Itʼs always nice to walk into a minimal, simply curated show. I hate walking into a show that looks jumbled with too many pieces, or pieces that are too big for the space, etc…Grizzly Grizzlyʼs current show, Southern Cross, is a great example of how to curate a well balanced, comfortable show without overwhelming the space, allowing you to engage with the work in an uncluttered and personal way.

Gallery View

No doubt Grizzly Grizzly could be easily overwhelmed, as itʼs perhaps the smallest gallery in Philly, maybe 150 square feet at best. Still, despite the limited space, when a show is hung correctly and its curation is sound, the art is allowed to breath and a successful show is given life.

Southern Cross, the theme and title of the show, is a distinctive five-star constellation, visible year-round in the southern hemisphere. The five stars hang in a cross-like pattern. The show consists of five artists, each given a position in the gallery that represents one of the five stars. (The irony wasnʼt lost on this writer that they decided to present a show that alludes to a major star constellation that is probably billions of light years wide in a gallery smaller than a McMansionʼs coat closet!)

Chris Moss - "March Madness," 2011 - acrylic on masonite - 30 x 26 inches

Representing the star Mimosa is an excellent painting by Chris Moss. The picture depicts a loose pile of those cheap, plastic strings of multicolored flags youʼd see strung up in the parking lot of a car dealership, thrown into the hull of a dark wooden boat. The painting is really awesomely colored and painted flatly with a rich matte surface quality that would look great hanging over my couch – a proud addition of my art collection.

Matthew Fisher - "Below the Salt," 2011 - acrylic on canvas - 23 x 19 inches

Matthew Fisher’s cleanly painted “Below the Salt,” which hangs in for the star Gacrux, is an obsessively tight, well-crafted painting that seems to toy with a super-realist aesthetic. A lonely grass-like blade rises out of the sand on an eerie sunrise beach. The painting has a clean, well-balanced eggshell surface and radiates a lazy, calming, but strange light. The sand at the bottom of the picture is trippy and complex. I think much of its detail was applied with paint flicked with a toothbrush.

Rob Matthews - "Memorial," 2011 - Color pencil over ink wash - 8 x 6 inches

In for the star called Delta Cru is “Memorial,” a dark, smallish drawing by Rob Matthews. Based on a makeshift street memorial that the artist would pass on his way to work, the drawing depicts a crucifix leaning against a tree, with empty cans of Budweiser strewn around its base. The dark, somber scene brings pause, making you think of innocent youth snuffed out prematurely, like a best friend who has suddenly been lost.

Patrick Brennanm - "Montauk Discussion," (2009 - 2011) - Acrylic, Hand dyed silk, mylar, Paper, spray paint and popsicle sticks on Linen - 24" x 18"

The other two stars in the show include a sculpture by Stacy Fisher and a mixed media painting by Patrick Brennan. Fisher’s shiny black “Vampires from Mars” has a nice spatial presence and resembles some cylindrical core samples of oil or tar, bringing to mind the Mercury Rev lyrics, “Iʼm a vampire baby, suckin blood from the earth…” Brennan’s medium sized painting “Montauk Discussion” is aggressively textured with multiple mediums, including popsicle sticks.

Stacy Fisher (free standing sculpture) - "Vampires From Mars," 2011 - Hydrocal, spray paint, wood - 58" x 7 1/4" x 8 1/4"

All in all itʼs another enjoyable show at Grizzly Grizzly. The gaze-worthy show runs until Dec. 19.

The opening of the Lightroom Gallery’s Two Cultures exhibition, featuring the work of the photo gallery members Ranjoo Prasad and Tony Rocco, saw a steady turnout, with audience members drawn by the magnetic qualities of both photographers’ work. Although rooted in two different parts of the globe, Prasad and Rocco’s photographs were given a sense of unity by their highly composed styles and close attention to the inner lives of their subjects. Both artists’ work also dealt in some way with distance, as evidenced by their respective biographies. But the similarity ends there.

Ranjoo Prasad, People on Roof, at the Light Room

The sense of distance evoked by Prasad’s work comes from the Philadelphia-based artist’s outsider approach in photographing people in India.

