WEST LIBERTY, W.Va., March 25, 2015 — Puppets can be used for social commentary as well as entertainment and Pittsburgh artist Tom Sarver is an expert at creating puppets with a message. His work can be seen at the new exhibit on display now through April 17, 2015 at the Nutting Gallery, West Liberty University. A public reception takes place from 5:30 – 7 p.m., today.
Combining humor, social commentary and a low-tech aesthetic, Sarver explores relationships between the art world and the everyday. His projects span a variety of disciplines including performance, installation, puppetry and events. 
Sarver’s concepts are often realized in storefronts, houses and public spaces. These include building an evolving museum in a city row house (The Tom Museum at The Mattress Factory), opening a bait and tackle shop installation in Downtown Pittsburgh, and coordinating a series of Olympic-inspired performance events, according to information found on tomsarver.com.
Sarver also practices traditional art making methods including drawing, painting and sculpture.
From 1999 through 2008, Sarver was a core organizer of The Black Sheep Puppet Festival, a national festival of activist and experimental puppetry. He holds a B.F.A. in Painting from Tyler School of Art, Temple University and an M.F.A. in Interdisciplinary Arts from SUNY Purchase College.
Sarver currently performs and promotes puppetry in Pittsburgh under a project called Puppet Happening. A selection of his work (28 puppets from shows developed from 1997 through 2013) was featured in an installation at the 2013 Carnegie International at the Carnegie Museum of Art. His current Pittsburgh project, The Sideways Museum, highlights folk and visionary art traditions in a downtown storefront.
Throughout Tom Sarver’s career, puppetry has been a driving force in his work.
“I’m drawn to the primitive nature of the art, its ability to reach people of all backgrounds and its effectiveness in the delivery of satirical commentary. Set into motion by a puppeteer, inanimate objects become uncanny creatures that challenge our ways of thinking,” he said.
In Puppet World, Sarver’s collection of performance puppets is on display alongside collages, drawings and art objects that are part of his constant practice of art making.
“Social commentary drives initial sketches, which turn into collage works or puppet shows. The two inspire each other,” said Sarver. “Both practices utilize materials at hand as I work in an immediate fashion to capture the essence of a character or situation.”
The Nutting Gallery is dedicated to educating, enriching and engaging students and the public through art exhibitions of the highest quality and to promoting the visual arts within the WLU community.
The Gallery fulfills this mission through eight exhibitions during the academic year. This exhibition schedule includes five exhibitions by visiting artists, two Senior Exhibitions, and the Annual Art Faculty Exhibition.
The exhibitions are free and open to the public. For more information, please contact rvillama@westliberty.edu or call 304-336-8370.
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