(bright music) >> Sharon: So I'm trying to get the message out about the environment and biodiversity and conservation and how we can solve some of these problems, but through the conduit or vehicle of art.

>> Rocco: Appreciate not so much the painting itself, not so much the technique, but the message I'm trying to send because to me the message I'm trying to send is way more important than the quality of the artwork.

>> These notes that ring out sound like they're melting or like they're falling down a waterfall.

(pedal steel guitar music) >> Carol: I think that it's a great community and we'd like to use the opportunity as an organization to show the community the value of local artists and the appreciation of local art.

>> Dale: Doing as much as you can as quickly as you can is important to me.

Life is short and the earlier we get started helping our community, the better off our community will be.

>> I have a very strong connection to other students.

Everyone makes an effort to help each other.

I'll remember the feeling of being here, the feeling that I was a part of a family.

(upbeat music) >> Announcer: Support for programming at Lakeshore PBS comes in part from a generous bequest of the estate of Marjorie A.

Mills, whose remarkable contribution will help us keep viewers like you informed, inspired and entertained for years to come.

(bright playful music) >> Announcer: "Eye On The Arts" is made possible in part by South Shore Arts, the Indiana Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.

Additional support for Lakeshore PBS and "Eye On The Arts" is provided by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(gentle music) >> My parents were a little bit different and they had a huge appreciation for nature.

And so, when I was quite young, we spent a lot of time going on camping trips.

My dad was an art teacher, so we'd pack everything up in the VW van and one time we went all around the Great Lakes up into Canada, saw Niagara Falls and we were camping the whole time.

We'd stop in a campground usually I think it seemed like for a week or something.

Another time, we went out west.

We cooked all our food over fires, slept in tents.

My dad built a one-room log cabin the first summer, then he built a studio, but us kids continued to camp in tents and sometimes my sister and I would take our sleeping bags off into the woods and say, "We're going camping."

But the hilarious part was we were already camping.

That gave me this huge immersion in nature at a really young age.

I don't know if you've heard the term biophilia which E.O.

Wilson coined, very prominent scientist, just means the innate love of nature.

And that's another one of my missions, is getting people out in nature 'cause I think it's so important.

So I was lucky enough to have that and my whole life, I just always need that and seek that.

I think it's so important.

(gentle music) I've worked throughout my career with a lot of different materials, starting at a very young age with stain glass, but then I started working with sculptural materials too.

I got interested in casting glass.

I'd been working with the flat glass.

So then I started studying with Preston Jackson down at the Art Institute and I learned about the casting process.

Actually there, it was casting bronze, but as I was saying to you earlier, there's a lot of similarities between the way you cast glass and the way you cast bronze.

But I became interested in making three-dimensional forms.

And then I felt compelled to make these very large plant forms that I call Biophilias that stand five and six feet tall and those were some of the first ceramic things I was making.

So it was kind of challenging because I didn't have a lot of experience with the clay, but because I did small drawings first, then whatever I saw, I was then committed to that shape and I had to figure out how to make the clay do what I wanted it to do.

And I don't throw on a wheel, all my forms are hand-built.

People are often kind of amazed at how many different materials I work with.

Sculpturally, my three favorite are ceramic and cast glass and cast bronze.

And some pieces will combine two of those materials or even three or just be one.

Or sometimes I will cast the same piece in bronze and then cast it in glass or cast it in bronze and then make it in ceramic.

It's almost like making prints.

Once you have a mold, you have a way to make multiples and you can do different things with them.

So I enjoy that, that you can cut one up or have one be open, one closed.

You have this more freedom to alter the form and do different things with it.

(gentle music) I enjoy the process of making art and there's a satisfaction of you get into, there's even books been written about it, how you get in a certain zone in your brain when you're working on artwork.

So for myself, I enjoy that.

I enjoy seeing a finished piece.

But the larger thing that drives and motivates me really has been from a very young age this whole interrelation between humans and nature.

Just in my short time on earth in the last 30 years, I feel like it's gone from save the rainforest to save the whole planet.

So I'm trying to get the message out about the environment and biodiversity and conservation and how we can solve some of these problems, but through the conduit or vehicle of art, that it becomes absorbable to people.

And I like telling stories that are woven into the artwork, the science behind it, because I think that's also a way of reaching people that are gonna remember that story better than just reading some scientific data.

And most through millennia, that's how we've exchanged information, is through story.

(gentle music) (gentle country music) >> My educational background is in business and in psychology.

And what drew me into psychology was more of the transpersonal type of psychology, meditation, self-actualization, things along that nature where you work on yourself, a lot of introspection as opposed to the counseling aspect of psychology of which ultimately that's where I made my career.

And I think that the psychology background helped me with my art quite a bit because it makes me more aware of the insights and the introspection of myself.

And I think it really helps my observation skills as I look at others and I look at the world.

Although I'm a colorblind artist, it's, in my opinion, a minimal challenge, minimal handicap in life of all the things that one could be struggling with.

Sign me up for colorblind, I'll take it.

That's a pretty easy one to manage.

Where it gets tricky is if I'm interrupted and I leave for an hour and I come back.

It's like, uh-oh.

