Review

"Yellow Crab Spider," Mixed Media Collage on Paper.

Kristi Arnold
Prints & Mixed Media

10 a.m.-4 p.m.

Speak Salon Studio
327 1/2 Southwest Boulevard
Kansas City, MO
816.221.7773

Hours: 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday.
Runs through: Dec. 31

Artist's site: http://www.kristi-arnold.com
Gallery site: http://www.speakhairstudio.com

Lots of artists draw inspiration from the beauty of Nature. Kristi Arnold draws hers from what most people -- except, perhaps, for fans of of H.P. Lovecraft -- would consider Nature's mistakes.

Arnold's prints and mixed media works, on display through the end of the year at the new Speak Salon Studio, are fantastic in several senses. Her creations are a lot of fun, visually ... and at the same time,  they're the stuff of the sort of dreams one gets after mixing too many pizza toppings just before going to bed.

(If the salon's Crossroads address looks familiar, it's because the space formerly housed the late Red Light Gallery. The great brick walls remain, and another bit of good news is that Speak has opened up the back room as well as the front.)

Arnold explains the story behind her works.:

Since childhood, I have actively been engaged in imaginative play, using my surroundings as a main source of entertainment and inspiration. My back yard, which consisted of acres of land and vegetation, was my playground. These early experiences prompted me to begin reading biology textbooks and observing the behavior of plants, insects and animals in order to understand how the world under my feet came into being. In an age where genetic engineering is gaining momentum, the possibilities of gene splicing and cloning are infinite. To this end, I am constantly questioning the evolutionary processes ... what would happen if opposing genes were spliced and something terrifying were born? These influences led to the interest in the amalgamation of human, insect and animal characteristics, creating fictional hybrids in my work that play between childhood memory and fantasy.

The mixed-media Yellow Crab Spider, today's featured piece, incorporates both the natural and the decidedly un-. It is, by turns, whimsical and beautiful and creepy ... the sort of thing that keeps pulling your eye back to it, even as it gives you a touch of the willies.

My work also investigates ideas connected with the awkward frailties of the human condition, the poetic and the horrific, Arnold continues. I am fascinated with the intricacies and the dichotomies between nature and the body -- the imperfections and deformities as well as its beauties. With this in mind, I am exploiting these situations by juxtaposing opposites, the beautiful and the grotesque. It is about creating a situation that combines these two ideas to form asymmetry, humor, and absurdity.

Not the sort of thing -- asymmetry excepted, perhaps -- that you'd want in a hairstyle. In Arnold's art, though, they make for a striking -- and unforgettable -- look.

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