The Cincinnati Enquirer from Cincinnati, Ohio • Page 150

EDITOR: SARA PEARCE, 369-1011 THE CINCINNATI ENQUIRER SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1991 SECTION John Kiesewetter Television Owen Findsen Art Aimrsa LEISURE Bells inspire this sculptor to sound off I mm i Art exists in space. Music occurs in time. Donald Lipski's sculpture, created from bells and chimes, fills both time and space in a show that opens Friday at the Contemporary Arts Center. The art is a mysterious mix of images. There are swaying steeples, ringing nuns, a huge bell that was made to be silent but rings nonetheless, and a jail cell that is a musical instrument.

All the works are shrouded in purple silk chiffon, and all ring to a score composed by Brad Fiedel, who wrote the music for this summer's hit film, Terminator II. Lipski is a New York artist of some renown. Art in America devoted the cover story of its May 1 99 1 issue to his art. The thing about Lipski's art that excites people is his use of materials, and the way he draws his inspiration from them. Most if if -'I -I i itot iihwt sculptors work from raw materials, metal or stone, but Lipski builds his art from objects that already evoke ideas.

In Philadelphia, he made sculo- We Can't Dance from Genesis includes work by, from left, Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks. inn In first album in five tackles everything from fad diets to death and homelessness Trom Taa aiets -i 10 aeatn ana nomei osetner a mm NBC drama flies away as favorite What's the best new show on television? The answer is obvious to Enquirer readers: NBC's I'll Fly A way. One-third of the 196 Tristate people who responded to the Enquirer's new fall TV poll named the 1950s civil rights drama, about a white family and their black housekeeper, as the year's superior series. With 64 votes, it finished far above other favorites: Brooklyn Bridge (23), Homefront (21) and Tim Allen's Home Improvement (17) comedy. "It's some of the finest programming I've ever seen on television," said Genie Libis of Landen.

"It has truly given me a real perspective on what life must have been like at that time, not only for black people, but for white people too." "It's a very honest show," said Louise Brouillette of Dayton, Ky. "It doesn't take the easy way out. And it's really like the South where I grew up (in Louisiana) in the 1950s." The nostalgia craze The strong showing for I'll Fly Away may surprise some viewers. The series is third at 8 p.m. Tuesday and ranked No.

53 for the year, far behind ABC's Full House (No. 19) and CBS' Rescue 91 1 (No. 28). But NBC had seen sufficient support to order a full season (22 episodes) last week. Our TV poll also showed that the networks' nostalgic kick is a big hit with viewers, regardless of Nielsen ratings.

The Tristate's second new favorite is CBS' Brooklyn Bridge (No. 72 in Nielsen ratings), about a 1956 extended Brooklyn family. Third among viewers here is ABC's Homefront (No. 46 in Nielsens), about U.S. troops coming home from World War II in 1945.

"'It's hard to believe that those are children acting in Brooklyn Bridge. wonderful! And the stories and people are so real," says Linda Krummel of Kenwood. "Brooklyn Bridge is by far the best 'show on TV because my family and I can watch it. It's wonderful. Please don't take it off," says Trena Goodwin of Pleasant Ridge.

Callers were concerned that CBS had "moved Brooklyn Bridge three times in two months. (It now airs at 8 p.m. Wednesdays, a stronger night for CBS than its original Friday slot.) Tops among fall sitcoms were Tim Allen's Home Improvement (17) and The Torkelsons (12). Rounding out the top 10 were Marlee Matlin's Reasonable Doubts (9); The Commish (8); Eerie, Indiana (6), Jim Garner's Man Of The People (5) and Roc (4). "Tim Allen is the funniest person alive.

And the kids aren't brats," says Rick Foley of Mason. A bunch of bimbos But not everyone agreed. Home Improvement also ranked sixth on the readers' worst TV show list though far behind the biggest loser, CBS' Princesses, with 20 negative votes. "They're all a bunch of bimbos. They insult our intelligence," says Judy McCane of College Hill about Princesses, which is on "hiatus" while producers replace Cincinnati's Julie Hagerty.

Adventures of Mark Brian ranked second (12) on readers' cancellation list. "These guys should be heard and not seen' says Curt Mathies of Covington. Fox's Herman 's Head finished third (11) among worst shows, with Eerie, Indiana fourth (10). Good Evil, the first series canceled, and Nurses were fifth (9). Tied with Home Improvement (8) were Sibs and the Carol Burnett Show; which premiered two days before the call-in.

Next were the Suzanne Somers-Patrick Step By Step sitcom and Flesh 'N Blood (7) and Dabney Coleman's DrexelTs Class (6). "Herman's Head is the worst, although there are so many to choose from!" says Barb Gerke from the Eastgate area. Some teachers didn't like Coleman's classroom demeanor, while several nurses were turned off by NBC's Nurses. And many readers didn't like the comebacks by some popular stars. "Carol Burnett has had her time.

I'm tired of seeing her," says Reeva Popp of Blue Ash. "DrexelTs Class is the worst. Dabney Coleman is in the wrong show, with a bunch of misfit children who think about sex more than Jimmy Swaggart," says Dave Henkes of Anderson Township. The best and the worstK-6 ture from Donald Lipski American flags. In Cincinnati, it's bells.

"If you think about what it is when a bell rings it's metal on metal," says Lipski. "From all rational perspective, metal on metal should make the harshest sound imaginable, and yet bells through that strident percussion are so sweet and so rich." For the CAC exhibition Lipski considered the United States Playing Card Company, Midwest Enterprises (traffic controllers on the Ohio River) and the Verdin Company as sources for his material. It was Verdin that rang a bell with Lipski, and Lipski rang a bell with company president James R. Verdin. Verdin saw the opportunity to create an exhibition around Verdin's products as a good way to launch the celebration of the company's 150th year in business.

