Intersection

[At the gallery] Undeniably dark

Tupac, Binion and Ungar’s death scenes come to life in paint

Julie Seabaugh

The sun uncharacteristically absent, Main Street’s grayer than usual, and Dust Gallery’s orange-on-brown signage serves as a retro beacon to casual afternoon passersby. Inside, broken only by one dark bench, even the air seems gray. The expanse is gritty and dead quiet. Literally.

Seven stark depictions of somber street corners and ominous doorways line the walls, most recreating entryways wherein rapper Tupac Shakur, gambler Stu Ungar, Horseshoe hoarder Ted Binion and others took their last breaths. There is also a piece entitled “Dayvid Figler,” though the lawyer/judge/poet/author/KNPR commentator is very much alive, and, artist Mark Brandvik is quick to add, “Nor do I wish him dead.”

The native Las Vegan best known for his out-of-time architectural series says his Primer collection is actually the result of two concurrent series: Death by Misadventure and Honey, I’m Home—the latter based on the idea of capturing the threshold between people’s public and private spaces. Not only is Primer named for the material from which two-tone leaves and turn-arrows took their shape, but the title also holds the double meaning indicating a starting point, specifically a first step in the long journey to truly knowing a person.

Yet a great deal of mystery remains; each piece exudes an undeniable noir or detective-novel vibe that Brandvik equates with works by Ross McDonald or Dashiell Hammett. “I’ve been documenting a lot of the city with different filters, one of the filters being that of where semi-famous people have passed,” he says. “The space is kind of consecrated when a famous person passes. Much in the same way people visit sites of the Kennedy assassination or the Lincoln assassination, I’m interested in that on a Vegas-specific level.”

Primer displays Wednesday through Saturday, noon to 5 p.m., until August 5, at Dust Gallery, 880-3878.

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