arts@entertainment
Nebraskan
Wednesday, January 19,1994
New gallery owner hoping
to make friendly atmosphere
By Sean McCarthy
Staff Reporter_
New Age music plays in the background. Art
fills the walls. You are greeted with a cup of
steaming java.
Sounds like a typical coffee house, but it
isn’t. It’s all part of the exhibit at Noyes Art
Gallery at 119 S. Ninth St.
At this exhibit, entitled “Tea Party,”
gallerygoers can actually drink from the art.
The exhibit is composed of cups and saucers
made by potter Alicia Hanck. Patrons can drink
hot tea or coffee from Hanck’s works for free.
Hanck said she hoped the audience would be
surprised at the exhibit.
“I think with pottery, some people who are
unfamiliar with artwork may feel afraid,” she
said. “This exhibit gives you more time to
experience and look at the work.”
Originally from Chicago, Hanck moved with
her husband to Norfolk and has been operating
out of her home studio for 17 years. Her work
has been shown in galleries in Chicago, Sioux
City, Iowa, and Omaha.
“Tea Party” is Hanck’s first work to be
featured at Noyes Art Gallery.
“There’s so much pottery, I have many more
works to give to her (the owner),” Hanck said.
Originally the Haymarket Art Gallery, Noyes
Art Gallery has changed both name and owner.
Julia Noyes, an artist and owner of the
gallery, said she purchased the gallery about
„ two months ago. Since then, she said, she has
operated out of the gallery for about three
weeks.
The gallery features about 60 works from 12
artists, Noyes said. Most of the featured artists
are from Lincoln.
Before setting up her studio in Lincoln,
Noyes said she ran the Norfolk Art Center for
nearly three years. She thought a move to
Lincoln would provide her with more opportu
nities.
Although she is the owner of the gallery,
Noyes said she was a painter nrsi. eesiaes
paintings, Noyes said she also designed ties.
Her trademark signature, a capital “no” with
“yes” about a quarter inch above the “no,”
comes from a spiritual belief.
“If you have a ‘yes’ above it, you can
overcome the ‘no,’” Noyes said. “It is sort of
like the yin and the yang.”
Besides a featured monthly exhibit, oil can
vas paintings, water colors and photography fill
the walls. Elma Dreesen, James Ray, Karla
Judt, Dorothy Dane, Jo Brown, Nancy
McClelland, Lois Meysenberg, Bob Egan, R.H.
Humpal and Noyes herself are artists featured
in the gallery.
“Every gallery has the personality of the
people who are running it,” Noyes said. “Our
artists are fun, but they are also very serious
when it comes to their work.”
Each artist is responsible for a shift in run
ning the gallery.
Patrons who frequent the gallery arc as
diverse as the works in the gallery. College
students, art patrons, other artists and curious
onlookers all visit the gallery.
Noyes said she was relying heavily on word
of-mouth to attract new patrons. She also has
plans to attract new visitors with artist demon
strations and classes for adults and children.
Noyes said she wanted to attract an even
more diverse group of patrons. All works in the
gallery are originals and are priced according
ly
Noyes said she wanted to make the galley
fun for patrons. In February, with the exhibit
“Red Hot Lovers,” patrons will receive free
kisses — Hershey’s kisses, that is.
In the summertime, Noyes said she planned
to take full advantage of her surroundings by
placing works on the sidewalk of the gallery
and having people model.
“We want the atmosphere to be friendly and
warm,” Noyes said. “A lot of people are scared
to go into a gallery; some feel intimidated.
“Our main goal is to have fun.”
The gallery is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Tuesday through Saturday.
Sandy Summers/DM
Julia Noyes, owner of Noyes Art Gallery at 119 S. Ninth St., shows off this
month’s exhibit, “Tea Party.”
Acting shines in finale of Vietnam trilogy
□ a □ q
FI I HUM
o a □ b p a a e
“Heaven and
Earth”
“Heaven and Earth,” the third
film inOliverStone’strilogyofthe
Vietnam conflict, is just short of
heavenly and very down-to-earth.
Stone follows up the successful
films “Platoon” and “Bom on the
Alternative point of view strengthens film
Fourth of July” with this moving
picture about the life of Le Ly
Hayslip (Hiep Thi Le), a Vietnam
ese woman.
