Tag: MCA

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Film/TV TV Features

The MCU Assumes its Final Form with WandaVision

Correct me if I’m wrong — and I’m sure someone will — but I think WandaVision holds the Marvel record for most elapsed screen time until someone gets punched. In the course of 23 films and eight TV series, the problems of superheroes and their discontents are always ultimately solved by scrapping. (I haven’t seen everything, but I’m guessing there’s a lot of punching in Iron Fist.) That’s to be expected from stories about characters who, as Vision (Paul Bettany) points out, dress like Mexican wrestlers. But for years, the “blam!” and “pow!” that are allegedly the genre’s biggest selling point have been the least interesting part of Marvel movies. How many action sequences do you remember from The Avengers? But you remember when the triumphant heroes went for shawarma.

WandaVision, the Disney+ miniseries that reaches its climax on Friday, March 5th, is the most creative thing to happen to superheroes since Into the Spider-Verse. Its real genius is leaving out the punchy parts that I’ve been tuning out since Vision was born in 2015’s Avengers: Age of Ultron.

Elizabeth Olsen (left) and Paul Bettany use TV Land tropes to unpack trauma in WandaVision

The love story of magically powered former Hydra operative Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision, the $3 billion vibranium synthoid of Tony Stark’s AI butler J.A.R.V.I.S. and rogue superbot Ultron, was mostly there to provide some pathos when Vision sacrificed himself to save half the universe. But despite the fact that Vision died (twice, thanks to the magic of time travel), when WandaVision kicks off, he and Wanda are living in a quaint house in a quiet New Jersey suburb. Their living room looks just like The Dick Van Dyke Show, right down to the black and white. The superpower couple tries to keep up appearances as normal, 1950s-style humans, even as their words are interrupted by a laugh track of mysterious origin.

The “real people trapped in a TV show” setup is nothing new — remember Raul Julia’s breakthrough performance in 1984’s Overdrawn at the Memory Bank? (No? Just me?) WandaVision‘s first three episodes see our heroic domestics trying to figure out what, exactly, is going on as they cycle through a survey of sitcom history, from I Love Lucy to The Honeymooners to the thematically appropriate I Dream of Jeannie. Then, as the world fills with color and the clothes become a lot less buttoned down, Wanda is pregnant with twins and their house looks like The Brady Bunch. As the twins grow up supernaturally quickly, we transition to the 1980s. In the show’s most delicious meta moment, episode 5 takes on Full House, the show that made Elizabeth Olsen’s sisters, Mary Kate and Ashley, into child stars.

Meanwhile, there’s a parallel story developing in a more recognizable version of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) is one of billions of people who return from Thanos-induced oblivion to find a world transformed. She reports for duty at secret super-agency S.W.O.R.D. and is immediately thrust into the twin mysteries of the violent disappearances of Wanda and what was left of Vision, and a small town in New Jersey that has been cut off from the outside world by a dome of energy. By the time the narrative threads meet and the first punch is thrown in episode 6 “All-New Halloween Spooktacular!” the real world and the meta world have become hopelessly intertwined — and we haven’t even gotten to the musical number yet.

Olsen and Bettany, an “unusual couple”

WandaVision is at its best when it plays like the legendary Adult Swim short “Too Many Cooks” with an unlimited budget. Showrunner Jac Schaeffer delights in subverting basic tropes of both classic TV and Marvel superhero movies. The most important scene in the entire show, when Vision confronts Wanda with the knowledge that she created the sitcom world with her magic, plays out with credits rolling over it.

But none of the narrative fireworks would matter without emotional grounding from the leads. Olsen and Bettany have perfect chemistry. You have no trouble believing a witch could love a robot so much that she would bend the fabric of reality itself to bring him back from death (or at least deactivation). There are plenty of good performances among the sprawling supporting cast, especially Kathryn Hahn as Agnes, the nosy neighbor with a secret.

After 2020, the year without superheroes, WandaVision‘s popularity points to the staying power of the MCU, and Disney’s continued market domination, as the film world tries to get back on its feet. In some ways, the show is Marvel in its final form. The MCU has looked more like serial TV than discrete films for a long time, and the show’s cheeky writing makes a running joke out of Marvel’s tendency to hijack unrelated genres and slap a superhero in them. Marvel the infinitely pliable is the perfect vessel for Disney the insatiable devourer.

WandaVision streams on Disney+.

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We Recommend We Recommend

MCA Hosts Final BFA Exhibition Online

CREDIT: Emily Warren

Emily Warren

‘The Station’ by Emily Warren, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 24 x 36″

Earlier this month, Memphis College of Arts’ final graduating class attended the school’s very last commencement ceremony, albeit in a virtual setting. An especially unprecedented and poignant moment in itself, that was not the only final tradition the now-shuttered arts college had to take online.

