Attack on Matisse at National Gallery highlights art security
After a recent attack on a Matisse painting at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, art security is on the minds of writers at the Washington Post.  That publication ran two stories recently about art security issues.

The artwork at the center of the most recent stir: Henri Matisse's "The Plumed Hat", 1919.

One article in the Post reports that the Matisse vandal had just been released from a hospital and was charged only four-and-a-half months ago with tearing a Gauguin painting off of a gallery wall. The paper also ran another story about an emergency preparedness container for saving important artworks in case of an emergency.

artblog’s museum studies guru, Andrea Kirsh, says that disaster plans are one of a number of planning and operational documents that all museums should have, although some small institutions may lack current disaster plans or other policy documents. For those who want to research this issue, Andrea passes on these links from the Northeast Document Conservation Center and Hertiage Preservation,  which include information on funding available for disaster planning.

O.U.R. Gallery and Studios in Port Richmond

O.U.R. Gallery

Port Richmond’s newest gallery O.U.R.(which opened back in February) opens a show September 10, “Figuratively Elsewhere,” which features artists Richard Metz, David Ferro, and Mikel Elam.
The show will be up until October 2.

O.U.R. is open to proposals for future shows. If you’re interested, email Melissa Purnell at mkpurnell2002@yahoo.com or contact the gallery through their Facebook page.

Bambi Gallery returns for a curated show at Crane Arts

The first show by Bambi’s Candace Karch since the little gallery with heart closed its space in the Piazza last February opens Sept 7 at Crane Arts. “Hold”, sponsored by InLiquid funs to Oct. 20. The show is an installation that deals with the desire to keep stuff.

Libby and Roberta voted Creative Connectors!
Roberta and Libby have been voted one of 76 Philadelphians who are Creative Connectors in LEADERSHIP Philadelphia‘s Connector Project. They were selected from over 3,200 nominees. The idea is that these “Connectors” are the glue that holds the creative community together; they grab hold of a concept and spread it around, acting as a trusted resource.

Art in Odd Places 2011
The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts will be participating in this year’s Art in Odd Places (AiOP) Festival. This annual gathering on West 14th Street in New York City is all about exploring the odd, ordinary, and ingenious in everyday life. “Ritual” is the theme this year including ideas of ceremony, obsession, myth, and superstition. AiOP will run from October 1-10 from Avenue C to the Hudson River. Jacolby Satterwhite, Pennsylvania native and recent UPenn graduate is among the 60 artists participating.

Opportunities

PenTales along with The European are holding The Connected Contest – but the deadline is soon: August 31! Write up to 5,000 characters (that’s around 800 words) in English (or German, all you German speakers out there) on the topic of being connected. Any writers, techies, creative individuals, or social media users are welcome. Send submissions to loewenstein@theeuropean.de – subject “Connected Contest” – for a chance to have your piece reviewed and shared in those publications.

The National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts will be hosting an emerging and student artist show at their conference in Seattle. The deadlines and rules are different for each category, but the deadline for the emerging artists category is August 30. For the student artists, the deadline is September 29. The conference is in March, 2012.

Live in NYC? Moving there? The Bronx Musuem is holding Artists in the Marketplace 32, a collaborative residency in which emerging artists can work directly with established artists, curators, and professionals before a culminating biennial exhibition in 2013. The deadline is September 5.

Artist News

Zoe Strauss is having an open studio this Saturday, Aug. 20, one day only – the last one before her big PMA show. There will be $5 copies of the remaining photos from her I-95 exhibition, and the artist will be snapping Polaroid portraits (ala Andy Warhol), for $5 as well. Stop by her studio at 838 Cantrell Street on Saturday, August 20 from Noon til 2 PM.  Snacks and air conditioning free.

Talia Greene has a number of shows coming up this fall. By date of opening: September 8 group show at The Print Center in Philly, September 13 exhibition at Wave Hill in the Bronx, and some site-specific installations at Flashpoint in D.C. on September 30.

Mark Skwarek, whose Augmented Reality project id featured at Little Berlin this month, has an AR project right now in Korea, a project that uses digital image manipulation to envision a unified Korea.

