(Grover)
Egg tempera creates glazes.
(Doug)
Very, very thin glazes,
starting with
your lightest colors
and building the layers up,
almost like colored cellophane.
And so, you end up getting
a luminosity from within.
(Grover)
With what he calls
tunnel vision,
Doug works on one painting
at a time.
He has spent three weeks
so far on this one,
which is destined for a show
in New York City.
(Doug)
It's a show called
12 American Realists,
and they requested
that one of the paintings
be inspired
by New York City.
I decided to do a painting of
this Empire State Biscuit Works
New York City box.
It's from the 1880s.
(Grover)
He associates the box
with his father-in-law
who grew up on Staten Island
and spent a lot of time
in New York City.
As always,
Doug finds the muse
in those
closest to him.
(Doug)
My mother encouraged me
almost on a daily basis.
She was approaching
her 70th birthday.
She was back
in the woodshed at home.
I was just taking
some photos of her,
not saying why,
and then when it became
her 70th birthday,
I presented her
with that painting
and titled it
"Sweet Seventy,"
like Sweet Sixteen.
(Grover)
And how did she respond?
(Doug)
Um, with tears.
(Grover)
Doug never got to paint
his grandmother Marie,
but he found a way
to remember her
in his painting
"Tools of the Trade."
(Doug)
I knew I wanted to do
a painting of this rag mop,
which was something that I'd
see her use when I was a child,
and as soon as I saw that,
I knew it was the perfect image.
(Grover)
Meredith E. Lewis
of Watercolor Artist
wrote that Doug's paintings
"overwhelmingly express
reverence and wonder
at the space,
time, and place
of their subjects."
(Doug)
The act of painting,
at least to me
from the very beginning,
was pursuing creating
objects of beauty,
and you can only hope
that in the end
that you've added
to that definition.
(Grover)
Doug has been adding
to that definition
for more than 40 years
as a nationally-acclaimed artist
who takes the commonplace
and makes it extraordinary.
For Focus,
I'm Grover Silcox reporting.
Thank you, Grover.
From ancient painting techniques
to visions of the future,
our first guest brings us
the science-fiction art form
known as steampunk.
Daniella Romano
is a guest curator
for the Kemerer Museum
of Decorative Arts in Bethlehem,
and she's here to tell us
about its latest exhibit.
Daniella, thank you
for joining us.
Hi, Laura,
great to meet you.
Some of our viewers
may not be familiar
with the term "steampunk"
and this art form.
Describe it for us.
Well, they're actually
familiar with the visual
even if they don't know
the term "steampunk."
This is a science-fiction
literary subgenre
that draws on the Victorian era.
So, women in fine gowns
with bustles
and men in top hats.
Project that classic look
into the future
as we develop
new technologies
and kind of project
that science fiction
into the future.
(Laura)
You specifically, for example,
mentioned "Hugo" to me,
that that's a very common,
um, vision for many people
when they think of steampunk.
(Daniella)
"Hugo," the film,
"Sherlock Holmes,"
the film from 2010,
"The League
of Extraordinary Gentlemen."
(Laura)
So those are all examples
of steampunk in pop culture.
-Exactly.
-Why bring this exhibit
to Bethlehem?
(Daniella)
Bethlehem has got
the perfect backdrop
to look at the future
projected through the past.
We've got the extraordinary
Bethlehem Steel blast furnaces
right here
behind the building,
a lot of incredible artisans
in the region,
in the local community.
I've brought a couple of pieces
to show you today.
One piece is in the exhibit,
and another piece
is for sale in the gift shop
so people can bring a piece
of the exhibit home with them.
(Laura)
So, let's start with this.
-You said this is a jet pack.
-Yes.
This is what
an artist
imagined a jet pack
would've looked like.
Right, and the artist
is Ed Kidera.
He's based
in Maryland,
and he has
an incredible body of work.
He collects antiques
and welds them together
into these kind of
fantastical fabrications.
This is a jet pack,
it's an antique
fire extinguisher
that's been weld-attached
to, um, horns,
a garden hose,
some electrical conduit.
And if you can imagine
strapping this onto your back
and blasting off to work
every morning,
then you might be somebody
who thinks about steampunk,
the look, and kind of wants
to live in that fantasy world.
(Laura)
So, this is just one piece
from the exhibit.
Tell us about what
people will see
when they come into
the Kemerer Museum.
They'll see great
examples of fashion.
