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Besides Josiah McElheny, who's making conceptual glass?
Mark Zirpel. He brings a handyman poetics to his constructions, some of which are at the Tacoma branch of the William Traver Gallery.
I'm charmed by "Lung," which is supposed to activate when people walk by but didn't, leading a flustered gallery assistant to mutter about a blown battery or maybe a snapped cable.
With its odd bellows attached to a pair of glass lungs with latex inside, "Lung" succeeds even in the off position, positing glass as the equivalent of an iron lung.
Is this self-criticism from a glass artist?
If so, Zirpel's showing at the wrong gallery. Traver is solidly behind glass, but it's not all he has to offer, as the current shows make clear.
There's Geoff Garza's ruined choirs singing out in collaged patterning; Rich Araluce's little boxes with interior evidence of cramped lives, and pure glass: Kathleen Elliott's "Botanica," thick glass twigs blooming with flowering fruit. Hers are nearly sold out. Zirpel's, Araluce's and Garza's are not.
Veering off the beauty path is not the way to succeed with the tourists who appear to be this Tacoma gallery's audience.
William Traver, 1821 E. Dock St. Through April 9. Hours: Tuesdays-Saturdays, 10 a.m.-6 p.m.
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