Tyler Held, "Cross-Culture", 2010.

Recent UArts grad Tyler Held is in a group show at Tyler School of Art opening August 29. From February 27, 2011 – June 24, 2012 he will be part of Contraption at Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts.

artblog international correspondent Matthew Rose has a solo show “God & Country” opening September 1 at Storie in Paris.

Gail Cunningham, from the cyanotype series, at Bambi

Sienna Freeman, cut paper collage

Bambi’s last show at the Piazza opens March 4, with works by Gail Cunningham and Sienna Freeman, two local artists whose creations bear the hallmarks of a Bambi show: well-crafted, sexy and conceptual. And Freeman’s Broken Mirror really is provocative: Photo collages that merge body parts from fashion magazine spreads show a lot of skin—and sometimes three or four arms and a muzzled head of a dog. Cunningham, in her third Bambi exhibit, makes paper cutouts using a Cyanotype photographic process. Blueprint series: The City Recollected imagines fantasy architectural spaces that stand out like ghosts on the cyan paper. The work has striking design chops with content that’s open to many interpretations. Karch, who represents can-do entrepreneurship, also knows how to throw a great opening reception party.

Gail Cunningham and Sienna Freeman, Opening reception Friday, Mar. 4, 6-10pm. Through March 27. Bambi Gallery, The Piazza, 1001 N. Second St. 267.319.1374. bambiproject.com

Read this at Philadelphia Weekly.

Projects Gallery

Fresh! 2010 is the third edition of Projects Gallery’s annual season opener of emerging artists. One of the criteria in organizing this exhibition, co-curated by Gallery Director Helen Meyrick and artist Brooke Holloway, is that the participating artists must have been educated or live in Philadelphia. The show includes eleven recent BFA and MFA graduates of local art schools, and even though eight of them graduated from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the individuality of each artist’s concept and presentation keeps the show diverse. Three artists in particular have intelligent ways of conveying the content in their work.

Adrian Aguirre, Bermudez 30”H x 24”W Charcoal on paper. also in Fresh 2010

Many artists in this exhibition allow the history of their work’s development to show. Some artists accomplish this with pentimenti, exposed layers of paint, or the animation of a developing drawing. A moving example of this is Adrian Aguirre’s Fences. This rigorous 38” x 50” charcoal drawing is powerful both formally and conceptually. The presence of the artist’s hand, the pentimenti, the use of the eraser, and the rendering of the men’s expressions make a work that’s full of life, space, light, and emotion.

Christy Bottie. Metal. 18”H x 18”W. Mixed media.

Another artist, Christy Bottie, was not afraid to try and succeed at using resin, a material she was unfamiliar with, in her works focusing on the elements. In Metal, Bottie painstakingly layered oil and resin, even though the oil would not dry fully on the resin, to create depth.

Katelyn Greth. Sheep Boy. 18"H x 10"W x 26"D. Mixed media.

Katelyn Greth’s startling mixed media sculpture, Sheep Boy, (seen recently in Vox VI) is poignant for conjuring the state of indeterminacy all graduates feel, being aggressive, young and fearful of the future. The open, unassuming approach of these artists made the delivery of their content – which varied widely from immigration (Adrian Aguirre’s Fences) to questions artists face when they finish school – all the more poignant. The work in this show was found through an investigation instead of a preconceived notion.

Maggie Mills. Chytrid. 54”H x 36”W. Oil on linen.

Winston Sordoni. Snug Harbor. 40”H x 72”W. Oil on canvas.

Kelly A. Kozma. little b. 10"H x 10"W. Mixed media.

The exploration of materials and what they can do could be pushed further in some of the pieces, however. Most artists seemed to stick with traditional materials. Likewise, some of the artists seem to hold back on stretching the variety, internal scale, and palette within their work making the whole show a little underwhelming. It would have been good to see more unexpected uses of color in paintings such as Chytrid by Maggie Mills and Snug Harbor by Winston Sordoni. Kelly A. Kozma’s work is intelligent in the way it draws with shadows, combines layers, and in it’s color relationships. However, the work would be more exciting if there was a greater variety in the internal scale of the work. Proportionally, most of the shapes stay within a very narrow size range and remain contained within the limits of the paper. The conceptual side of the work in this show was vibrant but the formal side needs to grow.