Stone wrote the screenplay based
on Havslip’s books, “When Heav
en and Earth Changed Places” and
“Child of War, Woman of Peace.”
The story begins with Le Ly’s
childhood in the Central Vietnam
ese farming village of Ky La. Her
parents (Joan Chen and Dr. Haing
S. Ngor) manage to keep the family
together during conflicts with the
French. But the Vietnam conflict
takes Le Ly’s brothers and later Le
Ly herself away from the family.
Surviving torture, rape and the
birth of an illegitimate son, Le Ly
manages to establish herself with a
job as a waitress. She meets an
American soldier named Steve
(Tommy Lee Jones), and they get
married. After the war, Steve takes
her back to America. What should
be a happy ending becomes anoth
er trial for Le Ly, as she separates
from her husband and begins life as
a single mother with three children.
The film climaxes when Le Ly
returns to Vietnam with her three
very American sons and attempts
to reconcile her past and her future.
Stone addresses the Vietnamese
side of the conflict in this film,
making it very different from “Pla
toon” and “Bom on the Fourth of
July.” But this difference makes it
a much stronger film. Le Ly, who
fought for the Viet Cong, must
come to terms with her love for her
native land and her love for her
husband and new homeland.
The audience is able to get a
good look at the culture of the
Vietnamese and how they learn to
live with constant warfare and dom
ination. Not many films have been
this successful in portrayals of dif
ferent cultures and getting the at
tention and sympathy of the view
ers.
The acting is excellent through
out the show. Tommy Lee Jones is
powerful in his role as a soldier
who is unable to deal with his hor
rific experiences in Vietnam.
Joan Chen is equally good as Le
Ly’s mother. She must deal with
the loss of her husband and several
children while somehow finding
the strength to rebuild her life.
But it is newcomer Hiep Thi Le
who gives the strongest perfor
mance of the show. She plays Le
Ly with the emotion and drama of
a much more experienced actress.
The filming of the Vietnamese
landscape and the battle scenes arc
exceptional. The setting increased
the reality of the show by a good
measure.
“Heaven and Earth” is an in
tense experience and another tri
umph for director Oliver Stone.
—Joel Strauch
James Mehsling/DN
‘The Country Girl’ explores two addictions
in intense environment at The Coffee House
I theater
review
“The Country Girl” opened at The
Coffee House’s “Off Broadway, On
Lincoln” Theatre to an enthusiastic
audience of about 10 people on Fri
day.
The Coffee House’s theater is ex
tremely intimate, almost in a bed
room sense. The actors are never far
ther than a dinner-table length from
the front row; even a slight facial
expression or whisper can be seen and
heard from a seat in the back. The
setting has an involving intensity,
strong even when compared to Ne
braska’s dinner theaters.
“The Country Girl,” written by
Clifford Odetts in 1942, is the story of
two powerful addictives: alcohol and
acting.
The play is the first full-length
production of “Off Broadway, On
Lincoln.”
Tom Winter, a University of Ne
braska-Lincoln classics professor,
is played by Carla Swartz.
Elgin is offered a part in a new play
by director Bemie Dodd, played by
Ron Silver, director and co-founder
of the theater. As the relationships
among Dodd, Frank Elgin andGeorgie
Elgin develop, the lines between al
coholism, playacting and
codependency blur.
Winter said, “It was fun to study
drama from the inside. Like the inside
of Dr. Who’s telephone booth, the
dimensions are bigger on the inside.
“I’m a tourist here. The drama I’m
into is 2,000 years old. Clifford Odetts
(the author of the play) is barel y dead.”
On opening night, ‘‘The Country
Girl” became a puzzling example of
“meta-theater.” Not only was “The
Country Girl” a play within a play, the
performance of the real-life actors
seemed to depend upon the fate of the
characters in the play.
When Elgin’s play was failing, the
actors strained and stumbled. But
when Elgin succeeded, the Coffee
House actors performed well.
Only a Coffee House insider or a
psychologist could attempt to explain
whether life was imitating art or art
was imitating life in “The Country
Girl,” Whatever the answer, the play
was worth the $5.50 to behold the
effect.
“The Country Girl” plays Friday
through Sunday until Jan. 29.
—Patrick Hambrecht