{"id":7634,"date":"2025-07-13T22:23:05","date_gmt":"2025-07-13T22:23:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/7634\/"},"modified":"2025-07-13T22:23:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-13T22:23:05","slug":"fluff-and-fold-with-culture-dubois-buffalo-skull-laundromat-to-host-art-exhibit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/7634\/","title":{"rendered":"Fluff And Fold With Culture: Dubois Buffalo Skull Laundromat To Host Art Exhibit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Most of the time, art shows consist of a boring expanse of white wall, punctuated with a canvas or three of artful color.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But Dubois is about to have an art show that will be quite different. That\u2019s because to get into the show, gallery-goers will first have to step through a giant, 15-foot-tall skull.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The skull is a fiberglass buffalo head that forms the entrance to the laundromat in Dubois. While the business is owned by Chuck Bryant, the sculpture was created by the late artist Vic Lemmon, who signed his handiwork in 1982.<\/p>\n

Lemmon just wanted to add a little pizzazz to his business, the Grub \u2019n Tub, which was a combination coin-operated laundromat and restaurant. It\u2019s been a fixture of the laundromat ever since.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bryant, who now owns the laundromat, told American Coin-op in 2018 he has no plans to ever sell or get rid of his unique entrance, which is a spot that frequently attracts tourists taking selfies on their way to Yellowstone.<\/p>\n

The skull also brings a certain flair for an art show, artists Brooke Hsu and Louis Eisner told Cowboy State Daily. Not the least of which are all the metaphors suggested from passing through a portal that symbolizes giant, oversized death.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a big fan of mythology, and in Greek mythology, you have many, many episodes where a person, God or someone, will go into the underworld to retrieve something or someone,\u201d Eisner told Cowboy State Daily. \u201cThere\u2019s the comedy by Aristophanes called \u2018Frogs\u2019 in which Dionysus, the god of wine and good times, decides there are no living poets skilled enough to sing his song.\u201d<\/p>\n

That forces Dionysus to make a dangerous trip to the underworld to resurrect Euripides, which he does disguised as a much tougher soul \u2014 Hercules.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, besides the fact that it\u2019s sort of funny, I saw this cow skull, in a way, as a sort of gateway,\u201d Eisner said. \u201cIt\u2019s a gateway of death. But does it have to be morbid? Not necessarily.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fluff And Fold Meets Art<\/p>\n

As Eisner and Hsu imagine it, their show,\u00a0which will begin Thursday and last four months,\u00a0pays homage to history and art, from old Western posters to European paintings.<\/p>\n

These will be artfully arranged inside the laundromat, right over the spot where customers fluff and fold their clothes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The laundromat isn\u2019t as atypical to such a process as one might think, Hsu and Eisner said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople don\u2019t usually spend all that much time in an art exhibition,\u201d Eisner said. \u201cThe thing about hosting an art exhibition in a laundromat is that people will be occupying the space for hours doing their laundry.<\/p>\n

\u201cOr maybe not hours, but at least an hour, doing their laundry.\u201d<\/p>\n

During that time, people are typically bored with little to do.<\/p>\n

Having an art show on site gives those people something constructive to do while they await the washing, drying and then the folding, which often happens on site.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s like a performative element of people doing laundry underneath and around the artwork,\u201d Eisner said. \u201cThe difference between the laundry machine and the people doing the laundry and the people of Dubois and the art \u2014 it all fuses into one thing. It\u2019s all one experience. They\u2019re not separate. It\u2019s sort of an interweaving of art and life.\u201d<\/p>\n

History and art, meanwhile, have long been intertwined, Hsu said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe look at history to understand our time,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Granted, the historical element here, is all about death, and how it was once perceived down through the ages.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe story of Aristophanes\u2019 \u2018The Frogs,\u2019 involves a process they call katabasis, which is a journey to the underworld where you ask a question of yourself or the world, and try to go on this journey to find an answer,\u201d Hsu said.<\/p>\n

That, to Hsu, really describes the lifelong journey of all artists.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re asking a lot of questions of artwork and of ourselves\u00a0to make a representation of it for people to experience that,\u201d she said. \u201cIt might give them any range of emotion or a feeling of like, acceptance or understanding, or a spiritual experience that might be without any kind of dogma.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bringing Tourists To Western-Inspired Art<\/p>\n

The clientele of the laundromat is also much greater than the usual clientele at an \u201cofficial\u201d art show, Hsu pointed out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the only laundromat in Dubois and people, like the whole community, when you talk to people in town, everyone washes their blankets and stuff there,\u201d she said. \u201cEven if they have a washer-dryer at home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The town also attracts a wide variety of people who come through in all four seasons for various activities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s this transient nature of different groups of people getting to come in and also experience the artwork,\u201d Hsu said. \u201cLike a lot of people doing the Continental Divide come through and will take showers at the laundry and wash their clothes. There\u2019s all the dude ranches and camps and all the kids and camp counselors who come and wash their clothes as well. And there are like rodeo cowboys on Friday night who might go in there to use the ATM or something.\u201d<\/p>\n