L.Q.T.M. What Should We Do Now? 19"H x 25"W. Digital Photo Print.

And while collaboration is hardly new, it’s great to see the joint work by a.d. loveday and Maggie Mills’ What Should We Do Now?, which included the participation of a group of people standing in the street outside of their studio building holding up signs with letters forming the question what should they do now that they are graduating. This work is exciting because it involves performance art with multiple participants, surprising the community, and branching out to a medium (photography) that is not their concentration.

Others in the show include Michelle Anne Clements, Scott Patrick Giblin, Reza Nahaie-Ghanad, and Laurie Werth. Fresh! 2010 runs through September 25th. Projects Gallery

Bambi

Joseph Hasenauer, painting from the Lil Pus series at Bambi

Joseph Hasenaur’s “Lil’ Pus..A girl’s best friend” is on view until September 26th at Bambi Gallery. This is Hasenaur’s first return to fine art in fifteen years after a career in graphic design, advertising, and filmmaking.  The show is comprised of brightly colored paintings, prints, and photographs, which humorously depict women and girls doing everyday activities with their “octopus,” which appears to be a funny, surreal reference to sex organs, sexual desire, gender… maybe all of the above.

Joseph Hasenaur. Photo Diary detail shot. 2010.

But these design-y paintings are less interesting than another body of work — a set of cell phone photographs with hand-written comments. The artist calls these photographs his diary of the last three months. This is where Hasenaur breaks with graphic design for fine art. It is obvious from the framing, sequencing, and content of these photographs that the artist has experience in film and creating a narrative open to interpretation. The subjects of the photos vary, but are tied together both formally and conceptually. They are all the same size and format, and the cell phone has a particular palette. In these photographs, the formation of this body of work is explored and it becomes clear how influential everyday life is on an artist’s studio practice. The comments on the photographs reveal some of the artist’s thought process. These images are personal, not precious in the way they were shot or displayed, and filled with vitality. The impermanent, private quality of the photographs – the food on the kitchen counter, a stage in the painting process – puts the viewer into a privileged position. Also on view, Veronica Hanssens’ portrait drawings in the project space. At Bambi to Sept. 26.

Vincent Michael

Tom French, Skull 1, charcoal on 300 gsm archival paper $1,100.00

Vincent Michael Gallery’s Hidden Realizations, on view through September 25th, includes Tom French, an emerging artist, and Chloe Faith Urban. Visiting from England, French is having his first exhibition of drawings and prints in the United States. Formally, French’s work shows a high level of technical skill, sensitivity towards mark making, and a love for the directness of drawing. The content of the work – life and death – is addressed with images of skulls and young women.  Unfortunately, the skill and vigor of the drawings far outweigh the content.

Urban’s gelatin silver prints with added collage of lace or ink have a strong focus on layering and tone. The formal side of a work can also be the rich, moving content in a work but that is not the case here.

This exhibition shows both artists have a great deal of potential due to their technical ability and energy – but the work stays within graphic design. It is a disappointment to see graphic design being called art because it takes away space from deserving artists. The work in this show leaves the spirit and mind wanting more. At Vincent Michael to Sept. 25.

Sarah Knouse, Pastoral Flamingos, 2009, 42 x 40 x 54 inches, cast polyester resins, urethan platic, shag, faux gilding paint, wood, mixed

The show’s at Bambi at the Piazza, 1001 N. 2nd St., Philadelphia, 6-10 tonight!

