Supporting Local Arts
Worldly Views
Davenport IA
I visited
the Bucktown Center for the Arts in Davenport, IA. The center is an artist’s
gallery as well as a store front to sell their work as well as display it.
There are several rooms within the 2 floors that I toured. There were several
different mediums of art displayed throughout the center. By far my favorite
gallery/store was called Worldly Views on the 2nd floor in suite
203, and is run by photographer and artist by the name of Jack Wilhoit.
Upon
entering the space I was overwhelmed, in a good way, by all that there was to
look at in the relatively small space. There was a mix of photography and
sculpture. He began taking pictures in 1995, when he traveled working for the
Army. He was lucky enough to have visited all 50 states and 49 different
countries, all of which, he took pictures from. He is known locally as the
“Door Guy”, because the majority of his work is of doors he photographed
throughout the world. Also he has old vintage doors with pictures of doors in
them, which is kind of genius to display a door within a door, and makes for a
pretty unexpected and very creative way to display them. Also he used old
windows as frames and shadow boxes, which were very cool. He also took to
recycling bottles and used them to make interesting chandeliers and light
fixtures. Another element that he uses a lot is bicycles; he has pictures, 3D
sculptures and very cool dioramas of scenes recreated from a picture, uses
parts of bike frames as picture frames, all relating to bicycles.
All along
the walls there are tables with every print he has ever developed, grouped and
labeled where each was taken. There are pictures from several different
countries including China, Italy, Scotland, Greece, Spain and several others.
His scope of work is amazing, and to see all of them at once is exiting.
Jack is a
really cool guy who is happy to tell the story of all of the pieces he has
displayed and how he came about the scenes in his work.
