REVIEW EXCERPTS
| | Transformative
Light
by Zack
Kopp
Mighty Mercury Lumonics
Light and Sound Gallery, 800 E. 73 Avenue, #11, in Denver, Colorado, is the latest
embodiment of a theme initiated decades ago by artists Mel and Dorothy Tanner. |
"Sunshine Spate"
Edge Zones remodels its space with a burst of Florida's best. "Among
the more unusual works at Edge Zones are Dorothy and Mel Tanner's ethereal Lumonics
light sculptures. Their booth is illuminated in acid rainbow-hue lights that palpably
vibrate off the pallid walls.
Paradigm,
a wall piece by the late Mel Tanner dating from 1975, features
a constellation of radiant Day-Glo orbs against an onyx
background polished to a mirror finish. A Frisbee-size oval
glows with fiery red, yellow, and blue streams that melt
into each other not unlike the lava flow from a volcano.
Dorothy
Tanner's Rocket looks like a futuristic toy Elroy
Jetson might have tinkered with. It's brilliant gold and
fuchsia exoskeleton coolly abstracts the lines of an arrow
in flight."
Carlos Suarez De Jesus, art
writer, New Times Miami
Art Basel Miami Week
|
| "The
key to so much of the art of Lumonics [is] light. The studio's founders, Dorothy
Tanner and her late husband, Mel, use light and acrylic the way painters use oil
and canvas — as a primary medium for artistic expression."
Michael Mills, art
writer, New Times Broward Palm Beach |
| "You've
heard of Pop Art, Op Art, and Kinetic Art. Mel and Dorothy Tanner create what
could be called 'Wow Art'. In truth, the Tanners do have a better term for their
acrylic sculptures: 'Lumonics.' "
Skip
Sheffield, Boca Raton Daily News |
| "Contemporary
Art at its most up-to-date..."
Millie Wolff, Palm
Beach Daily News |
| "Mesmerizing
art form..."
Rose Boccio,
Sun-Sentinel |
| "Performance
art or happening? Light-and-space art or installation? The mixed-media art at
Lumonics resolutely resists categorizing. It's all of the above and then some."
Michael Mills, art writer,
New Times |
| "It's
called Lumonics, but what is it? Is it art, is it entertainment, or is it interior
design. Yes, it is."
Rita Gillmon, The
San Diego Union |
| "If
inner space is the last frontier, then Mel and Dorothy Tanner are its pioneers.
They create an aesthetic experience unlike any other. A walk through the Lumonics
Gallery is a bit like a tour of some futuristic spaceship. The plastic sculptures
blink, drip, turn and glow. Like the Wizard of Oz behind a curtain, they create
a separate reality."
Barbara
Marshall, Broward Close-up, Channel 2 (WPBT Public TV) |
"You'll
become completely enshrouded in a world of sensory delight as the sounds and sights
of this astonishing multimedia art form gradually take control of your consciousness."
Jason Budjinski, New Times Broward-Palm Beach
|
| "If
you are stumped as to what to do Saturday night, consider spending a visually
stimulating, thoroughly entertaining, mind-expanding evening at Lumonics. Art
and technology meet to create a veritable shrine to the future's possibility.
It is a timely vision we should not fail to see."
Alex Loret de Molac, New Miami Magazine |
"As
much as I relish the whole performance aspect of Lumonics, I welcome anything
that expands the audience for the individual artworks in all their marvelous diversity.The
art of Lumonics is first and foremost an experiential art. That's only as it should
be."
Michael Mills, art writer, New Times Broward-Palm
Beach
excerpted from introduction to Art of Lumonics (Coral Springs Museum)
Mills
Introduction |
"Think
of Dorothy and Mel Tanner as modern-day Timothy Learys. Their sound-and light-filled
habitat, a Disneyland for the brain, is the only mind-altering substance they
offer. Drop in, tune out, and turn on. The Tanners will take you to anywhere your
brain desires."
Tracie
Cone, The Herald (1992) *
Tracie Cone, Pulitzer Prize recepient, is now the publisher of The
Pinnacle News in the San Jose, CA area. |
| "So
what is it like? Words are inadequate; it is, after all, a non-verbal experience.
Suffice it to say that emotions and the imagination are exercised in ways rarely
experienced in everyday life."
Eric
Furry, Sweet Potato, Bangor, Maine |
"Imagine
walking into another 'civilization' where verbal communication is kept limited
and visual and audio communications are allowed to roam freely. This idea has
come to life at Lumonics."
The
Chariot, Taravella
High School |
|