We have another artist,
Heather Hutsell,
who has designed
an extraordinary parachute dress
with a bustle,
and it's, um,
very kind of
couture design.
It's got little pocket watches
all attached to it,
and it's made from
World War II parachute silk.
They'll see other examples
of metal sculpture,
including a showcase
of some pieces
by a historic
Bethlehem blacksmith,
and that's a nice
actual call to action
maybe for your visitors,
they can kind of go
see steampunk in action
by visiting the historic
Bethlehem blacksmith shop
in the old Industrial Quarter.
And they have
the opportunity as well
to take pieces
of steampunk home
and bring it into
their own decorative arts
in their own home;
tell us about this piece.
This is another
local artist in Allentown.
His name is Ron Gutman,
and his studio
is Studio VII.
This is a hot air balloon,
it's all completely
hand-fabricated from paper,
um, with a little bicycle,
so I guess you'd be powering
your hot air balloon
with a bicycle ride
up in the sky.
(chuckling)
And you can do that,
um, by placing it
maybe over your mantelpiece
or somewhere in your house.
(Laura)
How have--how has the exhibit
been received so far?
(Daniella)
Really well, people have
been coming from all over.
Steampunk has got
a huge fan base,
so people have been visiting
from New York, Philadelphia,
we've had some visitors
from overseas,
a lot of locals
are coming to look
at historic Bethlehem
kind of through a new lens
of the steampunk fantasy.
It's been really well-received.
(Laura)
And the exhibit
remains on exhibit
until the end of October,
correct?
-Yes.
-All right, Daniella,
thank you so much
for joining us
and for bringing
the exhibit to us.
Oh, it's wonderful,
thanks.
In our next story,
we welcome
the Lehigh Valley Charter
High School for the Arts
to the SteelStacks neighborhood
in South Bethlehem.
A new school year recently began
in a new school building,
and Focus reporter
Brittany Garzillo was there
as students walked through
the doors for the first time.
-Brittany?
-Thanks, Laura.
Less than a month
into the school year
and it's already been
a momentous year
for the students
and staff
at the Lehigh Valley Charter
High School for the Arts.
These aspiring artists
have a new place to call home,
and while they're
still settling in,
remain tied to traditions
of their history.
(upbeat music)
(female teacher)
Happy first day!
(Brittany)
For some, a red rose
is a symbol of love.
For students
at Lehigh Valley
Charter High School
for the Arts...
Good morning.
(Brittany)
...it's a sign
of the first day
of school...
It symbolizes, like,
a fresh start.
(Brittany)
...and a tradition
that dates back
to when the school
first opened 12 years ago.
(female administrator)
I think that that's just
kind of a remarkable tradition,
and it says something
about that first day,
and it helps you
to remember what happened
with every single student
that walked through that door.
(Brittany)
While some students celebrate
the start of a new year
with a warm embrace,
Executive Director and CEO
Diane LaBelle
celebrates a moment
that's been years in the making:
the opening of the school's
new location in South Bethlehem.
(Diane)
With this facility now,
everything is possible
and anything is possible.
(Brittany)
Formerly located
in a renovated warehouse
on East Broad Street
in Bethlehem,
the Lehigh Valley Charter
High School for the Arts
has attracted students
in 12 counties
and 45 school districts
throughout Pennsylvania
since 2003.
Today, the four-story,
$27 million facility
sits on the corner
of East 3rd and Polk Street,
just steps away from
the SteelStacks arts campus.
(Diane)
Now we get that added component
of being part
of an arts and cultural
and educational community.
(piano music)
(conductor)
Three and go!
(chorus singing)
(Brittany)
The 91,000-square-foot school
includes state-of-the-art music,
art, and dance studios,
various classrooms,
11 practice rooms,
and a 350-seat theater.
(Diane)
I think that this facility
is exactly what
these students need
to really experience
their arts
and their core curricular
education to the fullest.
(band playing)
(Brittany)
Each of the 575 students
who auditioned and were accepted
into the school
partake in one
of seven majors:
instrumental music,
vocal music,
visual art,
theater,
dance,
literary arts,
and figure skating.
(Diane)
Our mission really is
for every student
to use their arts
to become successful.
(chorus singing)
Our hope is that every student
that walks through our doors
will leave
after their experience here
and be successful
in the world.
(Brittany)
That's the hope for students
like junior Gabe Moses.
I want to become
a professional actor
and a director.