Now is this black or is this dark blue?

Is this red or is this green?

I've been told that as a result of being colorblind, my colors are that much more vibrant and I guess I'll just have to take your word on that one, that it is.

(bright music) I like to refer to it as altered states of art.

I want the viewer to look at the art and be transformed, not only into the painting and what's going on in the painting, but somewhere else.

What I would hope when someone looks at my art is that, first of all, I don't mean this in a mean way, but they're kind of slapped in the head.

Pay attention, "Whoa, what is that?"

I want to catch them, I want to stop them in their tracks and I want them to really take a second look at what's going on and then really look at and study the art.

Appreciate not so much the painting itself, not so much the technique, but the message I'm trying to send because to me, the message I'm trying to send is way more important than the quality of the artwork.

So I'm hoping that the quality of the artwork is enough to show and get their attention and I'm always improving my technique.

But most importantly is the message behind that artwork, that's what I want them to leave with.

When I craft a message in my paintings, it's usually triggered by an event.

And quite often, almost always, as I'm focusing on that event or as I am quite often preoccupied with an event, it kind of gets in me and stays in me and it starts cooking in there.

And I don't know what to do with this emotion that enters me.

Sometimes life just becomes so overwhelming, I don't know what to do with it.

I don't know what to do about it.

How do you change things as one individual?

Yeah, you vote, yeah, you write people, yeah, you do that, but you have all of this.

If you are in any way, shape or form in tune to what's going on in the country, on our planet, what do you do with all of that?

Do you just turn away, "That's not me, that's not part of me?"

but if you become sensitive to that and you absorb that, that could be very self-destructive because you are in many ways quite powerless to make some of these changes that you feel might need to be made in the world.

So what do you do with it?

So I put it on a canvas hoping that someday someone in our country, on our planet, will look at that, maybe be inspired and want to make a change.

Life is beautiful, but sad.

While there are many aspects of sadness of life, I also want to communicate the beautiful aspect of life.

So all of my paintings have a story.

Some are very simple, vacation, a weekend getaway and there's a beautiful cloud and I wanna paint it.

Some are motivated by past historical acts that occurred on our planet, current events that are occurring on our planet.

I guess I enjoy a variety of different themes in my artwork, but the life is beautiful but sad theme seems to radiate the strongest.

(gentle music) >> Say when.

>> Good with it (pedal steel guitar music) >> Narrator: Whether you know what it's called or not, you probably recognize the unique sound of the pedal steel guitar.

It's been a part of American music since the instrument's mass production began in the 1950s.

For Nelson Wynn, owner of Broadway Music in Merrillville and member of the Original Hazzard County Band, the instrument comes with a personal and storied history.

>> My father was a Sunday school teacher in church and always loved guitar.

He played guitar and sang in church.

And when I was about four years old, he would get me up and I would sing harmony with him on some songs in front of the church congregation.

Later on, he left the church and started a country band about 1965 and that band was called Roy Wynn And The Country Clubs.

A lot of folks don't know it, but the area of, we'll call it the Calumet region, back in the heyday, there was a bar on every corner and there was a band in every bar.

There was a lot of bands playing music five, six, seven nights a week.

And I started playing in my father's band when I was about 14 and a half or 15 years old.

I was playing four nights a week, going to school during the daytime.

(pedal steel music) When I first started playing music, I played the six string guitar and my father had a steel guitar player in the band that was just a wonderful musician.

And as things happen, guys leave bands and they go different directions.

And at one point, he chose to leave the band.

There was a guy that had a music store in Downtown Hammond called Stan Bosega, Bosega Brothers Music.

And me being, I don't know, 15 and a half or 16 years old, he called me up and he said, "Hey, I got a pedal steel guitar down here in my store that a guy ordered and he can't pay for it.

I wanna know if you'd be arrested in a steel guitar."

It was a beautiful instrument, but it was $1,100 and I was 15.

I guess I was very fortunate because Stan looked at me and simply said, "Take it home.

If you can learn to play it, pay for it."

So I took it home and I bought the guitar.

Took me some years, but I paid him off.

(pedal steel guitar music) Pedal steel guitar can be played in so many different styles.

You can play it as a solo instrument and you can play it as a background instrument.

It can be a single string instrument and it can be a chordal style instrument.

It can do all those things and it does all those things very well.

(pedal steel guitar music) >> Narrator: With its many ways to manipulate notes, the instrument offers a sonic palette unique unto itself.

Nelson showed us some of the practical applications of his craft and how they contribute to the emotional impact of a song.

(pedal steel guitar music) >> Those notes right there just don't work together until they get resolved.

And Vince Gill wrote a song called "Look at Us," recorded that song and John Huey was the pedal steel player on that song and he played these lines.

(pedal steel guitar music) That's just incredible.

It's beautiful how that all comes together, yet much of the time, it's actually autotune or dissonant.

It's the nature of what the instrument can do and how you approach it.

One of the phrases that I like to play a lot, I would play these notes here and then step on that first pedal and strike the fourth string and then raise the fourth string.

Now you're just waiting for that to go somewhere, right?

(pedal steel guitar music) And then let it all go.

And now it changes and all of a sudden it's beautiful.

