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FRYING TIME AGAIN
Fish Shack: It's surprising to me that no one yet has been able
to make a go of it doing a basic fish shack business in Athens.
Sure, we're not exactly coastal, but Atlanta has places that
succeed at doing your basic baskets of fried this and that plus
hushpuppies and the like, so why can't we?
Stogie's on Baxter (525 Baxter St.), an extension of the
Gainesville restaurant on Lake Lanier, opened a couple of
months ago in the space previously occupied by Big Easy Cafe,
between Domino's and a wing shop, trying to do exactly that.
The menu is significantly smaller than that of its progenitor,
limited pretty much to fish, shrimp and chicken. Ordering is set
up as a series of choices: 'Pick UR Protein.' Grilled or fried?
'How U Like It" (i.e., basket, po'boy or salad)? Sides? Sauce?
Boom, you're done, and your food is out quickly. Everything
is laid out very specifically. There's no wondering how many
shrimp you're going to get when the answer, specified on the
boards above the counter, is 16. Sides are unexpectedly numer
ous: pretty good hushpuppies, bland coleslaw, too-sweet broc
coli salad, homemade sweet potato chips, waffle fries, fried
okra, fried pickles and fried
...Med fish, chicken
oi shrimp...
green tomatoes.
The po'boy made with fried
shrimp is acceptable but not
stellar, and that sort of holds
true for the restaurant's offerings as a whole, even though its
operators get credit for not just Sysco-ing everything they
serve. You can, should you so choose, get your fried fish,
chicken or shrimp 'skogified,' which means doused in buffalo
hot-wing sauce that's been modified to include a bit of BBQ
sauce and garlic. I imagine that works better for the chicken
than either of the other options, and the sauce is surprisingly
hot. 'Skogified' is not the same, you should note, as 'skogie
sauce,' which is the basic mixture of ketchup, mayo, etc., that
serves as house sauce at many restaurants.
The prices are good, ranging from $5.99 to $6.99 for most
offerings, and students who pay cash and show an ID get a
dollar off their meal. Skogie's is open for lunch and dinner
every day, with plans to add breakfast and espresso soon. It
doesn't serve alcohol, does plenty of take-out and delivery
(through Bulldawg Food) and takes credit cards.
Brewpub: The list of restaurants in Athens I've never been to
is brief by this point and ever dwindling. Weirdly, one was
Copper Creek Brewing Co. (140 E. Washington St.), which has
been around a long time (12 years!). It's one of those restau
rants whose lunch caters to folks who show up in neckties, and
its service reflects that slight formality, with waitresses who
ask questions with a big smile.
You can get a fine deal with a pint of one of the house
brews with your lunch, but if you're teetotalling during the
daylight hours, you still might check it out. Most of the lunch
menu will cost you $8, and the offerings are more interesting
than you might expect. The chicken pot pie, for example, is
presented in a pretty serving dish, baked to order. The fried
catfish po'boy with remoulade and pickled onions was well
executed, not the soggy mess that kind of sandwich can often
become. A particular highlight was the fried turkey sandwich,
which doesn't mean I quite understand it. I expected a fried
turkey patty, but the slices of tender meat may instead come
from a whole fried turkey or perhaps been subjected to some
pan-frying. Whatever the process, the result is good, combined
with pesto aioli, smoked gouda, roasted peppers and red onion
on sourdough..Copper Creek is open for lunch and dinner week
days, dinner on Saturdays and closed Sundays. It serves its
own beers and others, has a .full bar and takes credit cards.
What Up?: Read about the Athens Food Cart Festival (Mar.
31) in our Calendar Pick in this issue. Yay, food carts!...
Something called Quickly Boba Tea is opening up at 660 West
Broad between Finley and Pope, where construction work has
been ongoing recently, perhaps a branch of the large pan-
Asian franchise ('the world's largest chain of Asian food and
drinks') that serves everything from burgers to 'egg puffs”
and all kinds of interesting beverages. More details to come
as research progresses... Starting next Thursday (Mar. 29), the
downtown Transmet will be serving pizza slices at the upstairs
bar from 10 p.m,-2 a.m. (when the'kitchen is usually closed).
Hillary Brown food@fiagpole.com
NOT SO SIMPLE TRUTHS
Tabletop Triumphs: UGA painting professor and gallery cura
tor Jeffrey Whittle, who was recently hamed as one of Oxford
American's 'New Superstars of Southern Art,' presents his
paintings at Etienne Brasserie through March. Whittle's color
palette is gorgeous; watery blues, greens and peachy colors
form compositions of fruit or plastic toy cowboys in a shootout
amid seashells resting on a kitchen table.
