Alex Espalter-Torres in his studio at the West Tampa Center for the Arts. Photo: MV

Over Memorial Day weekend, the West Tampa Center for the Arts held an opening reception for the last exhibit of their inaugural season. (Click here to read the article I wrote in September about the organization’s transformation from Gallery 1906 into the WTCA.) Turns out their luck with the Tampa Fire Marshall’s office ran out that day; a fire inspector showed up the morning of the reception to issue eviction notices to the WTCA’s resident artists, based on his judgment that the building was not fit for safe occupancy.

Learning this after returning to work on Tuesday (of last week), I set out to write a story: here’s the result, which was published in Creative Loafing this week.

A closing reception for the exhibit, called A Sense of Space, has been tentatively scheduled for Fri., June 13, 6-9 p.m. In my opinion, it’s one of the better shows the WTCA has put on. Points of interest include mixed media works by Carolina Cleere, one photograph in particular by Diana Lucas Leavengood and an installation by Mitzi Gordon. (Which is not to say that regular WTCA participants like Scott Fleenor aren’t as engaging as usual.)

For those who haven’t seen Cleere’s work, she digitally manipulates landscapes and portraits (often of children, who become rather otherworldly creatures as a result– not unlike the wide-eyed waifs of Loretta Lux’s photographs) into surreal, quasi-narrative pieces.

The Leavengood photo that I’m digging features the artist in costume as a recurring character in her work: the artist (wearing a giant pair of fake red lips) as she smokes her last cigarette. It’s Leavengood’s Cindy Sherman moment.

I was not fully able to appreciate Gordon’s installation as it wasn’t lit when I visited the WTCA last week, but the piece gets interest points from me for taking on the psychologically loaded doll house (often a one-way ticket to clicheville) and just for being an installation (can’t recall having seen one of those at the WTCA before, though I haven’t been to every exhibit). Hopefully next Friday will present an opportunity to check it out at length.

If you’ve been to the exhibit or have opinions about the Center’s run-in with the Fire Marshall’s office, please feel free to leave a comment here– or chime in on the CL website, where quite a few people have already commented.

WTCA executive director Maida Millan stands surrounded by artworks in the building’s third floor hallway. Photo: MV