(Brittany)
Each school day,
Gabe commutes about 40 minutes
from his home in Bangor
to pursue a major in theater.
(Gabe)
I bid thee good day.
I just always loved acting,
I love entertaining
and making people laugh
and just connecting
with the audience.
(teacher)
But the point was Gabe
was the one catching her.
(Brittany)
As a theater major,
Gabe spends half his day
in his major classes
before breaking for lunch
in the school's Commons Cafe
and then heading
to his core curricular classes.
(Diane)
We are serving
a portion of our community
who truly needs the work
and the curriculum
that we offer,
the environment
of acceptance that we offer.
(teacher)
And consider how
that makes you feel.
(Brittany)
Diane Wagner, the school's
director of theater,
helps students like Gabe
perfect their craft.
(Diane Wagner)
He really typifies
the Charter Arts theater student
which is, there is
a different level
of maturity,
professionalism,
and just a general
sophistication.
To shake that all out,
all that character stuff out.
(Gabe)
Art, it talks to everyone.
It's not just for
one specific group.
Any kind of art--
theater, music,
singing, dance--
it all reaches
out to people.
Keep pressing down
in the plié, down.
(Brittany)
Upstairs, artistic director
of dance, Kim Maniscalco,
passes along what she calls
her very first love, ballet,
to a classroom full
of hopeful performers.
(Kim)
Nowhere else will they
get dance history,
composition at the level
that they're getting it here.
Up, seven, we're
gonna bring it to...
(Brittany)
She guides students
through each delicate motion,
motions senior Sofia Blasco
from Bethlehem
has been practicing
since she was eight years old.
(Sofia)
Dance is my life,
it's my passion,
it's what I do.
I couldn't live
without it.
(Brittany)
For Sofia, this new studio
provides an outlet
for self-expression.
(Sofia)
It's gorgeous,
it's really easy
to express ourselves.
We have the windows
and it's light.
(Kim)
I think for the students, too,
inspires them
to do their best,
and we're looking forward
to many, many years here.
(Brittany)
Though arts are
at the heart of the school,
not all students
that graduate
go on to pursue a career
in their majors.
(Diane LaBelle)
It's interesting that
probably less than 20 percent
of our students go on
to conservatories
in that particular art.
Most of our students
go on to be engineers,
they go on into
the medical profession,
they go on into being
attorneys, teachers.
Just about anything
that you can imagine,
our students
participate in.
(Brittany)
Regardless of what paths
they pursue after high school,
Diane's passion
for arts education is clear.
(Diane LaBelle)
I believe that the arts
are part of who we are
as human beings,
and being in touch
with that part of us
is what makes us
in touch with humanity.
(Brittany)
And with the right touch
in high school,
a love for the arts
that can blossom
throughout their lives.
For Focus,
I'm Brittany Garzillo reporting.
(Laura)
Brittany and Grover
join me for our next segment
along with guests from
the Allentown Art Museum.
Julia Marsh
is the museum's
Curator
for Community Engagement.
She's brought with her
Jill Odegaard,
the chair of the art department
at Cedar Crest College
and the artist
behind a new piece
called "Woven Welcome."
Thank you so much,
both of you,
for being with us today.
Jill, can you describe
"Woven Welcome" for us?
(Jill)
Well, "Woven Welcome" is
a community engagement project,
an art project using weaving
as a metaphor for community.
And I have designed
the project
to think about weaving,
the structure of weaving,
where the warp
is really symbolic
of the infrastructure
of a community:
the places we go,
schools, libraries, museums,
businesses, for-profit,
for-non-profit.
And then we,
as individuals,
are interacting each day
with our community,
and so we weave into 
the fabric of our day.
(Laura)
Julia, how has this
been received?
(Julia)
Overwhelmingly positive response
from the public.
We've had, um,
at this point,
over 200 events
out in the community,
and inside and outside
the museum,
we've interacted
with almost 9,000 people.
(Brittany)
Wow.
(Laura)
Well, we really want
to contribute as well,
so that's why you brought
the loom with us today.
-Will you teach us how?
-Absolutely.
So, it's participatory,
it's engagement,
it's getting people to connect
and have dialogue,
so it's been designed
where there's conversations
across the loom.
And so,
essentially what we do,
it's very simple,
we go over and under,
and I'm gonna go halfway
and then I'm gonna ask for help,
which you do in community,
working together.
