With nearly a year gone since his passing, Alfstad& Contemporary celebrates the life and art of Kevin Dean, longtime Ringling professor and director of the Selby Gallery, with a retrospective exhibit recreating some of Dean’s most singular installations and revealing never-before-seen prints and paintings unearthed from the artist’s past. Entitled “Extra Ordinary,” the exhibit, curated by Dean’s friends and Selby Gallery compatriots Laura Avery and Tim Jaeger, opens today with a reception at 5:30pm.

In addition to celebrating his later work, guests will have the chance to see examples of Dean’s earlier Sarasota art, including a series of prints made in the ‘90s during one productive summer with Ringling instructor Patrick Lindhardt, and an unnamed mid-size painting recently found in the back of Dean’s storage unit. Most likely the earliest of Dean’s work presented in this retrospective, viewers will recognize elements that Dean would continue to explore, as well as those things he left behind.

“In this series of prints, we feel the cast of the artist—a demonstration of Dean’s internal process, ability and desire to draw,” said Jaeger, who worked and studied under Dean at the Selby Gallery. “All said, I consider this exhibition to be another of Kevin’s tests for Laura Avery and me. I feel him smirking at us in an ‘I gotcha’ kind of way. He loved to test everyone now and then.”

Guests will also revisit Dean’s Whitcomb Series in part, which saw the artist adopting an alter ego to create a collection of installations and portraits rife with Dean’s trademark deft use of symbolism, bringing together disparate influences for a presentation simultaneously grounded and other-worldly. Dominating the main floor of Alfstad&, “Dreaming About My Cabin in the City of Dis” could be Whitcomb’s grandest construction, weaving Christian iconography, Dante’s Inferno, modern science and Americana kitsch into a kind of long-forgotten refuge of the intellectual rustic.

Serious but not solemn, Dean’s work retains an inherent playfulness as the artist explores themes such as mortality, religion, family and self-perception, but always with a wink and a nod. Irreverent and dry, the assembled work rings with neither self-importance nor insistence, just a quiet presentation of, well, the extraordinary.

“I just enjoy seeing all this stuff up again. You never know how many more times you’ll get to see it all,” said Dean's son Ian, who helped recreate the late artist's massive installation for the show. “His presence is still being felt and celebrated, and he’ll be remembered for a long time.”

“Extra Ordinary” opens today at Alfstad& Contemporary with a reception at 5:30pm and runs until June 5. 

Pictured: "" by Kevin Dean. Photo courtesy of: Alfstad& Contemporary

As David Bromstad prepares to give the commencement address for Ringling College of Art and Design’s graduation ceremony Thursday, the HGTV television personality and Ringling class of 1996 graduate sought out some wardrobe advice.

“Can I wear pink pants?” he asked Jim Dean, Ringling College’s dean of admissions. “If you didn’t, I’d be mad at you,” Dean responded.

After winning HGTV’s Design Star in 2006, Bromstad hosted his own HGTV show, Color Splash, where he was known for his bold use of color and personal artwork. He’s now a home design and fashion aficionado, designing a fall luggage collection and hosting a new show, HGTV’s My Lottery Dream Home. But he found his artistic start in the Ringling College Illustration Program. “The campus has changed incredibly,” Bromstad said. “I mean it was a tiny little campus.” He marveled at how large it had become on a tour a few years earlier. “But I still see buildings that were here,” he said. “They’ve kept the integrity of what it was and they’ve just added to the fabulousness.” 

Ringling College also helped inspire his love of color. “They taught me color theory, and that was such an important part of what my career is because I’m known as ‘The Color Guy,’ ” Bromstad said. Just don’t ask for a favorite. “Every color has a different expression, a different emotion, a different feeling,” he said. “I can’t choose a color—and I won’t. It’s unfair; I don’t want to make the other colors jealous.”

Bromstad touted gold accents as a new design trend and the future of white silver in color palettes, something big in the fashion industry now. Other things to look for include natural elements, but with a little bling here and there. Do-it-yourself projects and repurposing items, especially after the recession made getting in touch with your handy side a necessity, are still great style options. It’s about “taking your Grandma’s furniture that you would usually just sell at an estate and painting it a bright pink,” he said.  

Blue is the hue this summer. Embrace the cool color in its most vibrant form in these striking glass pieces that can be found at Stylish Living by Chasen Reed, including a glass bowl that can be an exquisite oasis for keys, jewelry or other decorative elements, a vase that will hold a lovely arrangement of your favorite blooms all while vying for all of the attention itself, and a glass painting for a waterfall-like effect for your wall.  

Stylish Living by Chasen Reed, 1425 1st St., Sarasota, 941-363-7975.

Sarasota-based startup Inside Out Sourcing will have more than 50 employees by the end of June and expects to have 150 employees by the end of 2015. The expanding firm designs and executes globally outsourced sales and marketing campaigns leveraging digital marketing, tele-based sales and custom analytics. The company currently occupies about 5,000 square feet of space on Cattleridge Drive in Sarasota, with an option on another 6,000 square feet. 

Inside Out Sourcing

Realtor Lindsey Geisel Asfur joined the Sarasota office of RE/MAX Alliance Group. She specializes in residential and investment properties.Asfur has a background as a legal assistant, serving with Greene, Hamrick, Quinlan and Schermer in Bradenton for more than four years. She entered the real estate field in 2013, rising to the Masters Ruby level at Century 21 Beggins Enterprises in Sarasota. 

RE/MAX Alliance Group

Gulf Coast Community Foundation selected a new cohort of professional consultants to serve local nonprofit organizations through its Invest in Incredible governance and capacity building program.  The consultants recently completed a three-day training offered by BoardSource, the national expert in board governance.  The Invest in Incredible consultants include: Rosemary Bowler; Nicole Coudal; Carlos de Quesada; Nathalie deWolf; Marcia Heath; Laurie Huebner; Stephanie Kempton; Tracy Knight; Scott Levine; Christie Lewis Nolan; John Ramsey; Denise Roberts; James Rollo; Amy Sankes; Betsy Steiner; Liz Wooten Reschke. 

Gulf Coast Community Foundation