Prasad’s photographs are set in her birthplace and her parents’ ancestral villages, located in East Champaran, a remote district in the rural Bitar State of India. In her biography, Prasad speaks of the difficulties she encountered as a woman and as an outsider approaching her subjects, which added no small degree of difficulty to her work. The insularity of these communities added a layer of tension that is evident under the surface of many of the photographs. Her work, although warm and intimate, in many cases also gives the very real impression of a considerable cultural and gender gap between Prasad and her subjects. Her magnificent attention to detail and ability to capture hints of her subjects’ inner lives and emotions belies a certain struggle to connect and bridge the gulf; her subjects’ eyes frequently appear guarded, and the sense of insularity is magnified by the elegant composition. Prasad’s candid discussion of the difficulties of this project makes the heartfelt appreciation of her culture and her home even more powerful.

Tony Rocco, Woman Sweeping

Rocco’s work shows distance in the disconnect between his subjects and the elements of their surroundings. His series of photographs was taken in his mother’s ancestral home of La Florida, Colombia. The works are, in his words, “an homage to the spirit and tradition of the people.” The content of these photographs deals with the rapid pace of modernity and its effects on the people of La Florida, many of whom seek to leave behind tradition in favor of more appealing new technologies.

Gallery shot at the opening of Two Cultures at the Lightroom.

Rocco, in his biography, writes that he spent a great deal of time teaching the children of La Florida photography so that they could document their farming traditions for themselves and, hopefully, for future generations. Some of the most striking of Rocco’s photographs feature the juxtaposition between traditional life and the rapid pace of urbanization. Here, the distance that is present in Rocco’s work is expressed in the stark contrast between children and their surroundings; two different worlds are seen in uneasy, implausible co-existence. The sheer scale of the changes visible in Rocco’s work brings into question the ability of the people of La Florida to adapt to the pressures of urbanization. Rocco, having invested so much of his time and talent infinding ways to help its people successfully make the transition while preserving their heritage, takes an optimistic view of this ability.

This exhibition is a testament to skilled, thoughtful curating; the two photographers’ work, shown side by side, complement the intense personal meaning inherent in each body of work.  The show is up to Dec. 2.

–Alyssa Greenberg is a writer living in Philadelphia.

The Shadow Lands at Little Berlin is a very ambitious presentation that produces a cautionary point of view and shows art in an evolving process. The key element is a non-linear approach — with action and interaction between the artist and the participating spectator.

Salvatore Cerceo, in The Western Lands. All photos in this post by Roman Blazic

It’s the degree of spectator participation that fulfills the vision. Without that there is a wide gulf between the artist and the spectator.

This is where the exhibition did not succeed. The interaction was well defined by the collaborations between the artists in producing a cohesive installation. The spectators were just that and nothing more.

Cipro, in The Western Lands at Little Berlin

This is a great challenge, and the members of Little Berlin have much awareness and forward thinking about it. They have earned sincere respect by not remaining in a comfort zone.

Tyler Kline

Tyler Kline, curator of the project, did a tremendous feat in making sense of a non-linear exhibition. He assembled a variety of art that would not necessarily stand alone and made it work well together. Tyler structured a creative partition of cardboard that enhanced my curiosity to find what I’m not immediately seeing. He was also gracious with his time to explain the vision, and he presented each artist in a positive light.

From The Western Lands

Some of the highlights are the mural collaboration of Brian Dunn and Skirmantas Pipas, “The Paint Machine” by Tim Eads, and sculpture work by Salvatore Cerceo and street artist Cipro.

In sum, by all means come to this exhibition (open to Nov. 30) to experience the evolution of art.

On a personal note, I want to thank Tyler, Roland, Cipro, Danielle and two un-named people who physically assisted me walking up and down Little Berlin’s steps. I find faith in the kindness of others and their unpredictable reaction to my injury.

–Fishtown resident and long-time observer of the scene, Roman Blazic is an artist and the event photographer for the Friends of Penn Treaty Park. He will have an exhibition of his works at Michael’s Decorators,when their building renovations are completed.

Prometheus stole fire from the gods and Zeus punished him by having him bound to a rock while a great eagle ate his liver, little bites at a time. Dan Reidy has brought his metaphorical adaptation of this drama to the Hamilton Hall platforms in front of the University of the Arts. On each of the platforms, a plastic lawn chair is chained to an alabaster boulder. On one side sneakers hang from a wire at the top of a metal pole. One boulder is labeled enigmatically with the initials P.M. R.C.

Dan Reidy's installation outside Hamilton Hall on South Broad St.

Stolen angel

The chairs chained to the alabaster boulders relate to Prometheus’ theft and punishment, but a theft has taken place here too. When Reidy installed the work, an adopted, repaired, and doctored angel figurine was placed on a ledge of the building’s façade as part of the installation. At some point the figurine was taken (not by Reidy). This was, according to Reidy, “Very sad, I knew it was at risk, it was part of the idea to have something easily stolen and hope it did not come to pass.” Almost begrudgingly it seems, Reidy has invited theft. If this is so, he certainly must be sympathetic toward the perpetrator since the punishment — sitting in the plastic chairs — is, of course, optional. Of course an angel figurine is also not fire and needless to say, Reidy is not a god.

