Best New Direction For a Local Artist

Tammi Kennedy has been using Scotch tape to make translucent shells of chairs for so long that we can't remember when she started. But her stunning pieces never cease to amaze everyone, which is why curators keep including them in group shows year after year. This year, without warning, Kennedy did something unexpected -- she took the basic idea of tape sculpture and made a set of animal heads for a winter show at the Byron C. Cohen Gallery. Although the functional structure of a chair was hard to imitate as perfectly as Kennedy pulled it off, the detailed contours of a deer head stretched her adhesive proficiency to a whole new level. And, of course, she didn't really have to do anything different -- the art community didn't seem to be demanding that of her. She appears to have pushed herself, taking on the challenge of growing and developing even as we were all singing her praises. We were so busy being impressed that the last thing we expected was this leap into what we'll call translucent taxidermia.