Toward the end of every semester, each graduating class contributes works of art to a final BFA exhibition, which is typically held on campus grounds. This year, however, the exhibition, entitled “Intrepidly Yours,” is being featured on MCA’s 2020 BFA website, featuring works from 33 students ranging in media and genres from comics books to animations to sculptural works.

“Every semester, Tom Lee, who’s one of our professors and who is tasked with working with the seniors, and I worked with the students from the first week of the semester getting this together,” says Olivia Wall, coordinator of external engagement for MCA. “We were about halfway through the process when everything went a little crazy. The students had done half of the work, but then all of a sudden, we had to very quickly shift to working with the students to make sure that whatever they were making could come to fruition online.”

To pull off the final exhibition, Wall and Lee worked with students and their advisors to develop plans to make sure they were able to get their final BFA contributions finished, despite possible lack of materials and space. Larry D. Springfield, Jr.

‘The Shaman of Oz’ by Larry D. Springfield, Jr., 2019, digital illustration, 14 x 11″

“For the most part, every single student was able to have their work done in a way that they wanted it to,” she says. “I know there were a few students who maybe had to do a couple less things than they were planning just because they weren’t able to get materials or they weren’t able to make sculptures at home.”

Despite the challenges, students were still able to develop works pertaining to their degrees in sculpture, painting and drawing, illustration, graphic design, comics, metals, and animation.

Wall, who is an alumna of MCA herself, says that she remembers the importance of participating in her senior art show, and while MCA’s final graduating class did it a little differently this semester, they’re still getting the experience, plus some new skills for the future.

“This is just like a traditional show,” she says. “It is something for their resume. It is a professional experience. And, differently from an in-person show, whereas that’s a whole different way of working with a gallery, there are so many galleries and museums that are switching to online. And even how students are applying for jobs is going to be more online-focused. This gave them the opportunity to learn how to submit files digitally and how to size and format their work so that it translates well on the internet. I think those are skills that are very important, particularly with the situation at hand.”

“Intrepidly Yours: The Spring 2020 BFA Exhibition” is on view until February 2021 through mca2020bfa.com.

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News News Blog

Arrow to Build New ‘Forever Home’; Passes on Plan for MCA Space

CREDIT: Paradigm Marketing and Creative

Paradigm Marketing and Creative

A rendering of the proposed Arrow building in the Broad Avenue Arts District.

Arrow, one of the organizations that had bid to take over Rust Hall next year when the Memphis College of Art closes, has pulled out of consideration and will instead set up its headquarters in the Broad Avenue Arts District.

Abby Phillips and Dorothy Collier, co-founders of the nonprofit creative co-working space, made the announcement Monday evening at Arrow’s temporary space at 2535 Broad.

Arrow has raised about $2 million toward acquiring the property and will mount a capital campaign to get another $10 million.

“The space will be more than a building, more than a program, and more than just studio space,” Phillips said. “Arrow will be a one-roof creative district in the heart of Memphis. We will house micro retail opportunities, creative community education with a focus on workforce development and artist development.”

It will have studios and creative offices, as well as co-working and shared equipment. Arrow has acquired some of the equipment from Memphis College of Art that will be available to the Arrow community.

“This space provides a unique opportunity with easy access,” she said. “We are 20 minutes or less of a drive from anywhere in the city, the street is already an established and thriving arts district, and over the next few years, there will be over 400 apartments in the surrounding five blocks.”

The 80,000- to 100,000-square-foot project is expected to take more than a year. Meanwhile, Arrow will remain in its temporary “concept” space that has six studios and already has artists working there. “We wanted to be closer to our forever home and to prove our concept that access to foot traffic does help these artists,” Phillips said.

Arrow is also offering classes and hopes this summer to have a summer camp for students much like MCA has offered for many years.

The city has selected several finalists who have proposals on what to do with the 75,000-square-foot MCA building, which will become vacant at the end of the 2019-2020 school year. Arrow had been one of the finalists. The city is also looking for ideas for the 86,000-square-foot Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, which plans to move Downtown in 2024. 

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Art Art Feature

Horn Island: The Last Show

CREDIT: Jon W. Sparks

Bill Nelson’s Walking Back to Waters Crossing With Cordie, oil on canvas, at the Horn Island exhibition at Memphis College of Art

There will be a lot of “lasts” at Memphis College of Art this coming year. The school closes for good after the next spring commencement with the remaining students graduating and going on their way, alumni to a memory.



As fall gets underway, the first of the year’s lasts begins with the 35th Horn Island Exhibition, one of MCA’s most distinctive endeavors. In the early 1980s, professor Bob Riseling liked the idea of students going on an excursion to the uninhabited barrier island off the Gulf Coast near Ocean Springs, Mississippi. There was a fitting historic resonance: Noted artist Walter Inglis Anderson (1903-1965) spent a good deal of the last 20 years of his life going to and from Horn Island, portraying the animals and landscapes. The Walter Anderson Museum of Art in Ocean Springs keeps his memory alive and his art protected.