(Laura)
And it's just over/under,
simple, anybody can do this.
(Jill)
And then when you go
under the last one,
you're gonna pull
the fabric through
like you're fishing,
going through a fishing line.
-Just like this?
-Yup.
And you're gonna
keep pulling.
It's sort of a little
magician's act.
You're pulling
the scarf through.
(Brittany)
Team effort, Grover.
(Grover)
That's right.
(Laura)
I like the purple
and the lace on this thread.
(Jill)
So, all of the fabrics
have been donated, okay,
and that's enough,
and then we push
the fabric down.
(Laura)
Like this?
(Jill)
And then you take
the tail of the fabric
and you're gonna weave
back to me.
(Laura)
So, do I start with this,
the end of it?
(Jill)
Just the end of it,
let the rest of it
just drop.
(Julia)
Come to the very top
of the piece of fabric.
(Laura)
And now I'm gonna go over
and under.
(Julia)
And then you're gonna go under.
(Jill)
And once you do it once,
you have the rhythm,
and it just flows.
(Brittany)
Now, where's the fabric from?
Is there a story behind it?
(Julia)
Most of the fabric we've gotten
has come from
Via of the Lehigh Valley.
We've partnered with them
for this project
as a community partner,
so their
Creative Expressions group
is a subgroup
within Via.
They have processed
the fabric,
meaning they've washed it,
they've cut it for us,
and they deliver it,
as well as helping
make rugs and looms,
and so they've been integral
to making the project work.
And also, we've been
taking donations.
We picked up a donation
this morning,
and we have one
of our Auxiliary board members
who actually has been integral
in getting us a lot of fabric.
So, it's all donated.
We have not bought
anything for fabric.
All the fabric
has been donated.
(Brittany)
So it's truly that community
effort and impact.
(Julia)
And you can see, somebody--
when we first started,
somebody joked that,
"I just donated
something to Via,
and it looks like that,"
and I said, "Well,
it probably is that."
(Laura)
Wow!
(Julia)
So, people--
what you gave them
would end up in a rug
that you might have worked on
at some point or another.
(Grover)
It's a great family project.
(Julia)
It is a great family project.
(Grover)
No batteries needed, right?
(Julia)
That's right, and it
actually does force you
to talk to people,
and Jill talks about that a lot
when we go out to do events,
about dialogue.
(Jill)
And opening up stories
and conversations.
I think that,
for me as an artist,
the project really
speaks to that,
that place that
it's time to connect
and take a little time out
to reflect
and be in the moment
with each other.
And so, this is
a way to do that
and get new stories,
sharing new stories.
Using the fabric is also
a very accessible
material for people.
Fabric holds stories,
so people immediately
have things to share
just by the use
of the material
that the project
is designed around.
(Laura)
And what are the ages
and the experiences
that people are having
using these?
(Jill)
We've been--we've had
as young as two years old,
with the help of his mother,
was weaving,
and we also have gone
all the way up to 100
at Cedarbrook
in Fountain Hill,
one of the residents there
was 100
and weaving
on the project.
(Laura)
And what's the final goal
for the project?
What's the outcome?
(Jill)
The final goal is to connect
people from the Lehigh Valley
in conversation
about making and art,
and at the culmination
of the exhibition
on the 11th of October,
we are taking all of the rugs
that have been woven
in the community since--
really since February,
and we're gonna take them out
in front of the museum
on the Arts Park lawn,
unroll all of the segments
to reveal this great tapestry
of community,
showcasing the handwork.
(Julia)
By the day that we close,
we will probably have
close to 350 rugs,
and, um, what's been
really important
for the museum in this
is that we've used this
as a way to open ourselves up
to the community
and ask community members
to help us make something,
also lets them come
into the museum and say,
"I helped make that,"
and have some ownership
of the project,
which I really like,
I like this idea that
when they come back
a second time,
which they will,
I hope,
that they can say, "I helped
make something in this museum,
I helped make art
in this museum,"
which is a different thing
than maybe people
generally associate
with the Allentown Art Museum.
It's a little bit
more touchy-feely,
a little more warm.
It's something that
we really want to embrace,
that we're open
and please come in.
(Laura)
Well, thank you
for bringing this to us
and thank you for letting us
contribute to it.
-Thank you.
-Thank you.
(Laura)
Well, thank you
for joining us.
We'll see you
next week.
Until then, remember
to focus on what matters.
(vibrant music)