Dan Reidy's portrait of a lady with her face "x"ed out

Reidy’s companion exhibit in the UArts Gallery 817 (closed Nov. 5) included paintings and several videos on a small monitor and continued the Prometheus theme. Two paintings in particular, portraits of a man and a woman whose images have been “x”ed out by gold spray paint have a completely inexplicable poignancy.

Dan Reidy's installation

Dan Reidy’s work is just that: Inexplicably poignant. And it is best not to worry yourself about translating the equation between the original Prometheus myth and Reidy’s version − because it probably cannot be done. There is however a phone number to call. The following instructions accompany Reidy’s statement next to the outdoor installation: Ring this number for audio, 267-519-5646, #921. Reidy’s Prometheus may be a tragic prankster. In this case, the tragedy is the theft of the poor baby angel, put at risk by Dan Reidy, the prankster.

Dan Reidy lives in Elmira, New York and teaches at the University of the Arts and Corning Community College. Reidy’s Hamilton Hall Platforms are on view through 11/28. Hamilton Hall, 320 S. Broad St., The University of the Arts.

–Lauren McCarty is a native Philadelphia artist, a recent graduate of the University of the Arts, and a less recent graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design. For more information visit LaurenMMcCarty.com,  and read her article on Bill Walton’s Studio at Title Magazine.

Western popular culture most often mirrors and reinforces the clean, filtered worlds of societyʼs haves. This is usually a bright and well-maintained place, where the rich and middle class go about their lives as pro-active masters of their destinies, enjoying from their desirable vantage points a close proximity to all of the resources that our cities and institutions have to offer. However, behind this one-sided veil, a vast, crumbling infrastructure looms in the shadows. Plagued by drugs, gang violence and chronic unemployment, these overlooked areas house the silent ghosts of humanity who are forced to make do the best they can in a constant struggle to overcome despite the overwhelming weight of their dilapidated environments.

Blue Sail (Vela Azzura) 2009-2010, Tobias Zielony, chromogenic print

Live Cinema/Peripheral Stages features the work of Mohamed Bourouissa and Tobias Zielony, two European artists whose past work has sought to give voice to the have notʼs, the people who struggle to thrive, at the lowest levels of society. At face value, the show, mainly photography plus a video by each artist, can be misconstrued as yet another cold, overly slick, brainless MFA thesis kind of show, but it doesnʼt take long to immerse yourself in the spirit of the work and its message. Indeed, the show struck me as quite powerful, successfully linking people with environment as two separate poles of a single, closed system.

stills from Le Vele di Scampia, 2009, Tobias Zielony, stop motion video

Zielony presents a group of photographs which depict a beaten down and desolate housing project just north of Naples, Italy. Built in the 1960s and known as “The Sails of Scampia,” the sprawling residential complex was to become a shining example of modern utopian architecture but turned out to be a failed endeavor, never living up to the lofty vision that its architect Francesco Di Salvo had tried to instill in its cavernous design. Now completely neglected and overrun by warring mafia factions, the complex has all the trappings of a post-apocalyptic nightmare, where existential dangers seem to lurk around every corner. Still, for all the negative energy that the lugubrious buildings exude, the young Gucci-clothed denizens have a glowing human spark in their eyes that conveys a sense of cautious hope and the inevitability of human triumph. Still feeling it necessary to posture themselves toughly and to dress smartly, it almost feels like these lost gang members are waiting for somebody to walk in and tell them that it was all a joke and that theyʼll be immediately handed a better life, like what might happen on a reality tv show. Zielonyʼs 7000-frame stop motion video is equally mesmerizing. In capturing the symmetrical housing towers at night the video brings to mind the spectacular futurist imagery of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis.

