Albuquerque Journal from Albuquerque, New Mexico • Page 21

Photography Can Be Art, City Club Members Prove 1 ts feu1' Photography is far more than candid snapshots of the toddler's fist steps, the latest traffic victim lying in a pool of blond, a toothy beauty selling one of a myriad of products in S'Jiue advertisement. Photography also can ho an art. Members of the Enchanted b'lis Camera Club are doing their bit to prove that photos are as effective as oil on a canvas in an exhibit of their recent works. will he submitting works for consideration in the annual New Stale Pair Photo Exhibit which draws thousands of entries from almost every nation in the world including many from behind the Iron Curtain. Mexico scenes that vo favorites of the painter likewise ai favorites of the camera carrying artist.

S- ai character studies of people, whose interests and attitudes com" in nrmy a photographic portrait. The darkroom can magic to equal the most abstract is crea.i'iti. io.h via pruning in unusual ways and treatment of tile negatives prior to printing. The chili's members currently are exhibiting a series of rc- -a A. e.

Bank's North Fourth Street branch. Participants iivlede R.iy llasserbroek, Joseph Council, Harry Howard, Ed Berry, Wolfgang Braun, Milburn Moore, .1 In Hob: LranCon. Dick Den Mereen, Alice Council, Joseph Council and Oran May. The snow cont.iiucs Sept. in.

It's worth a visit. J. X. rtpw ti mr Mt-y h' Tm-i A' v. i al C.MTillOh'' iy i'-'i'iy houi'rd 'Sht'iMdicrdri'" hv i hum "i bijtjt-J JOURNAL, 'g 1 Sunday, August 24, 1969 C-l I "Kiii1 i- 3 'X in-.

iP 1 Hints More Activity 4 4 4, "Sunlidit ill! "Clo Winds'' hy Ccituvdl Nick Krevitsky to Judge Craft Show, Deadline Near Hypocrisy of Public, Over 'Adult' Efforts I Shade" hv Braim ENTRIES will be received in the Hobby Building of the State Fair Thursday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Friday from 2 to 8 p.m. Mrs. Dorothy Clark, chairman of the acceptance committee, and her committee members, will be on hand to receive entries.

Shipped articles must be in their hands by Friday. To be acceptable, all articles must be original designs hand crafted by New Mexico craftsmen. It is not necessary to obtain an entry blank. Those ishing to enter work in the show may submit five objects. Each piece must be complete with a 3 5 inch card containing all pertinent information.

Mrs. Mary Elizabeth McDonald, state president of New Mexico Designer-Craftsmen, and Carl Paak, president of Albuquerque i gner-Craftsmcn, are among officers working with Mrs. Hooton on plans for the State Fair show, along with presidents of other chapters of the state, in Santa Fe, Taos and Las Vegas. 'IP jl LJ IVon'f Lcae ALT Bernard Thomas would like to direct more Broadway shows but only if it could be fitted around his Albuquerque Little Theatre schedule. "I certainly wouldn't want to give up the Little Theatre," he said last week in discussing plans for directing John Patrick's "Love Is a Time of Day" on Broadway this winter after the ALT production in September.

"THIS IS REALLY my baby and I am in love with it. It is so gratifying to be working constantly at things you love. "In professional theater there are long dry spells and I feel the artist to satisfy that inner something that makes him an artist must constantly be at work." HE ADDED that the Broadway producers wanted him to direct another show after "Love" premiered this summer in Paramus, N.J., "but it would have cut into our schedule of preparing for our season membership drive so I had to turn it down. But they told me if I ever wanted to direct I had a job as close as the telephone." Thomas found little difference in directing the professional performers in the premiere than in working with local performers at ALT. "The only difference I noted was the quickness in which they adapted to suggestions.

They also were sufficiently inventive to add to my ideas," Thomas said. "But then we have local performers who do this well. I never cease to be amazed at the amount of talent we have in Albuquerque. Thomas Broadway Nw against the libertines, as it were, Valenti's rating system for general audiences, for mature, for restricted to minors with parents, and for "watch out" has set down guidelines for the population at large, "TIIK HUME MOTIVE of the rating system," Valenti said, "is to inform parents, as accurately as we can, about the contents of a film and then let the family make its own decision. "We don't claim God-like certitude.

"We make mistakes, but the surprise of the rating system is not the mistakes we have made, but the fact we have made so few. Remember, the rating system rates for children, not adults." Valenti subscribes to the theory that adults should (and doi see anything they wish on the screen but that youngsters should be protected. Even so, he believes well adjusted children can't be ruined by movies. "T1IKKE IS NO persuasive evidence that movies cause juvenile delinquency," Valenti said. "Young people whose parents have given them solid, deep-rooted values will never he corrupted by vv "I WAS tremendously flattered to be asked to direct Patrick's comedy on Broadway.

