March 2011 Archive

Elisa Goodkind – surface matters

Elisa Goodkind left the fashion industry at the height of her career (magazine editor/fashion stylist) to raise her two children. After returning to the industry she discovered advertisers had taken over, and personal vision was a thing of the past for fashion stylists. This was the inspiration for her new book StylelikeU (co-authored with daughter Lily Mandelbaum, 21), which is also an online magazine (stylelikeu.com) that features video portraits of people from cities across the globe giving us a peek into their closets while philosophizing about personal style. If you’re someone who is frustrated, annoyed and angered by the silly ... More » »

Weekly Update – Common place, coming Friday at Extra Extra

The ladies are taking over Extra Extra this month, transforming the white-walled alternative space into a den of decor and comfort without, I’m guessing, a big-screen TV. “Common Place,” a collaborative sculptural installation by Beth Brandon, Luren Jenison and Samantha Margherita, is interactive. And it has to be, because any good lounge space has comfortable outcroppings on which to lean, sit or lie. But since this is also an art installation and not an IKEA showroom, there’s lots of stuff to look at, pick up and shake. The show’s theme is nature—specifically what role it plays in our increasingly domesticated lives. To prove ... More » »

Farewell maps&listings and hello new “our picks” page!

Dear beloved artblog readers, After more than a year of putting up the best maps&listings for art galleries anywhere on the internet, we have decided to move our energies elsewhere. As of today we are taking down our maps&listings pages and are no longer accepting listings for shows and events on this site. We still want your listings, though! Email them to us at robertafallon@gmail.com and libbyrosof@gmail.com. Thank you, everybody, for your contributions to the maps pages over the past year! And thanks to everyone who used them.

Holy Mary! fashionista!

Our friend Janet Cooke has been collecting annunciation art postcards since who knows when. Probably it started, says the artist and art educator, when she was living in Europe with her husband, and her mom came to visit.  While Janet and mom toured the churches of Europe and looked at the church art, Jim, Janet’s husband — whose tolerance for church art was slim — was enlisted in the quest for postcard Mary’s, Annunciation Mary’s, in the churches’ giftshops.  The Marys are easy to love, Janet says–they’re sweet. Janet always intended to do something with the hundreds of postcards she ... More » »

Art in America discovers Hennessy Youngman

It can’t be easy to interview Jayson Musson when he’s in character –he’s a little slippery, actually a lot slippery. But art writer Brian Boucher is game in his delightful interview in Art in America online of the ever funny Musson as his alterego Hennessy Youngman. Check it out! By the way, we interviewed the real Jayson Musson for one of our artblog radio pocasts. Look for it on our radio page (nav bar at the top will do the job).

Jennie Thwing next Monday on artblog radio

Jennie Thwing‘s whimsical stop-action animations have tickled our visual funnybone for years — at the same time that they’ve made us think about issues like the environment and our culture of waste.  The artist and educator (she teaches at Rowan University in New Jersey) is also a member of Nexus, one of Philly’s oldest alternative membership spaces.  Thwing tells us about her religious upbringing and about her labor-intensive work.  Listen to the entire episode next week.  Here’s a sample clip. Jennie Thwing 48 seconds

‘Possible Cities; Africa in Photography and Video’ at Haverford College

Possible Cities; Africa in Photography and Video at Haverford College’s Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery through April 29, 2011 was organized by Ruti Talmor, Mellon Postdoctoral fellow, around two considerations: that contemporary Africa is largely urban, and that the work  should counter the fact that most images that circulate internationally represent the continent either as a vast nature preserve or as overwhelmed with poverty, health crises and political and social conflicts. No one who has seen international exhibitions during the past decade is likely to have such a narrow view (nor would viewers of The Global Africa Project, currently at the Museum of Arts ... More » »

Report from Cleveland

Philadelphia and Cleveland have a lot in common in part because they each are eclipsed by a nearby major, international metropolitan area–New York and Chicago respectively. When our host (we were in Cleveland at the beginning of February) heard I admired Cleveland, she seemed truly thrilled. So for natives of both cities there’s a diffidence, a disbelief that someone would recognize the charms of the adored, much maligned hometown. Therefore, well may you ask with some humor, what were you doing in Cleveland?

Weekly Update 2 – Bodega’s the place in Old City

This new performance and exhibition space in Old City generated buzz well before it opened in July. Today, it’s the most exciting and experimental art venue in the city’s so-called arts district, a place where it’s now easier to get good coffee than it is to see art that’s pushing the envelope.

Weekly Update – Jessica Gath, Secretary to the World

Want to send a letter but don’t have the stamp? Jessica Gath wants to help you out with that. In fact, she’ll even type it for you.