The show includes 32 artists selected from 183 submissions this year.  Here’s the list of who, in random order:

Alissa Eberle, Daniel Petraitis, 
Kate Mortorff, 
Maureen Wynne, 
Jennifer Herman, 
Montana Torrey, 
Dan Schank, 
Phil Jackson
, Michael Bednar, 
Joe Levickas
, Fay Stanford
, Susan Marie Brundage, 
Al Wachlin jr, 
John Woodin, 
Tyler Matthew Oyer, 
Karen Stone, 
Emily Satis
, Sarah Knouse, 
Matt Kalasky
, Rachel Timmins
, Warren Holzman
, John Karel, 
Philip DiWilliams, 
Hugh Meade, 
Bobby Gonzales, 
Jay Walker, 
Marie Perrin Mcgraw, 
Milana Braslavsky, 
Zach Osif, 
Alexandria Carrion, 
Daniel McCartney, 
Justin Rubich

While we’re reveling at Bambi, our posse of interns will spread out across the city, looking for what else is good!

Susan B. Howard's A Day in the Life at Projects Gallery

On closer inspection, the paintings do show signs of discord. In A Day in the Life, the elongated form of a snake cuts across the bottom of the canvas, while a black spider dangles in the upper left corner. The animals’ eyes goggle disconcertingly, and the red halos around some of Howard’s creatures look uncannily like blood.

Considering the even balance of Howard’s compositions, it was a surprise to learn that Howard never plans her paintings before she begins. Instead, she covers her canvasses with washes, and then finds shapes in the residue to build up into animals, plants, and flowers. The result is a richly textured surface of layered paint inscribed with linear patterns. The uncertainty inherent in Howard’s work process mirrors her concerns about the fate of our natural environment. The name of her show, “Tipping Point,” signifies the natural world’s precarious future as well as the unresolved tensions between the creatures in her paintings.

Bambi Gallery features exhibits by both Matthew Osborn and Erin M. Riley. Osborn’s exhibit, “Dead Reckoning,” wraps around the main gallery space. The pieces vary in quality—some are highly rendered paintings; others are doodles on yellow legal paper—but skull, owl, spade, and ghoul motifs appear repeatedly. Intended to be viewed from left to right, Osborn’s exhibit conveys the exponential difficulty of searching for self-identify while remaining unaware of one’s origins. The final painting in the cycle, Chopping Block, depicts the inevitable conclusion to life’s narrative.

Matthew Osborn's "Chopping Block" at Bambi Gallery

Tucked away in the back space of the gallery, Erin M. Riley’s exhibit “How’s My Driving” is more than worth seeking out. Riley approaches her woven tapestries of cars as a way to explore the father-daughter dynamic. In many cases, she feels that the car can become a man’s “baby” or replacement child. Half of the tapestries are “portraits” of the actual cars her family owned from the time she was born until the present day. The other tapestries in the exhibit feature traffic accidents: overturned cars, cars with broken windows, and black skid marks on an otherwise empty road. With Riley’s analogy in mind, these tapestries become ominous depictions of the scars of childhood abuse.

Erin M. Riley’s “Mack” at Bambi Gallery

As I walked into Little Berlin Gallery’s group show “Value City,” artist Scott Bickmore was in the process of hanging an orange bicycle wheel on a wall. This, he explained, was the beginning of a collaborative, orange-themed piece that will be constructed over the course of this coming month. Anyone is welcome to work on the piece and will be compensated for doing so. Before I left the gallery, Bickmore—fittingly attired in orange clothing and sipping from a bottle of orange soda—had already garnered several contributions, including a lock hair from a redheaded visitor. Bickmore’s piece has been purchased by Hyperion Bank, where it will be installed once it is complete.

A visitor gives a lock of hair to Scott Bickmore’s (left) collaborative artwork

Two other pieces in “Value City” demanded attention in their innovative use of wall space. Sebastien Leclercq’s Co-opteration, a mural made from blue masking tape, juxtaposes two images from his previous works: a pyramid of grids and a handshake. As a symbol of merging, the handshake is hopeful gesture to Leclercq. However, he acknowledges that its meaning is ultimately ambiguous, since merging can imply the loss of individual identity.

Sebastien Leclercq’s Co-opteration at Little Berlin Gallery

Carolyn Salas’ Rug Project is a variegated and intricately patterned oriental rug. Not until I was only a few feet away from the piece did I realize that Rug Project, tassels and all, is constructed entirely from pieces of carpet foam padding. As Salas intended, I immediately felt new appreciation for the potential of this usually concealed material.

