Articles:
TERRENCE JAMES COFFMAN RETROSPECTIVE EXHIBITION
by: Graeme Reid
Assistant Director
Museum of Wisconsin Art, August 2008

Artist, teacher, administrator, writer and musician are all incarnations that Terrence James Coffman has enjoyed over the past twenty-five years in Wisconsin; sometimes one dominated but mostly they were practiced simultaneously. What unites them all is Terry’s belief, reflected most succinctly in a recent body of work – the “County Road Y Paintings” (the “Y” metaphorically referring to those “forks-in-the-road” or direction-of-life choices we all inevitably have to make) is that we must make profound decisions with one option often being fraught with uncertainty. Over the years Terry has confronted numerous “forks” with a mixture of confidence and apprehension, but always with a sense of adventure and progress.

An intrinsic part of the Milwaukee art scene since 1983, Washington DC native Terry came to Wisconsin to be President of the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, leaving the east coast where he had been president of the Maryland College of Art and Design. Eschewing his early abstract work from the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, back then he was, in addition to coping with MIAD’s cramped old location on North Milwaukee Street, executing watercolors of enormous proportions: five by six feet in some cases. These works, often florals, consciously challenged traditional notions of watercolor being reserved, timid or small scale; they were passionate, tactile and in-your-face – traits that would remain a feature of his painting throughout the years, but ones that still subtly referenced his roots. After all, to work on such a scale one must pay homage to the grand gesture and invest an emotional and physical energy that belies convention.

In the early 1990s Terry faced an administrative fork: keep MIAD downtown or relocate and build a campus in the now-thriving but then quasi-industrial Third Ward. Bravely, he led MIAD to a new home on North Erie Street in 1992, giving the state’s only accredited independent art school much larger premises and budget, increased enrollment and a national profile. This transition eventually precipitated a change in his work: the representational floral watercolors had run their course and a new direction was sought and found – but one that was not quite so filled with trepidation. A return to his abstract painting roots—reflecting early training at the Corcoran School of Art in the 1960s and the influences of the abstract expressionists of that era—saw him work contemporaneously rather than retroactively.

Retiring from MIAD in 2003, Terry moved from Mequon to Jefferson, midway between Milwaukee and Madison and is currently Artist-in-Residence/Director for the Advancement of Visual Studies at Cardinal Stritch University. For a big-city guy, this relocation to a smaller community has revitalized him, reigniting his passion for starting anew but with the distinct benefit of accumulated experience. His current work, collectively titled “The Center Avenue Paintings” are abstract but again on a scale that is both physically and emotionally challenging. “I’ve found my center again” he gushes, “I dance intuitively without choreography to my own rhythm. The rules no longer apply” Big, bold and expressive, these paintings have structure but remain chaotic; they have impulse but also intent. These words can, to a great extent, sum up Terry’s career: there are always “safe” roads, but the unknown path often leads to the greatest rewards and pleasures.

© Graeme Reid
Assistant Director
Museum of Wisconsin Art, August 2008


A WORK IN PROGRSS

With an ideal location, Jefferson seeks artists and growth

By JOANNE CLEAVER
jcleaver@journalsentinel.com

Posted: April 26, 2008

Jefferson - All artists need inspiration.

Terrence Coffman gets his every morning by walking around the corner from his studio in downtown Jefferson to the Bon Ton Bakery, where his muse awaits incarnated as a cup of fresh coffee, a light, fragrant doughnut and a nod to his neighbors. Then Coffman heads back to his dream studio - a vintage whitewashed brick warehouse big enough to accommodate oversize canvases for his abstract landscapes.

Downtown Jefferson, Coffman thinks, has all the elements required to blossom as an artists' community: abundant inexpensive space, easy access to big city galleries (Coffman's work is in galleries in Madison and Milwaukee), and local officials eager to work with anyone who wants to open a shop, working space or business.He'd know: When he was president of the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (he retired in 2003), Coffman advocated for the transformation of Milwaukee's Third Ward from a scruffy industrial district to the arts, shopping and entertainment neighborhood it is today. "If we get the artists, we know the condos and creative businesses will come," says Coffman. "Critical mass will come, but you have to make it interesting. People want to see some vibrancy, with great shops, cool coffee houses."

Precisely midway between Milwaukee and Madison, Jefferson has seen steady, moderate growth from residents whom Mayor Gary Myers likes to call "bicoastals" - one spouse commutes to each city. He and other municipal leaders have been revamping zoning and other regulations to accommodate imaginative uses of the city's older buildings, especially those in its Victorian downtown, which is lined with brick buildings decorated with arched windows, and the riverfront, which has a park and walk along the Rock River, and a footbridge over it.

One big developer, Simon Group, just bought into their vision.

Development plan In early April, Brookfield-based Simon announced it will buy and redevelop the 174-acre St. Coletta's complex. The plan for "Sanctuary Ridge" includes a 30-acre commercial development using the turn-of-the-century buildings, plus condominiums on 40 acres and single-family homes on another 100 acres. President Scott Simon hopes to get the first of the commercial spaces built and occupied by fall but will let market demand dictate the pace of building for the condos and houses.

St. Coletta was founded in 1904 by the Sisters of St. Francis of Assisi as a home for people with developmental disabilities.Myers has been pulling together growth-minded officials and residents to advocate for "intelligent" growth in all directions, he says. Plans include a small but pricey condo development to overlook the river, with units priced from $200,000 to $700,000 to compete with similar units in Madison.

Architect Craig Ellsworth, who designed Fort Atkinson's riverwalk, hopes to replicate that success in Jefferson as he works on the condo plans. "I envision this riverwalk to be residential-oriented with a strong and easy connection to the existing downtown district," he says. "It's a small market, and we're not talking 100 condos. The scale would be a boutique type project, with unique features related to the river."

More commercial and residential developments are planned for the city's north side. Jefferson is only four miles south of Interstate 94 and the sprawling Johnson Creek outlet mall. Newcomers are often eager to invest in their new hometowns, a dynamic that Coffman and others say that longtime city residents are more than ready to embrace.

Coffman is trying to recruit more artists to Jefferson, selling them on the sweet deal he got 2 1/2 years ago: 5,200 square feet for $74,000 - much more space for much less money than he could have afforded in either Madison or Milwaukee, he says. He built a studio apartment in his building and hopes to convert a loft space into a gallery. This spring, with the aid of a $42,000 low-interest city loan through a façade improvement program, he is replacing the windows and making some other exterior repairs.

Steve Lewis, who owns several properties in Jefferson, including a small business incubator, believes the city has long thrived on creativity and entrepreneurship. That, he hopes, should act as a magnet for growth-minded small and start-up companies as well as artists.

He recently showed a riverside building to an artist intrigued by the dirt-cheap rent of $3 a square foot a year. "It's still early to call us an arts community," he says. "But entrepreneurship is virtually the fabric of our community. Here, you have a whole city of allies. In Madison or Milwaukee, they wouldn't even know you."




Terrence Coffman Center Avenue Studio