Still-life paintings can be simply assemblies of objects,
but often we are invited to consider the transitory nature of
life and our own mortality. Viewed through this lens, Whittle's
painting of three peeled pears sitting side-by-side becomes
much more than just a picture of fruit Undressed and exposed,
the pears' fleshy forms could be a depiction of middle age.
Soon to show more signs of bruising, they stand for now in
a moment of defiant beauty and in full possession of their
corporeality.
Similaiiy, Whittle describes one of his cowboy combat
paintings, "It's Doom Alone That Counts,' as both a 'cool still-
life set up' and a response to the feeling of 'indecision [when]
gazing at chaotic action and destruction.' It is this combina
tion of aesthetic beauty and emotional insight that makes
these seemingly simple paintings so compelling.
>* Ticket to Ride: A Lamar Dodd School of Art alumna
who has recently returned from her MFA stud
ies at the New York Academy of Art, Meredith
Lachin brings a little bit of the Big Apple to
Watkinsville in the form of her "metrocard
project' on view at the ArtLand Gallery,
a newly opened art space located on the
second floor of Chops and Hops. Lachin's
small paintings on subway access cards
are joined by larger monotype prints on
paper in the exhibition titled 'Restraint
and Release,* contrasting the con
trolled and miniature metrocards
('Restraint') with the looser prints
('Release').
Lachin describes the project's
development* began working on
Metrocards in New York in spring 2010
when there was a call for entries for a
show of 'paintii>gs on recycled metro
cards' put on by a colleague of mine,
from the New York Academy of Art.
The first show, called 'Single Fare,' was
hosted in his studio in Brooklyn and
got quite a bit of attention.'
The show appeared twice more, and
by then Lachin had a large collection of
cards. She found them to be an excel
lent canvas for small studies: *T started
off doing portraits of.people I knew,
screaming, because I often felt like I
wanted to scream while on the subway;
I thought it was an appropriate transla
tion of my stifled emotion to portray
someone screaming—another 'silenced
scream' on a metrocard."
Lachin's formal training includes
classical 'old master" techniques and
the study of anatomy, which is easy
to see in her portraits and pictures of
hands, but perhaps less apparent in the abstract monotypes
that also appear in the gallery. I asked her where the two
approaches met for her.
"The academic studio training I received has not only
greatly enhanced my ability to make good judgement when
it comes to the formal qualities of my abstracts, but has also
raised my aesthetic standards. My knowledge of the figure, first
and foremost, has been the most vital training I have received.
The figure is all about the relationships of masses, and much
abstraction is based on the same principle. And, let's just say
I am a firm believer in the saying, 'You have to learn the rules
before you can break them," she says.
Our art community is lucky to have Lachin as a returning
member, and I will be looking forward to seeing more of her
rule-breaking artwork in Athens in the near future. Her current
exhibition is up through March.
Growing Pains: If the generative act of creating art can be
compared to giving birth, Lisa Freeman's 'Peculiar Children'
are two-dimensional progeny that recreate moments in her
own childhood in the form of haunted-looking kids in settings
occupied by a puzzle of symbols. Allegorical portraits—not
necessarily of a person, but of an experience—line the walls
at ARTini's Art Lounge in downtown Athens through March.
In each painting, Freeman presents one or two figures that are
nearly identical. These children have almost elderly faces with
weary eyes and careworn expressions. Though one composi
tion references Diane Arbus' photograph 'Child with Toy Hand
Grenade,' others appear as personal allegories with buttons,
thread, untied shoelaces and playing cards representing fate
and the ties that bind us.
Southern Hospitality: In a charming confluence of setting and
subject matter, White Tiger Gourmet is currently showing
Mary Porter's beautifully bright paintings of front porches—
one of the best things about
living in the South.
With vivid colors
and strong line,
Porter's
paintings
radiate
Meredith Lachin's paintings are on display at ArtLand Gallery in Watkinsville through March.
shine. Most are scenes of porches with chairs waiting to be
rocked and flowers blooming by banisters. Grab a BBQ sand
wich and some sweet tea and enjoy the view through March.
Coming Up: Always one of the most anticipated events on the
local arts calendar, the Lamar Dodd School of Art opened
its 2012 MFA Exit Show on Mar. 23. Look for coverage on
the class of 2012's creations in the next Art Notes column...
ATHICA closes 'Southern' on Apr. 1 and prepares for its next
exhibition, titled 'Upcycte,' opening on Apr. 22... At the
Gallery@Hotel Indigo-Athens, "The Rower Show' blooms
on Apr. 12, and the Georgia Museum of Art's exhibition
"Southern Folk Art" opens on Apr. 28 and will include works
from the permanent collection.
Caroline Barratt arts@flagpole.com
8 FLAGPOLE.COM • MARCH 28,2012