All in the family Verdin, in the fifth generation of family ownership, is the world's largest supplier of bells and carillons. The company also makes chimes, church steeples and animated figures for amusement parks. The company operates a converted warehouse in Over-the-Rhine as an art space, providing studios for 47 artists. Lipski's art was created in the Verdin foundry on Eastern Avenue, with the help of workers from every part of the company. Verdin gave Lipski his pick of bells.

Lipski created four works for the exhibition plus a limited edition bell sculpture. The works in the show: "Leaves of Grass" Two full-size fiberglass church steeples are connected, bottom to bottom, and placed on their sides, swaying back and forth like a (Please see BELLS, Page K-4) A thumbs up Genesis, We Can't Dance, Atlantic. For the silver anniversary of its founding, Genesis has painted its masterpiece. With We Can't Dance, arriving in stores Tuesday, the trio of Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks has created Genesis' crowning glory. The band's first album in five years contains streamlined songs of great fun (lambasting televangelists with "Jesus He Knows great rock 'n' roll Can't Dance," a spoof on airheads in blue-jean commercials) and great sorrow I Lost You" grieves for Eric Clapton over the loss of his son, Conor).

On each cut, Rutherford, Banks and Collins strip these Genesis songs of their customary layers of art-song artifice and leave just the art. CLIFF RADEL BY CLIFF RADEL The Cincinnati Enquirer Genesis says it has six left feet. Don't believe a word of it. This band can dance. On its first album in five years, the trio of Phil Collins, Mike Rutherford and Tony Banks has created a work that proclaims: We Can't Dance.

"It's all lies," Collins says about the title as he chuckles into the phone from Genesis' London headquarters. Collins is telling the truth. We Can't Dance in stores Tuesday is just a smoke screen. This album the follow-up to 1986's quadruple-platinum Invisible Touch dances with Genesis' weightiest lyrics and most musical material since Rutherford and Banks founded the band in 1966 with Peter Gabriel and Anthony Phillips. Covers it all Over the span of 1 2 tracks, We Can 't Dance covers child abuse Son of TV fleecer-preachers He knows the pretty faces and empty minds of TV commercial models Can't fad diets and the homeless Me And those are the lighter songs.

The album closes with Genesis pondering life and death. "Since I Lost You" is Collins' memorial to Eric Clapton's lost little boy, Conor. "Fading Lights" is Banks' reverie on the shortness of life. "We didn't purposely go for doom and gloom," Collins says. "With the way we write, it's hard to know what the intention of the album was.

"The three of us go into a room with nothing written beforehand. We use a drum machine to free me up from the drums so I can sing." Banks and Rutherford play the barest bones of a song. The former mans keyboards. The latter handles the guitar. As they play, Collins sings a stream-of-consciousness melody and lyrics.

"When you're singing like that you with "Since I Lost You," if Collins hadn't played the song for Clapton. The grieving guitarist was so moved by the song and the lines, "I held your hand so tightly, that I couldn't let it go, Now how can life ever be the same," he had to tell his friends. They, in turn, told others. Word got out. "Now we're talking about it," Collins says.

"I'm glad I can. But it still gives you shivers when you think about it." Collins grows quiet. To bring himself around, Genesis' class clown cracks a joke "here's Mike to tell you that everything I've been saying is a lie" as he passes the phone to Rutherford. Why the five-year gap The band's unofficial historian, Rutherford tries to account for the five years between Genesis albums. "We wrote Invisible Touch in 1986 and finished touring in 1987.

We were going to start writing in 1990." But their solo careers got in the way. Rutherford's is with Mike the Mechanics. Banks writes film scores. Collins makes Grammy-winning albums like But Seriously. The band finally got together in March and completed We Can't Dance in September.

"It has been five years," Rutherford admits. "In our minds, however, it just feels like three. But then, we are all getting older and time goes faster." Time is flying so fast for Banks, he wrote a song about it. "Fading Lights" deals with "those times when you're doing something and you stand back and say, 'this might be the last Is Banks dropping a hint? Is We Can't Dance and Genesis's planned 1992 world tour the band's last dance? "This song can apply to anything in our life," Banks says. "It's not supposed to apply literally to the group.

"But it could. "That's the way it's always been with us. We have never said, we're definitely carrying on forever. That's why I couldn't resist ending the album with the word New holiday discsK-3 "Sometimes the words make sense and start to string together and make up a line of a song. Certain hooks of what you sing wind up giving somebody an idea of what to write.

"So, you see, some of what ends up quite broody starts life quite innocently." "Since I Lost You" was born in innocence. Rutherford and Banks were working in the studio the March day Eric Clapton's 412-year-old son, Conor, fell to his death from an open window on the 49th floor of a Manhattan apartment building. "I came in the next day and they played it for me," Collins said. "Straightaway, I was singing the things you hear on the record. cos my heart is broken in pieces yes my heart is broken in pieces since you've been gone.

"It wasn't until the lyrics were finished that I told Tony and Mike what they were about," Collins says. "I didn't want to talk about it. Nor did any of us. We would prefer for people to think it's just a love song." That is where things would stand "The Belles" are figures of nuns built on old English bells from the Verdin collection. I id) I mm tend to sing words, he says.

CW- Holiday entertainment calendar nrv? vnur nroun have a soecial holidav concert, show. Droaram or exhibit planned? We'd like to know. Send us the information, with ticket prices and a phone number. We'll publish a special holiday entertainment calendar in Arts Leisure. Mail to Holiday Calendar, Tempo Cincinnati Enquirer, 617 Vine Cincinnati, Ohio, 45202, or fax to 369-1 813..