(pedal steel guitar music) Just a really nice change.

And then, we can make these notes that ring out, sound like they're melting or like they're falling down a waterfall.

(pedal steel guitar music) But it's letting those strings ring while you play other strings that aren't necessarily in tune with them.

(pedal steel guitar music) I mentioned that the music store owner gave me a guitar and said, "Pay for it if you can learn to play it."

I had the opportunity a couple of years ago to pay that forward.

I heard about a kid 13 years old in Danville, Illinois, Tobin Hess.

And Tobin was playing just a very poor idea of a pedal steel guitar, but learning to play nonetheless.

And a friend of his told me about him and I happened to have an extra pedal steel guitar sitting in a case.

So I called him up and I said, "Tobin, I want you to do me a favor.

I want you to talk to your mom and dad and I want to see if they would agree to let me loan you a guitar."

And so of course, he did.

And I got a phone call a couple of days later and his dad said, "How can we meet you?"

They drove up from Danville and met me here in the store and I gave them my Emmons pedal steel guitar, which is probably a $5,000 guitar.

And I said, "Take it home.

Play it as long as you want to.

Learn to play it and if you ever get the opportunity and you have the funds and you wanna buy a guitar, I'd like to help you if I can."

About a year later, he called me up, he says, "I think I'm ready."

And so, I had a used guitar at the time, I sold him that used guitar and got my Emmons back and I think he played that guitar that I sold him about a year.

And the company that built that guitar saw him playing that guitar and said, "Hey, we want to build you a new guitar and give it to you."

So they built him a $10,000 guitar and gave it to him because he is such a phenomenal pedal steel guitar player.

This kid has gone way beyond what my capabilities would ever be.

He's a pretty ingenious pedal steel player.

(pedal steel guitar music) >> It's a great space to be in with the group because we all represent so many different decades of experience and training and vision.

I think that it's a great community and we'd like to use the opportunity as an organization to show the community the value of local artists and the appreciation of local art.

(bright music) >> Area Artists had their first exhibit in 1980 and they were just creating the first serious art museum in Michigan City.

The Area Artists Association was developed for all the working artists and I think we're still kind of linked more with what's now the Lubeznik Center for the Arts, which is a good thing, I think.

We influence each other.

We bring members into them and the art center of course provides us the occasional exhibit venue and so forth.

>> The art center was providing exhibit space and other art exhibits in there.

And then periodically, the Area Artists would've an exhibit in there.

And it's a place for the artists to gather, to- >> Network.

>> Network, to discuss art issues, to organize art projects, art exhibits.

And artists, I think, are always kind of looking for a place to network.

>> It's a lonely occupation.

>> It's pretty lonely.

You're working by yourself most of the time, so that provides a mechanism for that.

So it's added a lot to the community I think that way.

>> We often have a program, somebody will get up and give a little talk about their work, show some images of what they're working on and sometimes invite somebody else who's not a member to come in and talk about an aspect of something.

There was a series of very interesting projects that we got wrapped up in, mostly due to Kevin Firme.

He got us involved in doing fluxus exhibits and it's where you have some kind of an event going on and then there's also a residual exhibit of the artwork after the event.

>> I was with it from the start.

It was like 40 years ago.

It was a good way to get together artists from Michigan City area, but that was a way of coming together, sharing ideas.

And also, I met one of the professors from Purdue through there and I was able to get a recommendation for graduate school from him.

So that really helped get me in.

So that kind of thinker, that organization and that camaraderie was really helpful for contacts.

>> There's only a few of us that have been around forever.

It's mostly like a new group of people moving into it and becoming active every few years, but that's okay 'cause it keeps the blood fresh.

>> And it's based on exhibiting and artists tend to look for places to exhibit all the time and this provides that.

As a group, they organize these things so you can do it individually or as a group.

>> It was nice to go out and hang around the art center and make friends with my same interest.

So it was a good thing for contacts and for meeting other artists and sharing ideas and sharing our work in a show.

So that was a lot of fun and it's been good experience so far.

I've met a lot of wonderful people.

>> Our group looks to really connect with community, the local community, I think, rather than just put things up on the wall.

It also helps artists like me, I'm one of the youngest in the group and I have probably the least art experience in our training.

So to watch and listen to them, to see what they do and see what their challenges are and also learn from them as well just on individual bases, it's been good for me.

I would hope that other members feel the same.

(bright music) >> Dale: Doing as much as you can as quickly as you can is important to me.

Life is short and the earlier we get started helping our community, the better off our community will be.

>> Almost every single professor I've had, I'm on a first name basis.

By building that relationship with faculty, I was able to get involved with research.

It's one thing to read about an idea and a book versus physically doing it and seeing the results.

(upbeat music) >> Announcer: Support for programming at Lakeshore PBS comes in part from a generous bequest of the estate of Marjorie A.

Mills, whose remarkable contribution will help us keep viewers like you informed, inspired and entertained for years to come.

(bright music) >> "Eye On The Arts" is made possible in part by South Shore Arts, the Indiana Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.

Additional support for Lakeshore PBS and "Eye On The Arts" is provided by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(bright music) (bright piano music)