Not everyone who is born with a creative impulse is graced with the familial support for that drive. Todd Stahl not only benefited from such support, but has also chosen to pay it forward and foster that spark in artists of the next generation. Born and raised in Fairport, he now teaches art at Webster Thomas High School. They're lucky to have such a passionate art teacher pre-collage - he even gives his students a shout out in his artist statement at his own art show at the Little Theatre Caf� this month.

When I viewed the show, the staff had chosen to play erratic, meandering jazz from their music collection, and Todd Stahl's art seemed like visual stills from that soundtrack. Though he's been making artwork inspired by jazz musicians for five years, there has been a shift in Stahl's approach, from images of the musicians playing, to "the musicians at rest :: between takes, contemplating their next solo, watching the other players," as per his artist statement. He says, "To me, jazz has become a wonderful interplay of the rest and release."

One valuable lesson to teach young artists is the power of resourcefulness: you don't have to drop bank on �ber-expensive materials to make good art. Stahl uses "found surfaces," raw items like tar paper, cardboard, and table tops, incorporating the assorted textures into the pieces in order to convey something of "the earthiness of jazz and its musicians," he says.

"Resolution [John Coltrane]" is acrylic paint on tar paper, and shows the musician's focused face in profile, bent slightly over the instrument he cradles and plays. Stahl captured eyes that are somewhere else entirely, within a larger-than-life face, rendered sketchy and loose, but holding together where it matters, like the music genre itself. The monochrome of "Round about Midnight [Miles Davis]" is set off by a spray of orange behind him, like stage lights.

The half-circle, decorative-edged table top provides the perfect surface for the oil painting "Jazz Iconography [Miles Davis]," which mimics a Russian Icon in its use of gold leaf around the rim of the panel and in a halo around the trumpeting musician's head. Stahl has left the water stains and scratches on the wood visible, and the peeling paint around Davis reveals blue strips that hint at a heavenly sky.

Thelonious Monk is the subject of a rougher-still mixed-media piece created on a cutting board, entitled "Chops." Monk is portrayed in pencil playing the piano, and the viewer looks down the span of keys at his hands poised, his ear bent toward the sound. Bright orange vertical brushstrokes set off the portrait in a simple but effective study. He appears again in "After Hours," an archival print of a digital painting in which two overlapping sheets of old and dingy graph paper are marked with the sketchy contours of a face and shoulders hunched above a single line to insinuate the piano he sits behind. The skillful scribble on graph paper is clever; a nod to a genre of music that can't be contained, and flows loose, conveying only what it needs to.

"Dig [Miles Davis]" is a black, white, and maroon acrylic on cardboard piece that, seen across the caf�, appears to be a tight portrait of the man with the horn, but disintegrates into chaotic, choppy strokes up close. A smooth surface of cardboard is directly under the figure, but Stahl has ripped away the paper around him to reveal lines of corrugation and create an instantly graphic and interesting pattern. Another piece, "Out There [Eric Dolphy]," further shows off Stahl's skill at portraiture - even in vague, club-lit environments, the features are recognizable. The charcoal-on-cardboard man is gracefully poised with his flute, a strong horizontal set off by unfinished phrases of line and gesture trailing off below.

Coltrane stars in "Form and Release," a mixed-media collage that includes a black-and-white portrait of the man below the eyes, his fist pressed to his mouth, deep in thought. A detail image of his hands on the instrument keys is layered on, and the word "meditation" is stamped in red blocky letters. Scraps of typed words convey obsession: "hymns and strange, impassioned squalls of sound. Still obsessed with form and release, Coltrane toiled. Still obsessed with form and release, Coltrane obsessed with form and release. form. release." This repetition underscores not only his fixation, but our fascination with those who dedicate their lives to perfecting and advancing their craft, and to chasing that place, touching that mode of existence.

Sound Meditations

By Todd Stahl

Through September 19

The Little Caf� Gallery, 240 East Ave.

2581-0400, thelittle.org/cafe.php

Mon-Thu 5-10 p.m., Fri-Sat 5-11 p.m., Sun 5-8 p.m.