Much More Than Meets The Eye

Jim Hollan has an affinity for the odd and the eccentric.

That fondness has transferred to his paintings and mixed media works, which have appeared in 50 juried exhibitions over the last nine years. This winter, his work will be on display at two Annapolis exhibitions, one at the Circle Gallery and one at the Arundel Center.

The 80-year-old Arnold resident turned his passion for art into more than a hobby 12 years ago after selling his consulting and management company. Before that, he served as the president and chief executive officer of several national and international trade associations. From Singapore to Lisbon to his native New York, he collected keepsakes everywhere he traveled.

“I still have those boxes of stuff,” Hollan said. “It is very nice as a springboard.”

That springboard of ideas empowered him to mess with mixed media. Though he could not draw well, he had a sense of color and texture, so collages worked well for him as an art form.

He also joined the Maryland Federation of Art, which has a tagline: “Much More Than Meets The Eye.” The phrase is a perfect complement to Hollan’s work, which often pieces together items of seemingly no relation to tell a narrative.

“I had a story, but it’s your story now,” Hollan said. “It may be about your weird Uncle Burt (and your memory of something he did) when you were 14.”

Hollan has a piece in Maryland Federation of Art’s “Small Wonders” exhibit, which opened November 27 and runs through December 21. Art enthusiasts are welcome to visit the Circle Gallery to check out the work, which celebrates little things that can have a big impact.

Entries are limited to under 11 inches in all directions, but there is no limit on creativity or media.

Set in a box that is three inches deep, Hollan’s piece “Dream #7” combines a black-and-white image with graffiti-covered buildings and a bicycle. Layered onto that image, a shirtless man covers his face with his hands and a miniature skeleton groom looks upward.

“You see a photograph and that is a combination of three photographs, so you keep adding layers,” Hollan said of mixed media. “The hardest part is knowing when to stop adding layers.”

Hollan was also selected for a solo exhibition by the Arts Council of Anne Arundel County in the Front Gallery of the Arundel Center. That space will feature 12 of Hollan’s pieces from December 18 through February 25.

Two of those pieces are juxtaposing versions of “Regret in Blue,” an image made with archival inks and acrylic on canvas. The exhibition includes a 40-by-30-inch version of the image and a smaller one at 11-by-14 inches.

Hollan hopes to meet new people during the exhibitions. Networking with other artists is always an experience, too.

“You have conservatives, liberals and the poor artist types who only come to eat 11 sandwiches and put cookies in their pockets,” Hollan joked. “It’s a great cross-section of all the people who share this hobby.”

Hollan also incorporates his other hobbies into his work. A former participant in poetry readings at The Dove, before it became Rams Head On Stage in Annapolis, Hollan is inspired by the prose of William Butler Yeats, John Donne and other poets. A singer, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, Hollan is also drawn to music. Overall, he is a fan of thought-provoking material and looks to capture that concept in his work, whether his muse on a certain day is a poem or a song. In that sense, he can create art that is more than meets the eye.

“If there is a way for me to put a soundtrack on the art, I probably do,” Hollan said.