The Quad-City Times - News, Sports and more from the Quad Cities region or Iowa and Illinois

You are not logged in.
Login

Log in to qctimes.com
Email:
Password:
Remember my information.
Register
Site Help

Ostrom's nature artwork on display

Font Size:

By David Burke | Saturday, December 23, 2006 11:41 PM CST | () comments

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO This 2001 piece called “Coming Home” symbolizes Ostrom’s constant struggle to find a place where he belongs, a quest that ended when he found himself in his art.

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO This 1972 piece called “The School Teacher” shows Ostrom’s life has been an ongoing trial by fire that began early in his childhood. His unknown dyslexia was the source of endless frustration for him, his family and his teachers.

The devil’s getting his due in one of Rock Island folk artist Warren Ostrom’s latest pieces.

An exhibit of Ostrom’s work, “Revealing the Elemental Spirit,” at the Lakeview Museum of Arts and Science in Peoria, Ill., includes the heaven-and-hell square-off.

“I found a large tree that had been hit by lightning — obliterated,” Ostrom said. “I’ve always wanted to make my guardian angel beating the devil out of the devil, for all the pain, agony and suffering we have to go through.”

Ostrom said the piece has been getting good response.

“They said this one gentleman walked up and was standing there and tears came down his cheek because he related to something in it,” Ostrom said.

The founder of his own commercial painting business, Ostrom has been using found items in nature — such as bones and pieces of trees — to create his work.

“I looked at this and saw the face of an angel. I had very little to do with it,” he said. “Then I looked down and saw a big mound that represented the mouth of the devil. I used beaver teeth for claws, and the angel has a left arm raised up to jam a lightning rod into the devil.”

The exhibit includes a variety of work from Ostrom’s career, from his rattlesnake hat, belt and vest to “The School Teacher,” a tree trunk that has turned into a harsh-faced educator that Ostrom remembers from his youth.

Kathleen Woith, vice president of community relations at the museum, said Ostrom’s exhibit has been incredibly well-received.

“People are amazed,” she said. “I hear people say, ‘I’ve taken a walk in the woods, but I’ve never seen these things this way.’ They find it beautiful.”

This is Ostrom’s fourth museum exhibit; his exhibit in Peoria continues through Jan. 28. The museum has created a DVD profile of the artist and his work for sale in its gift shop.

Ostrom, 73, was diagnosed a decade ago with Charcot-Marie-Tooth, or CMT, a form of muscular dystrophy. Symptoms of CMT include weakness and atrophy of muscles in the hands and lower legs, with foot deformities and some loss of sensation in the feet.

Although doctors told him to prepare for life in a wheelchair, walker or cane, he has remained mobile. He works on his pieces in his Rock Island shop from 2-6:30 a.m. each day, then puts in a full work schedule at Ostrom Painting.

Ostrom said he’s spent his life defying the odds, and he’s doing that with CMT as well.

“It’ll never stop me,” he said.

David Burke can be contacted at (563) 383-2400 or dburke@qctimes.com.

IF YOU GO

What: “Revealing the Elemental Spirit: The Artwork of Warren E. Ostrom”

When: Through Jan. 28; 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays-Saturdays; 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesdays; noon to 5 p.m. Sundays

Where: Lakeview Museum of Arts & Science, 1125 W. Lake Ave., Peoria, Ill.

How much: $6 adults, $5 seniors, $4 children ages 4-17

Information: (309) 686-7000