The Capital Times from Madison, Wisconsin • 37

Comics, astrology. 2D Advice columns. 6D TV listings. 7D 00 TheCapitalTimesDThursday, Ait, 1991 McMEDIA Patrice Wendling Another request channel? 4p- 'A, Skates MX 'typ II mwi The success of WSSM-TV's 24-hour video jukebox is prompting its owner to consider bringing another television channel to Madison viewers. Dan Dobrowolski, owner of WSSM-TVChannel 54, says Wendling OAVIO SANOELLTHE CAPITAL TIMES he may branch out from his current viewer-programmed video channel with another audience interactive channel.

WSSM works by charging viewers $3 a call to air the music video of their choice from an on-screen menu of some 5,000 videos. "Interactivity is the wave of the future," Dobrowolski says. "I'm extremely pleased with how well it's going in Madison. They've gone for it big time. The Positive Images Gallery doesn't restrict itself to black artists, only black images and themes such as this poster of a mother and child reading (right).

It commemorates the 30th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court decision ending officially imposed segregation in public education. The collage (above) celebrates friendship. 'Black art fflnds mtlet 'Interactivity is the wave of the DAN DOBROWOLSKI By Kevin Lynch our history. "Maybe we're doing something the classrooms have failed to do," says Thomas, who holds a master's degree in educational policy.

"There are more things you can do with this technology beyond videos like comedy, classifieds. So, I applied for another over-the-air channel and got the construction permit. And frankly, I've had so many commitments I put it on the back burner. But because (Channel) 54 is doing so well I may go ahead with it." i WSSM, which hasn't had an office in Madison for nine months but houses its laser disc player in the penthouse of the Concourse Hotel, switched from a primarily sports and movie lineup to 24-hour videos in November 1989. After a rough transition of fine-tuning its format and library to Madison tastes, the station began gaining Continued on Page 5D Month, the Nautilus Art Gallery in Milwaukee's very white North Shore enjoyed what dealer Sam Lewis called "the most successful promotion I've done in the 11 years that I have owned Nautilus." Numerous monied and prominent blacks are investing in recent black art.

Actor Danny Glover Color Purple," "Die recently opened the nation's largest African-American art gallery in San Francisco. Several artists carried by Positive Images, including Varnette Honey wood and Brenda Joysmith, got big breaks on TV when their work adorned the weekly sets of "The Cosby Show" and "Amen." Thomas himself has found new life in his new job. He resigned as an assistant to Mayor Paul Soglin in June to open the gallery shop. The space was purchased recently by Thomas' daughter Pamela, an anesthesiologist at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina, as a means of investing in her native Madison, and to give her father a less stressful job. Thomas, who in his youth emigrated north from Mississippi as a sharecropper, doesn't figure to just sit back and watch the art hang.

He's a man of action who has worked for President Carter's administration between stints in both Soglin administrations and directing Madison's CETA program, a community employment training program. His varied background also includes being the first black salesperson in the Sears corporation. Thomas' new "pitch" is no hard sell. "I'm not really in this for the money," he says. "My kick is seeing the happiness in people's faces and maybe in being an educator.

A lot of folks don't know The Capital Times re we seeing things? Can a I symbolic black image be fill real? Or is it illusion, mere lJ flashing forms in the night? I Ralph Ellison's ground-I breaking novel "Invisible LJ LI Man" depicted a modern young black man in a society which, for all his self -asserting efforts, continually deflected him into nothingness, in a baffling array of subtle and overt ways. And the negative self-image in Ellison's 1952 work of fiction has held true in visual art. Yet today the black visual artist's foot is in the art world's door, the shoulder has pushed past the maddening wall of invisibility. What now? There's a need for positive artistic images, says Jim Thomas, manager of Positive Images, Madison's new gallery shop devoted to African-American Art at 708W E. Johnson St.

(Hours are 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday.

Call 255-0277.) "There's a hunger for this among African-Americans," he says. "Heretofore there have been mainly white images available, so black people tended to have animal images or nature scenes in their homes," he explains. "Now we don't have to do that. "People are coming in here and saying that we needed this 10 years ago, we finally have our own gallery. They are really proud." Art here will be affordable, with un-framed work ranging from $7 to $150, framed work from $25 to $250.

