They had to call in the cops before Mariano Gonzales' solo show could open at the Anchorage Museum.
One of the items, "Don't Touch My Cheese," involves a faux gun -- the kind of noisemaker sometimes used to start races and in theater productions. Set on a spring-loaded arm, it aims at a shelf holding a Bible and an American flag. Remove things from the shelf and a Rube Goldberg mechanism swings the arm out and fires the gun.
This week city officials voiced concerns about the fake pistol, described by the museum as a "disabled firearm" and identified as a Turkish-made Zoraki blank pistol with the capacity to shoot fireworks and signal flares.
"I have huge concerns about this," wrote the Municipality of Anchorage risk manager, Connie Ernst, in an email to Anchorage Police Chief Mark Mew and the city's contract administrator Debra Fitzgerald.
Ernst advised getting an opinion from the museum's insurance company.
"If someone came and snatched the gun from the exhibit ... it could ultimately be used to commit a crime," she wrote.
"I have big concerns about this exhibit," replied APD Deputy Chief Myron Fanning. "I don't know how you make a pistol capable of only shooting blanks."
He also raised the possibility that it could be snatched and used for criminal activity. In addition, he noted general protocols for handling guns. "I don't like the idea of a weapon being pointed in the direction of the public."
Fitzgerald concurred. "In light of recent gun violence in Anchorage, the Municipality does not approve the gun being used in any fashion to this piece of art," she wrote.
Gonzales called it "a tempest in a teapot."
"Thinking that a museum patron might snatch the pistol and use it to commit a crime is beyond ludicrous," he wrote in a response addressed to museum personnel. To remove it from the arm would take time, tools and more trouble than it's worth, he said.
He acknowledged that the facsimile was realistic in appearance. "Why use an obviously fake pistol to make a point about gun violence?" he wrote. But, he insisted, it cannot be modified to fire lethal rounds.
Furthermore, Gonzales noted, Alaska allows law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons. It's possible that at any time, any given patron -- or maybe every one of them -- has a real gun legally in his or her pocket or purse.
The complaints are "only an inartful attempt at censorship," Gonzales wrote. "What part of law enforcement deals with assumptions about what might happen? Since when, and in what country do governments determine what is appropriate in Art?"
The matter resolved after an inspection by muni and APD personnel on Thursday morning, closed to the public and the press. Museum spokesperson Laura Carpenter said it was "a public safety check, not a content review."
Carpenter said the firing pin was removed from the gun and the show will proceed as scheduled starting Friday, Feb. 27.
Guru in a cave
It's not the first time Gonzales' art has roused controversy. A 2009 installation of a coffin and American flag at Alaska Pacific University was removed not long after it went in. Safety issues were cited in the removal but some, perhaps most, who saw it wondered whether the display's anti-war message had been the real cause.
The artist gave a sneak preview of the show, "A Man in the Shadows," at his home earlier this month. "Cheese" was still a work in progress at that time.
The second floor of the large house in Chugiak looked like a secondhand shop. There was a shop drill, saws, a skeleton and a sitar. Work tables were crowded with bits and pieces of projects in various stages of development and several hundred LP records shelved along one wall. A mannequin standing at a window blocked the view of Knik Arm. Cables linked computer hardware and giant screens to enormous printers, one with ink cartridges the size of old VHS tapes.
"I need it all," Gonzales said, referring to both the space and its abundant contents.
Gonzales has been a presence on the local art scene for decades. He was part of the crew at the original Visual Arts Center of Alaska near Anchorage International Airport, an ambitious but chaotic experiment in bringing modern art to Alaska. He studied under groundbreaking local artists like Keith Appel, Bill Kimura, Pat Austin and Wassily Sommer. He began instructing at the University of Alaska in 1990 and eventually became head of the art department.
He's worked in jewelry, sculpture, painting, photography and multimedia. He was a pioneer in using computer and digital technology in fine art. A current of whimsy has commonly informed his work, often expressing a specific message with political overtones.
Another of the large pieces being prepared for the show involved a life-size skeleton, a reflection of the Mexican cult image Santa Muerte. In this case "Saint Death" holds a machine gun rather than a scythe and comes with a parking meter for those who may want more time.