Screen 7 (Ecran), 2011, Mohamed Bourouissa, transparency in light-box

French artist Mohamed Bourouissa provides a series of large-scale transparency photographs mounted in light-boxes that depicts the insides of smashed-out televisions and video monitors in a Carravaggio-like chiaroscuro stylization. Perhaps commenting on the anger and contempt for the great displayer of synthetic popular reality, Bourouissa goes behind the screen, showing us a tangled mess of worthless wires and electronics. The TV, with its supreme power to shape and control the masses, suddenly becomes marginalized and useless, divested of all its magical power. The broken TV becomes a symbol of liberation and rebelliousness, a visual battle cry for a new social revolution that is not all too different in tone from that of the Occupy protests just down the parkway. I was also impressed by Bourouissaʼs grainy cellphone video chronicling the life of a prison inmate he became acquainted with. Through text messages, he communicates with the imprisoned man, telling the man what heʼd like him to film, like for instance making the man film himself eating, or performing other lonely actions. The movie has a strange voyeuristic quality. The filmmaker at times seems like a selfish user of the incarcerated man, making him perform superfluous actions that seem to exploit the prisoner’s loneliness and clouded judgment. But in the end, as the two grow closer and more dependent on their unlikely communications, the video becomes a poignant example of humanity that prevails in the face of adversity and human relationships that endure in the most isolating of situations.

still from Time Out (Temps Mort), 2009, Mohamed Bourouissa, cell phone video with sound

In order to thrive, human beings must adapt as best they can to the specific conditions of their immediate environment. Live Cinema/Peripheral Stages is a window into the darker, lesser known places where human beings must hustle and claw their way through the shit in order to rise above and flourish. This show was curated by Adelina Vlas and runs until January 16 in the Perelman Building of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

You will find the staircase to Robin’s Bookstore and Moonstone Arts Center between two bustling restaurants on an equally busy street. Once upstairs, you still might be able to hear the rabble and cries from those encamped at City Hall. Their chants and shouts are not intelligible, and many wonder what the protestors are trying to say. However confusing their message, we know why they have chosen to occupy the city center. We all feel it, hear and talk about why rabble-rousers and Americans hang their heads together.  And the Class Warfare exhibit at Robin’s/Moonstone will show you.

Group shot of works in the exhibit "Class Warfare in Philadelphia"

"Vek," photograph by Justyna Badach

Class Warfare In Philadelphia is a five part educational series presented by the Moonstone Art Center. The photographs in the exhibit act as mirrors for gripping stories that exist but have been hidden by the media haze and politics of the recession. The truth behind the photographs is what is both gripping and frightening. The largest color print, by Justyna Badach, is titled “VEK”. The picture was taken the day the subject learned of his eviction. The image catches your attention when entering the bookstore. And you are stunned because the subject is so bewildered. He sits on a stool frozen with his belongings around him, disheveled and recently homeless. Your mind subconsciously might start to erase the belongings from the frame, considering how they will soon be gone, but you will never be able to rid yourself of the subject’s devastation.

"Mother Crying," photograph by Kevin Cook

Most of the pictures follow in the same vein as glimpses into lives we may or may not share but understand and empathize with. One of the best examples is a photograph by Kevin Cook of a mother holding her child. As the mother cries she tries to conceal her sobs from the child on her chest by turning her head away. The child seems content, with her or his only wish to be with the mother. This black and white work communicates the history of photography’s role in documenting economic hard times. It is akin to the well-known Dorothea Lange photograph of the Migrant Mother. The same shroud of namelessness and grief are in both photographs. However, the mother in Cook’s picture cannot hide her emotion from the photographer – and maybe she shouldn’t.

"I Need a Beer," photograph by Sherry Ruczynski

This recession is visibly different from the Great Depression of the 1930s, but the photographs of Class Warfare are eerily close. What adds to this feeling of historical continuity with the past — as you discover photographs in every nook and cranny of the bookstore — is the fact that the images of Class Warfare are mostly untitled. During the Depression, photographs by Lange and others appeared in magazines and newspapers showing us the pain the economic downturn. Now we get little magazine coverage, but photographers like those in Class Warfare continue to document. The idea of class warfare has been called unpatriotic, divisive, and false.  But it is living and breathing in these photographs, which are as diverse as Philadelphia and our nation.

"Hooded," photograph by Harris Fogel

The photographs of Class Warfare allow for a discussion we need to have. Photographs do not shout, have a political party, or run for reelection. They show what we can all tell through a war that is not only between the rich and poor, but between the idea of America and the reality of American citizens’ lives.

The photographs of Class Warfare in Philadelphia are on view until November 3, coinciding with a panel discussion.

Amidst the “The Golden Triangle” of museums in Madrid — the Prado, Reina Sofia, and Thyssen-Bornemisza — a new gallery has popped up with interesting aims. Centro Mexico Madrid opened on September 15, 2011, hoping not only to create an exhibition space for Mexican artists but also to become a headquarters for celebrating Mexican art, culture, and traditions.