I'd never had any aspirations to direct there since it didn't seem possible. I was concerned about even directing the show in New Jersey because I didn't want in any way to affed the relationship we have with Patrick and if the show had been bad this might have hurt. "We are very lucky to be able to have plays from such a brilliant man, and to have him willing to come to Albuquerque almost every year to work with us. "But the New Jersey production turned out so happily I was delighted when they asked me to direct for Broadway." THOMAS, however, realizes the slim chances of success on Broadway even for a show that has proven successful in community theater outings. "The theater going public today doesn't begin to realize the problems of getting a show polished for Broadway.

All the little things that slip by elsewhere just can't be in New York." The ALT production opens Sept. 4. Reservations are being accepted at the box office now. Young Painter lo Show Works An exhibit of water colors by Stephen Patrick McDonnell will open with a reception from 2-5 p.m. today at the Institute of Attitude Motivation, 120 Morningside SE.

The show continues through Sept. 20. The watercolorist exhibited with professional artists in Paris in the Pinacotheque des Peintres Modernes and has been accepted in many professional juried shows. The artist is a 17-year-old senior at Del Norte High School and is the son of Mr. and Mrs.

E. J. McDonnell, 126 Utah NE. He has traveled widely via his father's military service. He began study at the age of six.

Locally he has studied with Siegfried Hahn and Howard Wexler. He has won several first prize awards, including first in oils in the Albuquerque Student Council Exhibit and earlier this month first place in the New Mexico Arts and Crafts Fair youth exhibit. Art Classes Set By Betty Colbert Betty Colbert, widely known Corrales potter, will teach an evening course in ceramics at the University of Albuquerque this fall semester. UofA art department chairman Don Bush said the clases would be held Mondays and Wednesdays from 6:45 to 9 p.m. Students may register on Wednesday at the UofA gymnasium from 8 a in.

to 3 p.m. or at St. Francis Hall on the campus from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Last day for registration is Sept. 8.

Mrs. Colbert has exhibited her works in shows throughout the United States Some Film Rapped by anybody or anything. "More of life, good and bad, is to be learned on the playground and in the school yard than in the theater. "If my own son goes wrong, it will be my fault, not the Bijou Theater." In substance, Valenti put the rap on the failure today of parents to fulfill their obligations. He was, to a degree, defending mast forms of entertainment as blameless and accusing parents of using movies -and by implication, television as a cop-out.

"If there is a puzzling and tragic flaw in the American scene, it is the gradual erosion of the family and the parent as the indispensable rostrum of a society that deserves to endure," Valenti said. THEN HE TURNED to the fast buck operators i Hollywood: "In the making of some movies there is also a torturing of values which is oft-times frivolous and sometimes venal. "The producer or director who inserts senseless violence and useless sex in his film so that he can lure more restless voyeurs into the boxoffice is a faker and a fraud and he ought to be so labeled." Hv VKRXOX SCOTT HOLLYWOOD (LTD -Jack Vah'nti, peppery president of the Motion Picture Assn. of America, stopped by the citadel of fihn-makinK to shake a firmer under the noses of producers and the public. Former President Johnson's one-time top aide spoke to the Greater Los AnRcle.s Press Club and said.

"If I am concerned about anything in the motion picture arena it is the hypocriy on the part of some portions of the public ami some few movie-makers. "Those citizens who mvpieh against movies usually are infuriated by films they have never seen but only read about. "The films they say they want, they don't support, and the films they support are the ones they claim they never wanted, Finally, there is nothing in civil statute of canon law that says someone has to pay money to see a film he doesn't want to see." In specific terms, Valenti is talking about the long waiting lines for the would-be erotic "1 Am Curious, (Yellow)" as opposed to the empty seats for "Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies." To balance the puritans Makers Valenti Valenti cannot be accused of partiality. After singling public morality and film makers, he took on that most smug of all tribe, the critics. "The critic who pillages every crevice of his integrity so that he may be accounted intellectually 'with and who describes as art what ought to Ik? quarantined, is surely part of the general contagion.

"There is such a substance as public manners and public civility. What one can do in the privacy of his home may be something he ought not to do in the lobby of the Waldorf Astoria or in a public theater. "BLOOD and brutality, entwined nudity, foul language these are the last, gasping cries of the inept film-maker as he drowns, talentless, in a sea of mediocrity." Not since Will Hayes has the movies' top banana cleared the air with outspoken i redness. Unfortunately, Valenti's power to enforce his convictions is limited. "So long as an audience says one thing and does another, so long as there are a few film-makers who have a ready taste for trash, so long as there are critics who are hesitant to say, 'the emperor has no clothes so long as there are movie executives who stand hy mutely, we shall continue to blow an uncertain trumpet." Valenti concluded by painting a brighter picture.