"The meter actually works," Gonzales said, demonstrating the device. "I get to keep all the money people put in."
"A Man in the Shadows" is actually Gonzales' fourth solo show at the museum, but the first since 1989.
"That's quite an interval," he acknowledged. "I got the job at the university. I got a family. I got busy." With his wife, Linda, he has raised nine children. "Now that it's an empty nest, I've had time to think about it. I may become like a guru in a cave up here."
Fitting everywhere
Gonzales moved to Anchorage from El Paso, Texas, in 1959. He was 8 years old. His parents' motives were a mix of "a sense of adventure and lies about free land," he said.
He attended Creekside Park Elementary (where his accomplishments included winning the school spelling bee championship), Clark Junior High and East High School.
"I always liked making things. I remember poring through encyclopedias and drawing a skeleton. I always gravitated toward that."
His first sale was a miniature totem pole fashioned after the tourist trinkets he saw at a local store. He made $10.
"After high school I started taking art classes at UAA," he said. "I became an artist by default because there was nothing else I could conceive of wanting to do more."
He earned a bachelor's degree in print making, then a graduate degree in metalsmithing at the Rhode Island School of Design. It was a discipline that lent itself to jewelry, but he was never a single-discipline type of guy.
"My teachers in Alaska were all multitalented people who worked in a variety of forms," he said. "You had to if you were going to make a living in Alaska. I was told that I wouldn't be taken seriously unless I specialized in one thing, but I don't do any one thing. It's one of the ways Alaska has affected what I do."
It may have limited his career outside the state, but he thinks he's gained something as well. "I told a friend that I didn't think I fit any one place. She said, 'It's because you fit everywhere.' "
Media, genre and form are all secondary to what he sees as the purpose of art. "I want to create an experience," he said. "It's a two-part deal. What I do and what reaction people have to it."
Although he was among the forefront of artists to begin using computer and electronic printing technology, the technology did not equate to art, he said.
"A lot of what artists do is driven by industry, getting the latest CAD system, for instance. I never bought into that. I just made things work. Computers extend data processing, mental capacity, but using one just adds another tool to workshop."
Pyramid cells
In the museum show, the new technique most evident is seen in a series of large pieces composed of pyramids with triangular bases (composed of four equal sides). Using a computer program, Gonzales transferred photos and other images to fit the shape and printed them on metal flashing. He then cut out the individual cells and crimped them using an old-school scissor-style bending device -- he called it a spot brake -- that he designed and fabricated himself.
The individual cells were assembled into the semblance of a painting on a board or canvas, except that they intrinsically have a three-dimensional illusion of depth. "I got away from flat a long time ago," Gonzales said.
The shapes seems to change with light and the viewing angle. Some are clear commentary, like one showing weapons. Others are abstract or impressionistic, like "Tsunami." And at least one, "The Ancients" is a photo of prehistoric pictographs found in the Utah desert.
"This is a different from what I've done before," he said. "The scale is much bigger." "The Ancients," for example, is 11 feet long and other pieces are similarly sized.
The pyramid cell works are also different in another way. Much of Gonzales' best-known art has been temporary, such as pictures printed out on a copy machine and doomed to fade with time. But the painted metal comes close to being permanent.
It's also reproducible. For the first time, he plans to make a limited edition of pieces to order, no more than 20 copies, he said. "It takes me back to my print making days."
Lightweight yet tough, things like "The Ancients" have architectural applications, he noted, and could be suitable for decorating public space or office buildings. In theory such a piece could cover an exterior wall.
Looking at the piece in his dining room, before it went to the museum, Gonzales observed how the work's appearance changes dramatically depending on where the sun is, at night under lights, on a bright or overcast days.
Though he's resigned as the head of UAA's art department, he continues to teach. That may not last forever, but he has no intention of slowing down his creative efforts.
"It's funny, but I only started feeling like a decent artist about six or seven years ago," he said. "Before then, I felt like I was still learning. What I do is starting to amaze me. I know sometimes people burn out. When your art stops being awesome, it's time to give it up.
"But I'm not going to burn out. I'm just going to die."
A MAN IN THE SHADOWS, new work by Mariano Gonzales, will be on display at the Anchorage Museum through May 19.