Betsabee Romero Untitled. 2007. Carved tire and print. 55cm x 20cm

Centro’s first show is a solo exhibition by Betsabee Romero titled “Memoria frente al espejo” (loosely translated “Memory in the mirror”). You may remember Romero from the 2010 Moore College Philagrafika exhibit, where she displayed prints in a traditional Mexican style made with recycled tires turned rubber stamps. The artist is best known for her public art sculptures incorporating manipulated cars, usually Volkswagon Beetles.

Betsabee Romero Untitled. 2007. carved tire. 55cm x 20cm

Romero has exhibited internationally for about 10 years now in important institutions in Mexico and South America as well as in the US (Los Angeles MoCA), Europe and the Middle East .

Betsabee Romero Desde la Alhambra. 2007. 6 half tires and gold leaf. 63cm x 17cm

In “Memory in the mirror” she continues her work on the sentimentalizing of traditional Mexican art and that art’s clash with consumer culture. Romero uses familiar materials such as tires, strips of rubber, and gum, but she also incorporates metallics in her palette with gold and silver paint and convex mirrors. And here, she adds remote control toy cars and trucks with bright colors and miniature sculpture in the mix.

Betsabee Romero Siempre en la mira. 2009. Acrylic security mirrors, frosted and painted with gold leaf. Sizes variable.

On the gallery’s first floor the metallics take center stage. Although the designs in the carvings and prints are pre-Columbian my first thoughts go to the Mexican-American “tricked-out” car culture. The convex mirrors resemble wheel rims or safety mirrors. Gold and Silver prints made using tire carved tire treads as rubber stamps wrap around the gallery’s columns. One tire remains in mid-print on the ground while others hang on the wall cut up and painted to create patterns or simply display exquisite carving.

Exhibition view including Cruzamos hasta el otro lado 1-111 and Carne de canon. All 2011.

On the gallery’s lower level Romero’s work creates a totally different mood. Brightly-colored, remote control trucks and cars are miniature art cars that carry portable graveyards with crosses and flowers. A more modern and slightly larger silver car is parked in the gallery’s front claiming superiority.

Betsabee Romero Cruzamos el otro lado I. 2011. Painted remote control truck with roses and crosses. 49cm x 15cm x 15cm

Romero’s handiwork, creativity, and juxtaposition of modern and ancient motifs make this show worth seeing. The show runs to November 10.

Centro Mexico Madrid is located at Calle Alameda, 3. 38014 Madrid, Spain. Their website is under construction but there is plenty of information on their facebook page (brush up on your Spanish).

You can see all of Betsabee Romero’s work on her website.

–Brittany Papale graduated with a BFA from University of the Arts in 2011.  Currently, she is teaching English in Spain.

Upstairs in a large, fancy chamber of the storied Mutter Museum, the sold out crowd eagerly buzzed in anticipation of the world premier of the Quay Brothers‘ latest film, titled Through the Weeping Glass: On the Consolations of Life Everlasting (Limbos and Afterbreezes in the Mutter Museum). Billed as the greatest coupling of subject matter and filmmaker that has ever been proposed in the history of art, surely the Quay’s dark-macabre style would present the strange and gruesome collections of the museum in a perfect mysterious pitch!

It’s taken me four days to conclude that the Quay Brothers’ commercial for the Mutter Museum is not art. It’s a 31-minute, boring, underwhelming money-grab by the Brothers Quay. (Did I read they got $273,000 to do this???) The only mysterious thing I detected the entire time was when the closing credits came up and not one person in the entire place clapped (after 20 agonizing seconds, some kind soul broke the ice and helped rouse up some applause). The other mystery is how or why MOMA is somehow involved with this, it being so brutally insignificant in the Quays’ career. It is a corporate commercial highlighting a few of the specimens in the museum and nothing more. The soundtrack, by Timothy Nelson, is cold and corporate sounding. There is no theme, narrative, or flow to the film. The other mystery is that the Quays, known for their awesome stop-motion animation, barely included any animated sequences in this movie!

Perhaps the most visually complex aspect is the rampant use of the Ken Burns Effect (an easy, automatic button in iMovie). During the question and answer session after the film, you could almost feel the brothers’ embarrassment when they actually admitted to the audience that the guy who did the voice over/narration didn’t even look at the images and only took 20 minutes to do the whole thing.