"I am convinced the film landscape is not a cheerless gray," he said, and judged as high caliber these snon-to-be-released movies: "Hello Dolly." "Marooned," "Topaz," "Goodbye Mr. Chips." "Paint Your Wagon." "The Secret of Santa Vittoria' and "The Madwoman of Chnillot." Valenti is very much a man of his time. He does not choose to be a censor or an obsolescent "czar." But within limitations of his powers he is doing his job bettor than it has been done in decades. CO-PRODUCERS HOLLYWOOD (ITI) -Shelley Winters and producer Sidney Glazier will co-produce a movie titled "The Last of the Great Jellv Bellies." I.B I FILM DUE HOLLYWOOD (LTD Producer Mack Bin" an- nounced he film own "Lyndon Johnson Is and Living Exactly Miles From for his Pia Productions. Mrs.

Robert P. Hooton, chairman of the 19 New Mexico State Fair Contemporary Crafts Exhibition, stresses the importance of having entries from con-temporary raftsmen throughout the state. The show is sponsored by New Mexico Designer-Craftsmen. in conjunction with the State Fair, with financial assistance from Now Mexico Arts Commission. "We especially ask professional craftsmen in all areas of the state to participate in the show it is a joint responsibility of all of us." "NICK KREVITSKY.

internationally known Arizona craftsman, will jury the show this year," Mrs. Hooton said. Krevitsky is director of the public schools art department, Tucson, Ariz. He is a noted writer, lecturer and craftsman, and has more than three books to his credit. Krevitsky was sent overseas in the cultural exchange pro.

gram of the U.S. Department of State and is widely sought as consultant and juror of major shows. He holds a doctorate in art education, and currently works in his most recent craft, the art of stitchery. Hooton, chairman of the committee hanging the show, is assisted by a committee composed of Rod Blanklcy, Richard Hicks, Max Chavez, Don Parker, Clara Zehner and Reinhard Ackerman. The committee is busily rebuilding and adding to displays for the contemporary crafts show, and are asking everyone interested to come out and work part-time Monday during a "painting party" to refurbish the display area in the State Fair Hobby Building.

MRS. HOOTON pointed out the importance of the show, saying "We decided to sponsor this State Fair show because, until that time, there was no facility for showing con-temporary crafts suitably and we do feel that the objects should be displayed to an advantage, and not as a 'confusion of "This gives us a chance to present a volume cf recent work by contemporary professionals to a mass of people, many of them unlikely ever to tour a museum." "Bowls, containers, woven yardage first considered as crafts, have developed in recent years to become a borderline art form the work of professional designer-craftsmen co mbining utilitarian functions with artistic design. Many of the objects are intended entirely for decorative purposes." Public Lashes Love Lust-But Supports Stag Movies few- kt I ft By JIM NEWTON Journal Arts Editor There may be much talk and protest of indecency in the fine arts across New Mexico, but the opening the past few weeks of two new "adult art" theaters indicates there are quite a few New Mexicans who pay no attention to such controversy. Commonwealth Theaters Inc. which operates the bulk of Albuquerque's theaters including the Sunshine, Lobo, Hiland, Cinema East, Kimo and several drive-in facilities has converted the old El Ray into the Reel.

Its "adult art" policy is drawing well, sources report. The Mini-Vue Theater, a lOfl-seat converted retail store at 3211 Central NE, opened recently to full houses, sources indicate. These two facilities now compete with the well established Guild. AT A TIME WHEN GOOD "FAMILY" FILMS such as "Popi" a sensitive yet humorous study of a slum dweller's desperate efforts to improve the lot of his two youngsters die on the vine, Hollywood is moving ever closer to rivaling those cheaply made cheap "art" offerings. Profanity is old hat.

No longer will a nation be shocked hv "Gone With the Wind" when Clark Gable, at last fed up with Miss Scarlet's wishy washy nature, told her "Frankly, I don't give a damn." Nudity is almost commonplace--and not the fleeting shadows that once seemed so daring. Backsides are a bore, frontsides hardly fun any more. Perversions are popular, but unfortunately not always necessary for a serious dramatic film. No longer do scenes fade out when the stars hop into bed. What once was reserved for Army training films and sex education classes is considered public "entertainment." What does it all mean? Simple.

THERE MAY BE A LOT OF TALK about pornography, but the talkers for the most part still like to enjoy it, albeit perhaps a bit secretly. Certainly the "Love Lust" poem was read by a lot of people. The "adult art" theaters would not be in operation if at two bucks or so a head there wasn't an audience. Such films as a "A Cold Day in the Park" which has little redeeming values in its sordid little study of a spinster who takes in a freezing young man and even provides female fun for him are filling theaters across the country, including the respectable Ibo Arts. As long as people protest-then patronize such films-theater operators are going to capitalize with even more daring public exhibitions.

PEOPLE EKil'IlE: Mrs. Robert P. Hooton, chair-man of the Contemporary Crafts exhibit, at New MeNieo State Fair, adjusts the feather boa on her most reeent work, a "people ft.ire" she titles Helen Iiestirtwted, which was displayed in the 1S Southwestern Regional show at Dallas. Vogo, in the foreground, is more interested in cameras than in "dolls." Mrs. Hooton will display several "people fibres" in the show at State Fair, but is ineligible for competition because of her post as chairman.

(Journal photo by Hay Cary).