That diverse element is particularly appealing to Hsu, who said she\u2019s always before had to show her work in big cities.<\/p>\n

\u201cI come from a small town in Oklahoma, and I\u2019ve never gotten to share in a rural location,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s really meaningful to me to be able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buffalo Bill Cody And The Bucking Frog<\/p>\n

All the work that Eisner and Hsu are showing has been specifically developed for the laundromat as an art venue, and much of it is Wyoming-inspired.<\/p>\n

While both artists live and work in New York, both have also been spending a fair amount of time in Wyoming. Those New York art connections, however, are what helped them bring a Bortolami art show to Wyoming.\u00a0Bortolami is the name of an art gallery in New York.<\/p>\n

\u201cStephania (Bortolami), who is the owner of the Bortolami gallery, knew I\u2019d been spending time out here and she was like, \u2018I\u2019d love to do an artist city project in Wyoming.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Bortolami\u2019s city art projects have all been from formulated around the idea of doing art shows in unusual, unconventional spaces, and are intended to be more artist-driven than a typical gallery might be.<\/p>\n

In the same timeframe, Hsu had happened to meet Eisner and the two began talking about their Wyoming roots. With both artists having family members who live in the Cowboy State, the idea naturally occurred to them that it\u2019d be cool to do an art show together.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was serendipitous that Stephania asked around the same time Louie and I had been talking,\u201d Hsu said.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cWe were also pretty reliant on who we knew as friends. So the laundromat is actually owned by a friend of mine who I met through my partner.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hsu has produced five new paintings for the laundromat show.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a focus on animals in them, because my connection and affection for being and living in Wyoming is now very much rooted in my relationship with animals,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Some of Hsu\u2019s paintings were also inspired by a poster from Buffalo Bill Cody\u2019s Wild West Show.<\/p>\n

\u201cI spent some time at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, going through the archives and learning about that history,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd there\u2019s a couple of paintings that make reference to Buffalo Bill\u2019s rough riders, which was part of the Wild West Show, but all the figures have been turned into frogs.\u201d<\/p>\n

That particular change was inspired by an actual poster Hsu saw of Buffalo Bill riding around on a bucking frog, which is hanging up at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West.<\/p>\n

\"AA giant 15-foot buffalo skull made by Vic Lemmon from fiberglass forms the entry of the Laundromat and Carwash in Dubois, Wyoming. It will also be a temporary art gallery when it hosts a unique exhibit. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily)\"TheThe top of Vic Lemmon’s 15-foot-tall buffalo skull that forms the entryway for the Dubois Laundromat and Carwash. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily)\"TheThe view from inside Vic Lemmon’s skull on the Dubois Laundromat and Carwash. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily)\"VicVic Lemmon signed his skull entryway in 1982. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily)Arrow leftArrow rightPreparing The Space<\/p>\n

Eisner has done a couple of sculptures and three paintings, among them a re-imagination of one he did of a log near the Snake River.<\/p>\n

\u201cI painted it to look like a sort of deteriorated copy of the original,\u201d he said. \u201cAll of the paintings have this sort of black and white, grainy texture to them. And I did that intentionally, because I felt it spoke to this sort of morbidity that we were talking about earlier, the underworld and death and the skull and digging things up from art history.\u201d<\/p>\n

The bronze sculptures include one of Aristophanes\u2019 book, \u201cThe Frogs,\u201d which has a bronze lizard partially buried within it, as well as coat hangers garnished with some frogs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To prepare the laundromat for the art show, some light renovations were undertaken, rebuilding and shoring up the center island. That way, paintings can be mounted right over the spot provided for people to fold their clothes. A wall was also built out to hang some additional paintings on, to make room for everything.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Those changes to the laundromat are permanent improvements at no charge to the owner.\u00a0For the renovations, Hsu and Eisner were helped by people in the community, making it something of a team effort to bring the art show about.<\/p>\n

\u201cA local cowboy who works with my partner and also rides bulls in the rodeo on Friday helped us weld the stand for the paintings,\u201d Hsu said. \u201cAnd a retired gentleman who runs an auto body painting shop helped paint (the wall) for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whether the laundromat will host more art shows is unknown at this point, Hsu said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s up to Chuck,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019d be happy to help him figure it out. I\u2019ve been meeting with local artists, too, and I think it\u2019s such a great space and a great way to look at art.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ren\u00e9e Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most of the time, art shows consist of a boring expanse of white wall, punctuated with a canvas…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7635,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[228,226,227,229,88],"class_list":["post-7634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}