Coloring her world

Friday, Feb. 24, 2006 | 7:24 a.m.

Almond Zigmund's installations are often as fun as they are soothing.

The formally arranged geometric patterns applied directly on the wall make the art appear to bend and stretch.

Often, she works in bold aquas, salmons and oranges.

"Color is really sort of a potent voice," said Zigmund, who arrived in Las Vegas Tuesday to install her exhibit at Dust Gallery. The opening reception is tonight at the gallery at 1221 S. Main St.

"I prefer ... for people to have a visceral reaction to my work, rather than an intellectual one."

Zigmund works with patterns and textiles and you can easily see the layers of her life and studies come together in her work.

The granddaughter of a dressmaker and a tailor, Zigmund has been around fabric all her life. She went on to study painting at the Parsons School of Design in New York and earned a bachelor's of fine arts degree.

Zigmund then worked for four years for a sculptor before she came to Las Vegas in the late '90s on a fellowship to study at UNLV. She studied under art critic and author Dave Hickey and earned a master's of fine arts degree.

Her installation pieces came after working with large objects in multiples.

"I wanted to make something that suggested great scale and distance, but that could be kind of compact and didn't actually take up a lot of physical space," she said.

Also featured at Dust are six digital prints - called Lambda or c-prints - from Zigmund's Roseroad series, which she began while living in Las Vegas.

The works, based on images of roads, incorporate various vibrant colors, bold patterns and sensuous shapes.

After graduating from UNLV, Zigmund moved back East where she has been showing her work at various galleries, including the Avram Gallery in Southampton, N.Y., and the Rebecca Ibel Gallery in Columbus, Ohio.

Tonight's reception will be from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. For more information, call 880-3878.