When one of the moderators made a joking remark regarding the Quays’ insistence on having ample amounts of Belgian beer on hand throughout the making of the film, I think the first thought on everyone’s minds was that maybe they should have laid off the sauce a little! This is not a proper Quay Brothers production, as it seems like they really didn’t even try. Check out films like Nocturna Artificilia or Street of Crocodiles to experience the dark, precise genius that the brothers are most widely known for.

These pictures were taken on Sept. 10 on York Street just above Coral Street. Little Berlin (Viking Mills) was a half a block away at Boston and Coral Streets. The parade started on York St and eventually ended at Flux Space, 3000 Hope St.

Marshalling on York St. before the parade

The participants in the Miss Rockaway Armada parade (a project sponsored in Philadelphia by the Art Alliance) gathered on Little Berlin’s Fairground/Garden that borders both York and Boston St. This lot is in the planning stage of becoming a community artistic park and performance area.

The band warming up

The parade participants were small in number but high in spirit. The event drew the watchful eyes of the neighbors, who found it amusing. The young toughs’ hard looks and comments were set aside with laughter when I approached them and said, “Now we know why they call this New Kensington.” The mood of fun was too strong to be spoiled.

Eight musicians formed and molded themselves into a marching band. The pleasant spontaneity of their music outweighed the perfection of their sound. (I don’t recall what songs they played but they were familiar.)

Everyone loves a parade, and so I was there too. My intention was to record the event in pictures and to meet and talk with the paraders and the neighbors. I found the neighbors very in tune and much in favor, with hope for the wider picture of the New Kensington, whereas, the participants were mostly caught up in the moment.

–Fishtown resident and long-time observer of the scene, Roman Blazic is an artist and the event photographer for the Friends of Penn Treaty Park. He will have an exhibition of his works at Michael’s Decorators,when their building renovations are completed.

Ordnance, Timothy Belknapʼs solo show at Rebekah Templeton, is a humorous and fun explosion of colors, textures, and forms. in this comment on the dangers in the American dream, Belknap deploys a surrealist and almost cartoonish eye to mash up the everyday benign with a suggestion of real physical harm or deformity. Some of the unexpected occurrences in this strange world include plastic skeletons coming to life, a lawn mower squirting its engine into the air, and a display of succulent fancy cakes concocted out of multi-colored fireworks.

"Unlovable," plastic skeletal bones, pneumatic, 2011

Upon entering the show you’re immediately forced to contemplate a sloppy mound of plastic human bones. This jumbled mess of bones seems purposely constructed to convey a sense of sad deformity, which I liken to the Elephant Man. The piece is hooked up to a crude array of pneumatic pumps that run through it like arteries. As you inspect it, the mangled skeleton suddenly and clumsily pops to life! But the pneumatic energy given is superfluous and weak, and all that really happens is that every minute or so the arm gains some strength and moves a little. Whatʼs interesting about the homely little wreck is that you quickly develop feelings for its terrible predicament. I found myself rooting for him, that he might gain enough strength to right himself and become whole again!

Gallery View

Then there’s the firecracker layer cake sitting on the floor. Itʼs definitely one cake you donʼt want to put candles near. Made from what looks like thousands of strands of firecrackers, the cake grows out of the floor like a monument to good old-fashioned high school mischief. I asked Ben (gallery co-owner Ben Will) if there were any plans to light the thing off, but he said he didn’t think so (Iʼd like to be present if it does go down!).

"Big Boom-Kake," fireworks, 2011

As with almost all the pieces, Big Boom-Kake gives off an orderly, formal elegance, while allowing the artist’s excellent color sense to come through. I personally love when sculptors have a good color palette; often times a nice form is cancelled out by lackluster color decisions.

"Moving Towards Entropy," lawnmower, 2011

Behind the dangerous cake a psychedelic lawnmower explodes in the corner. Here Belknap has painstakingly disassembled your typical push lawnmower engine and painted every component in nice, mostly high-key secondary colors. Then with monofilament, he hangs the pieces from a slow-moving wheel on the ceiling. The frozen explosion pours away from the white lawnmower like iron smoke bringing to mind Damian Ortegaʼs cars and Alexander Calders mobiles. Like the sad pile of bones near the door, this lawnmower clearly has seen better days, but even as the worst case scenario explosion has occurred, the result is somehow playful and uplifting.

"Unlovable"

Standing in the midst of Belknapʼs colorful sculptures, the gallery seems to bloom with slapstick humor and surrealism. Spending time among these smart, visual jokes makes you feel like you’ve been cast into a Bugs Bunny cartoon and that any minute all hell is going to break loose. I was waiting to be offered an exploding cigar and then shot with a bang flag gun!

The show runs until October 22.