Riseling imagined students, faculty, and alumni going for several days to the island where they would observe and absorb the environment while roughing it the whole way. To this day there are no amenities on the island, so everyone  camps and creates with the idea of coming back to complete artworks inspired by the experience. Riseling led the expeditions for years and then handed off the direction to MCA faculty member Don DuMont, who remembers well how it changed him.



“The first year I was adjunct here at MCA, well in my forties,” DuMont says. “That experience on Horn Island took me all the way back to when I was really young, to all the islands I had been on throughout my service years. Things just flooded back into me. And I started looking at my life and it just took a big 180.”



Jon W. Sparks

Don DuMont’s Horn Memories Spirit Box. Walnut, cedar, pewter, found objects, at the Horn Island exhibition at Memphis College of Art

For many of those who have trekked to Horn Island over the years, it is revelatory in its own way. “Some of them have never camped before,” DuMont says. “Some of them had never even been to the coast. Some of them never even been on a boat.”



DuMont went to Horn Island three times when Riseling was running the show, and the senior professor saw the effect. “He told me, ‘I think you’re the one to take this over,'” DuMont says. “And I’ve done it 14 years. It’s been just a tremendous opportunity and something that’s changed my life greatly, and then to be able to see all of this wonderful work all these years. All of these people that have participated feel that it really had big significance in their lives, too. So it’s pretty damn sweet.”



This year’s show runs through October 4th, with the reception this Saturday from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at MCA. As in the past, there will be refreshments in the form of barbecued Spam and Gatorade, the essential sustenance of the art adventurers.



Students are required to do four to six pieces for the show. They have sponsors, and the idea is to give the benefactors choices in selecting a work for themselves. The sponsors are typically art collectors and understand the value of a visit to Horn Island. Sometimes they’re happy to forego having a piece — they’d rather the student have the experience on the island and then have a chance to sell their work.



Jon W. Sparks

Scottie Wyatt’s gyotaku print Pompano, at the Horn Island exhibition at MCA

That experience, DuMont says, is different every time, whether veteran or newbie. “We step on a different island every year,” he says. “As a matter of fact, every morning when you step out of your tent, it’s a different island.” Nature does what it pleases and it presents the artists with fresh visions and not just a few lessons. He mentions Hurricane Katrina that blew through the region in 2005. “Pre-Katrina, the island was very lush. After Katrina, we witnessed a significant die-off.” The devastation came, he says, because there wasn’t significant rain for several months after the hurricane. “So that island just sat there and had salt water that killed off a lot of those trees. Over the years, we watched the island come back, and this year in particular, it seemed really, really lush. I think it had a lot to do with our wet fall and winter.”



Each artist takes away whatever they will from the excursion and then spends the summer working on their art. There is certainly no theme imposed on them, although DuMont says, “I think people really were reflecting a lot, maybe thinking about the past, and thinking about what they’ll do now.” And then when the pieces started coming in to MCA to be hung or placed, DuMont noticed a thread that ran through many of them. “Reflection literally shows up a lot in work,” he says. He points to a symmetrical work made of cut paper. “It’s almost like a mirror,” he says, speculating that perhaps it being the last show spurred thoughts about past, present, and future, which then emerged as balance, reflection, and symmetry in the artworks.



Peyton LaBauve’s porcelain Don DuMonster (Smoking Pipe) at this year’s Horn Island exhibition

There is also much diversity in the show, DuMont says. “It’s all like-minded people there, so you would think they’re all going to be doing the same thing. But that’s so far from the truth. We have beautiful jewelry, we have ceramic work that’s phenomenal. The other thing is that it’s not just traditional style work, but there are all kinds of mediums here.” Painting, drawing, photography, printmaking, animation, fabric. “New technologies, old methods, just a wonderful blend,” he says.

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Art Exhibit M

See the Pictures: David Bowie Visits Memphis College of Art

David Bowie played a couple concerts in Memphis back in the early 1970s, during his Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane days. In February of 1973, Bowie played (as Ziggy) alongside his band, the Spiders From Mars. The eyebrowless rocker then hung around town for another day and paid an impromptu visit to Memphis College of Art, where he met longtime teacher and painter Dolph Smith. 

Smith engineered the meeting by contacting Cherry Vanilla, Bowie’s PR person. The artist presented Bowie with a painting inspired by the song “Major Tom.” It shows a vividly-colored landscape and two paper airplanes — a longtime motif in Smith’s work. 

Smith, now in his eighties, remembers Bowie as unpretentious: “You know performers have a stage presence,” Smith remembered. “I found he had a modest person to person presence. No pretense… just so easy to be with that night.” 

The entire incident is remembered by local film auteur and lay historian Mike Mccarthy in two essays about the meeting, and about Dolph Smith. The photos below are all by Cherry Vanilla. 

Dolph Smith