Akron business and community leaders show their fun side in art show [The Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio]

Nov. 18--Who says community and business leaders can't have a little fun?

Seventeen Akron leaders are featured in an art show at the We Gallery in downtown Akron opening tonight with a VIP reception. But these aren't your typical corporate or formal photos.

University Park Alliance Executive Director Eric Anthony Johnson is pictured in a Superman costume. SummaCare President Marty Hauser is standing in front of a hovering helicopter. GAR Foundation President Rob Briggs is coming out of a field of hay holding a pitchfork with cows and roosters, including one on his head.

The show is called Men & Women of the Apex: Leaders of the Bio-Innovation Corridor.

Featured are artistic photographs of leaders of the biomedical corridor, an area surrounding the city's three downtown hospitals that has been designated for medical-related development.

"I see these folks as artists in their own right, whether it be some type of mechanical or engineering or the art of administration," said Tony Troppe, who funded the show with his Apex Productions with help from David Kettlewell, who produced the show. Troppe is a downtown entrepreneur and promoter who with several investors has renovated historic Akron buildings.

"I wanted to capture them in an artful pose," Troppe said.

Troppe recruited James Vaughan for the job. Vaughan is a Silver Lake native who spent more than 25 years in Chicago as an advertising and fashion photographer. Vaughan returned to the area in 2001 and set up a studio in Kent.

Several of the pieces of art, which were blown up to a 40-by-60 size by Fairlawn's Photo Imaging, could be thought of as quirky. Some have a back story to match the subject's personality and others take a little creative license.

Johnson calls himself a "big Superman fan."

"People that really know me know that I have Superman stuff all over my house," he said.

Johnson went to the photo shoot prepared to wear a business suit and tie. He ended up being displayed in a super­imposed photo over the body of Willie Gault, the star football receiver for the 1986 Super Bowl-winning Chicago Bears.

"I took a leap of faith there, so to speak," Vaughan said, "and did a print of the old shot [a photograph Vaughan took of Gault for a magazine cover] and showed him and he loved it."

Hauser was one of the early subjects to be photographed and had to do some recruiting of other leaders for the idea. "I think it's flattering and I think it's somewhat admirable what Tony and David are trying to do to promote the community," Hauser said.

Everyone wants to know Hauser's back story and why he's photographed with a helicopter about to land. Hauser said after a few shots of him leaning on a stack of books (Hauser was a history major in college), Vaughan asked Hauser to put on a borrowed trench coat, stand in front of a green screen and look serious.

"My life is one big smile. He kept saying, 'Don't smile. Don't smile.' I said, 'I can't help but smile,' " Hauser said.

Hauser said he did his best to bite his lip and look serious while Vaughan pulled out fans and blew "what little hair I have."

When Hauser saw the final photo, he thought it was great.

Vaughan said he was inspired by the old 1940s insurance ads, "where an insurance agent is running into your burning house and saving your kids. I wanted the drama and was trying to push sort of what these people were doing to the most extreme."

Hauser said an ironic thing about his photograph is that because of motion sickness, he would never ride in a helicopter.

Briggs has been a part-time farmer since buying a farm in Hartville in 2003. Briggs, who lives on his farm and has a part-time employee who helps him, says raising beef cattle is very different from his life as a lawyer and president of the GAR Foundation.

Briggs has 19 belted Galloway cows, so named because they have a white band on their stomachs. There are also a few chickens that provide eggs.

While Briggs grew up in Wooster, a farming community, he wasn't a farmer until later in life.

"I was a little reluctant to let that picture go, yet what the heck, you have to have a sense of humor," Briggs said. "He wanted me to bring overalls, which I did, but I didn't put those on. I brought a pitchfork and he just Photoshopped it from there. The guy is an artist. He clearly doesn't like to take still shots."

Vaughan said he was going for the American Gothic look to mirror the famous painting.

Others featured in the show are: Greater Akron Chamber President and CEO Dan Colantone; Akron Children's Hospital President and CEO Bill Considine; Austen BioInnovation Institute of Akron President and CEO Dr. Frank Douglas; Northeast Ohio Medical University (Neomed) President Dr. Jay Gershen; Akron Biomedical Corridor Executive Director Zev Gurion; GOJO Industries CEO and Chairman Joe Kanfer; Akron General Health System President and CEO Vince McCorkle; Akron Mayor Don Plusquellic; Summit County Executive Russ Pry; University of Akron Professor of Chemical, Biomolecular Engineering and Polymer Science Judit Puskas; Summa Health System Medical Director of the Health Disparities Research Dr. Edward Demond Scott; Summa Health System President and CEO Tom Strauss, and Troppe.

The We Gallery has an entrance at 20 N. High St. and is also above the Mocha Maiden/Urban Eats in Maiden Lane.

Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays and 11 am. to 9 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays. Admission is free. The show was originally only scheduled to be open for a week because of a prior show commitment for the gallery, but Troppe said Thursday that the show will now stay at the gallery through the Akron First Night festivities on New Year's Eve.

Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/blinfisher and see all her stories at www.ohio.com/betty

___

(c)2011 the Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio)

Visit the Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio) at www.ohio.com

Distributed by MCT Information Services