Java.June.2017

collections nationwide, including Indiana, Utah, New Mexico, California,
Colorado and Arizona. Over the years, Valley residents have had the opportunity
to experience Tuomisto-Bell’s work first hand, both in exhibitions at various
venues and in public art commissions. He has had the opportunity to exhibit at
many prominent galleries and museums throughout the Southwest, including the
Albuquerque Museum, Mesa Art Center, Phoenix Art Museum, Shemer Art Center,
Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, Tempe Center for the Arts and Tucson
Museum of Art.
In 2010, he received a prestigious Contemporary Forum grant and had the
opportunity to exhibit his work at Phoenix Art Museum. He was commissioned
by Scottsdale Public Art (SPA) in 2015 to create his installation “A Little Slice of
Heaven” for IN FLUX Cycle 5, which was installed in Scottsdale at the Pavilions at
Talking Stick.
IN FLUX is a wonderful art initiative launched in 2010 by SPA to activate vacant
storefronts throughout the Valley with site-specific temporary public art created
by Arizona artists. For the installation, Tuomisto-Bell’s created 40 individual
homesteads, complete with delicate eerily glowing wax heads that appear to be
sleeping on grass within the picket fences. This poignant work examined the idea
of the so-called American dream of owning a home. According to the artist, the
piece “embodies the concept of American idealism as a quest for prosperity and
peace juxtaposed with the complacency of the human condition.”
Tumisto-Bell had always wanted to pursue his Masters of Fine Art in sculpture,
but the timing was never quite right. What ultimately led him back to ASU was the
combining of all the MFA studios into one location, under the direction of Adriene
Jenik, at Grant Street Studios in Phoenix’s warehouse district. This was ideal for
creative inter-disciplinary interaction.
Led by the desire to “hone my own studio practices and learn how sculpture
methodology had changed,” Tuomisto-Bell entered the MFA program a few years
ago. Going on to say, “Technology has exploded in the last five-to-eight years
with digital enlargement, robotic milling and modeling technologies, including 3D
printing. ASU being a research university was perfect.”
Going back to school at this juncture in his life and career “was quite difficult at
first to balance work, family and school. Some things had to be sacrificed.” He
went on to say that “with the backing of my wife Julie and by showing my kids
that education is crucial to bettering oneself and one’s community, the sacrifices
were worth the opportunities.”
With the recent completion of his MFA, Tumisto-Bell held his thesis exhibition
entitled “Cause and Effect” in April at the ASU Step Gallery. It was inspired by
what he is most passionate about, “mankind’s inability to cope with our violent
nature, our bigoted attitudes toward people who are not like us, and how religion
drives a lot of cultural institutions. These have always been talking points in my
work and with the current political atmosphere over the last year, it seems I had
found all the inspiration I needed.”
“Cause and Effect” included a captivating collection of bronze sculptures that
centered on Tuomisto-Bell’s “Brothers” series, featuring powerful, emotive works
that emphasize “the fraternal connection and my relationship with my own brother.
This is brother-against-brother and becomes a broader metaphor for relationships
and their outcomes on a global scale.”
The series includes such provocative pieces as “Kiss,” depicting the two brothers
engaged in an awkward embrace, and “Whisper,” showing the intimate yet
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