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A rousing welcome to
young people, Almost Warm & Fuzzy is an exhibition that
will attract both the art-savvy gallery-goer interested in cutting-edge
installation art and children and teens eager to find their own experiences
reflected in the world around them. Various views of childhood-a mix
of innocence and nostalgia, comic-strip heroes and science-fiction,
fairy tales and computer games-are explored in 39 thought-provoking
works by 31 contemporary artists from the United States and abroad.
The exhibition features several eye-catching kinetic and interactive pieces. The Art Guys have created a gigantic nose, aptly called Big Sneeze, which duplicates the act of sneezing in every detail (including an explosive liquid and an audio component), to the delight of the audiences who see (and hear) it. For Charles Long's Sunday Sculpting School, visitors are encouraged to mold sculptures of their own from chocolate-brown clay. Among the many captivating installation works is Sandy Skoglund's Shimmering Madness, a dreamlike environment of thousands of jellybeans (installed at each venue by the artist's assistants). Almost Warm & Fuzzy has been designed with families in mind. A 24-page, Spanish-English children's activity book raises intriguing questions in connection with the works and provides a series of projects and tasks for young people. The interpretative object labels have been developed by a group of museum educators especially for younger visitors. A cheerful poster serves as an attractive souvenir of the show as well as an unconventional catalogue, with an essay and the exhibition checklist on the back. Almost Warm & Fuzzy was organized for the Des Moines Art Center by its director, Susan Lubowsky Talbott, and its research curator, Lea Rosson DeLong. It is being circulated by iCI.
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