Education, or as Thomas modestly put's it, "back to school," is the theme of the shop's August display. The art deals with social dynamics of schooling, and among the most striking images is one by, of all people, Norman Rockwell. "We don't restrict ourselves to black artists here, only to black images and themes," Thomas says. Rockwell, the beloved chronicler of Americana, stepped out of that role when he painted "Problems We All Live With," which depicts a police-escorted black school girl marching resolutely past a wall scrawled with the word "nigger." Varnetta Honeywell depicts confrontation between blacks. In a painting such as "Double Dare," the faces of school kids deal out disdain as they puff up self-pride.

Honeywell's almost comical style defies caricature by adorning her characters with a game, heady presence. You can see how her work appeals to Cosby, a master of facial expression and a man who exudes self-assurance, wit and wisdom. Honeywell's collage works contain elegant, jet-black profiles dressed up either in middle-class attire or African garb. The figures symbolize the duality that the black person may now be enjoying more today rather than suffering through, like a life spent on a stretching rack. Continued on Page 5D 'My kick is seeing the happiness in people's faces and maybe in being an JIM THOMAS Signs around the state and country indicate that he's dealing in a hot commodity African-American artists.

They're obviously hot in film with the ascendance of young black filmmakers Spike Lee, Mario Van Peebles and John Singleton. And they're happening in visual arts. During last February's Black History JUST CLASSICS rO Jacob Stockinger mm State fair opens The' Wisconsin State Fair opens today and continues through Aug. 11 at State Fair Park in West Allis. Hours are 8 a.m.

to 1 1 p.m. daily. Admission is $5 ($4 for seniors; children 11 and under free). Tonight's grandstand entertainment is the Doobie Brothers at 7 p.m. (there is an additional admission charge).

For ticket information, call 414-257-8930. For general in-, formation, call 414-257-8800. Vox Box is back, and it's better than ever on CDs 4 i.J uno When compact discs first appeared less than a decade ago, they sold for more than $20 each. Many consumers thought the day would never come when they could buy fine music, first-rate performers and state- You'll have trouble finding a better bargain than the new Vox Boxes. Jammin' the blues Check out Max Cantilever's Variety Jam with Tate and the Million Dollar Blues Band at 9:30 tonight at Patricks, 4925 Monona Dr.

Stockinger and have up to 70 minutes per disc. Four record sets have been remastered in three-CD boxes. A thorough survey of Western classical music. All that plus a price of per disc for the two- and three-CD sets vs. regular premium 2-CD sets that run 15 per disc.

Not that the Vox Boxes don't have shortcomings. There are no glossy photos in the liner notes; sometimes the sound comes up a bit thin and wanting; and occasionally the interpreters are less than top-flight. But given what you get for the money, the Vox Box may still seem too good to be true. Yet listeners who grew up in the 1960s can attest to the reliability of the Vox Box even if it did seem somewhat tacky to market great culture as if it were cheaper by the dozen, maybe even the Schubert's complete works for piano and strings are available as a new two-CD set called a Vox Box. of-the-art engineering for less than $10.

Today, all major labels and numerous minor ones have mid-price and budget lines. Still, you'll have trouble finding a better bargain than the new Vox Boxes, which are selling well, according to several local stores. No wonder. These classic boxes the vinyl pressings stopped in 1983 and are now collector's items offer just about everything: Popular and standard repertoire for starting collectors, andless well-known music for more sophisticated listeners. Outstanding performers, some of whom later turned out to be superstars under contract to top-of-the-line labels.

Fine engineering of mostly remastered analog performances. At their best, the vinyl LPs never sounded this good, especially after the first two or three plays. Fully used disc space. Most three-record sets have been remastered into two-CD boxes, Tomorrow: Looking at Madison as a market research, product testing site i dider the two boxes of the complete Locatelli violin concertos with soloist Suzanne Lauten-bacher. This rarely recorded music is full of the dark, resiny melodies and hair-raising virtu-Continued on Page 5D Even listeners unfamiliar with the formula format should take note of the return of the Vox Box, however.

If your taste runs to Baroque music, there's Bach, Handel and Corelli. But you might also con- 4.