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 Des Moines artist and actor Gene Hamilton explores an aspect of his past for a new body of paintings to be exhibited in a solo show titled “Vent Figure Fun” at Chicago’s Packer Schopf Gallery. These portraits of ventriloquist dummies draw on Hamilton’s stint as a ventriloquist. In 1995 Hamilton produced a public-access sketch comedy show called “The Art Roamer Round-up.” The show starred Hamilton as Art Roamer and a ventriloquist dummy from the 1920s era as Art’s son, Woody Roamer. While Hamilton lost interest in performing ventriloquist acts, the imagery of the puppets has stayed with him. “I love the visual look of ventriloquist dummies,” he says. “As a kid I loved Paul Winchell and his TV show ‘Winchell-Mahoney Time,’ featuring his famous dummies Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff.”
The opening for “Vent Figure Fun” at the Packer Schopf Gallery (942 W. Lake Ave., Chicago, www.packergallery.com) is 5-8 p.m. Jan. 8. The show will continue through Feb. 13. This August Hamilton’s portraits and works by Okoboji artist Mari Steward will be shown at the Witter Gallery in Storm Lake, Iowa.
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