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Throughout her culturally and artisticlly rich life, Sioux Bally-Maloof has
experieced many "wow" moments that she has since
captured in a variety of artistic media.
In a one-person exhibition at the Bunny Gunner Gallery
in the Pomona Arts Colony, she shares some of these intense
and meaningful instances with the public in, "The
Wow Show," on display through October 6, 2009.
"I try to bring something to light to the audience,
to the person looking at the piece, where it's goint to
touch them in some way," said Ms. Bally-Maloof. "If
you can get that emotional conversation going with artwork,
to me, that's like having a big 'wow'. Finding some way
to touch someone is the ultimate."
The lauch point for "The Wow Show" was Ms.
Bally-Maloof's artistic connection to the concept of palindromes:
words, phrases and numbers that can be read the same way
in either direction. For example "wow" and "radar".
Printmaking, one of the primary media in which she works,
follows the palindromic pattern, inspiring her to explore
the idea in her artwork.
The word "wow" particularly enticed Ms. Bally-Maloof
because in addition to reading the same forward and backward,
it is still a word if you flip it upside down. And each
piece of art in her solo show incorporates this word,
"In very, very strange ways," she said.
Raised in Claremont, Ms. Bally-Maloof was drawn to art
from and early age and, being true to her passion, her
devotion never wavered.
"I can't imagine not having it in my life. It's
who I am," she said. "I think if I wasn't able
to do art, I might as well curl up in a ball and roll
away."
After graduating from Scripps College in 1976 with a
bachelor's degree in fine art, Ms. Bally-Maloof roamed
around Europe and eventually settled in France for several
years.
Blossoming as an artist there, she found keen interest
and pleasure in rendering eye-catching and emotion-capturing
characters and street scenes in pencil and ink drawings.
She also honed her photography skills, bringing subjects
to black-and-white life in a small darkroom in the attic
of her residence that overlooked the Mediterranean.
After Europe, Ms. Bally-Maloof returned to Claremont
where she contiued to paint and explore a multitude of
artistic media including oil, oil pastel, fine art digital
printing, printmaking, ceramics and more. She also operates
a graphic design and photography business and, with her
decades of fine art immersion, she is "able to serve
my clients in an artistic way that other graphic designers
might not," she commented.
In "The Wow Show," which opened at the Bunny
Gunner Gallery last Saturday, Ms. Bally-Maloof displays
oil painting, monotypes, photographs, drawings, and collages.
"I hope I'm able to leave my art as a legacy to
the world and have it live on," she said. "I
equate each piece of art with giving birth. For me, that's
how important it is."
"The Wow Show" will be on display through Tuesday,
October 6, 2009, with a Last Saturday Reception taking
place from 6 to 10p.m. on Saturday, September 26.
The Bunny Gunner Gallery is located at 266 W. Second
St. in Pomona. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., Tuesday
through Saturday. Information: 868-2808, www.bunnygunner.com.
Sioux Bally-Maloof can be reached by phone at 794-0917
or by email at: sioux.art@verizon.net.
-Brenda Bolinger
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