Carolyn Salas’ Rug Project at Little Berlin Gallery

Jenna Wilchinsky and curator Masha Badinter’s contribution to “Value City” was a cake formed in the shape of an ATM machine. Visitors to the exhibit were allowed to break off chunks to eat. It’s not hard to guess how this work of art evolved—or, rather, devolved—over the course of the evening!

Jenna Wilchinsky and Masha Badinter’s cake--before consumption began

]]> http://www.theartblog.org/2010/05/see-what-happens-evolutionary-artwork-at-projects-bambi-and-little-berlin/feed/ 3 http://www.theartblog.org/2010/04/bambi-biennial-juried-by-us-apply-now/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bambi-biennial-juried-by-us-apply-now http://www.theartblog.org/2010/04/bambi-biennial-juried-by-us-apply-now/#comments Mon, 26 Apr 2010 10:37:28 +0000 libby and roberta http://theartblog.org/?p=13177 Hey, we’re jurying the second Bambi Biennial at Bambi Gallery — the show is in July and the deadline for applying is April 30. Here’s where to find the info.

Special news for all you last minute potatoheads, April 30 is a soft deadline. May 10 is the hard deadline.

At PPAC through May 15, .matrix includes work by artists interested in “pushing the limits of the printed image and how it is created, used and disseminated.” This isn’t your grandmother’s printmaking. Much of it purposefully challenges our perception of the single matrix, or surface onto which one unique print is impressed.

Kasselskramer Publishing's wall of archival inkjet prints

Kesselskramer Publishing’s wall of archival inkjet prints were achieved using the same kind of digital printing that any of us can use to run off copies of our vacation photos.  Does the ability to make countless copies of the same print quickly and with very little effort cheapen the final product?  In what ways do these prints blur the line between printmaking and photography?  These are just the kind of questions .matrix hopes to provoke.

Many of the prints here are lovely to look at, but reading the labels is the key to really appreciating them.  As with the Kasselskramer prints, the techniques are unexpected.

Donald E. Camp's faces through the glass

Donald E. Camp’s larger-than-life images of heads were made with casein and earth pigment on Arches rag paper.  Matthew Brandt used his subjects’ own bodily fluids to texture and color his small character studies.

'Belen, 2006' - A print soaked in the subject's own sweat

Paul Swenbeck and Nick Lenker’s collaborative show at Bambi is a twisted fever dream, in clay.  Imagination and spontaneity drive these pieces, and the curator’s description reminds us that this approach to shaping clay, and the work that it produced here, is a big break from traditional ceramics.

Swenbeck and Lenker's 'Lucifer'

Libby and Roberta said it best last week: these two are “the boys of darkness.”  The gore-factor is simultaneously off-putting and intriguing.  These are the kind of pieces that make you take two steps forward, one step back in confusion, and then a step forward again for another look.  I was most drawn to the mythological references, as in Lucifer, above.  But symbolism aside, the oozing eyes were just plain great.

On the red eye

There was more clay to be had at Projects Gallery, where To Die For is on through May 1.  Like Swenbeck and Lenker, the artists showing here are putting a new spin on the medium.  Instead of breaking with the past though, they are riffing off of it.  Ceramics, like canopic jars in ancient Egypt, have long played a role in death rituals, and these sculptors use clay to deliver modern meditations on death.

Gregg Moore's 'The Miner's Canary Project (Carbon Cloud with Canary Pile)' at Projects

There is lots of dark humor, including in Gregg Moore’s canaries, and Janice Farley’s The Suicide Set (9 plates).  And some artists even deal with non-human, or avian, death.  David Furman bemoans The Death of Dessert & the Birth of McDonald’s in five pieces that morph from bowl of ice cream to Golden Arches franchise store.

Handmade graph paper, shattered glass on the floor at Rebekah Templeton.

Finally, a quick hop over to Rebekah Templeton on Girard Ave.  Sebastian Leclercq’s Supposedly fills the one-room gallery and covers the building’s exterior until April 24.  No splashy clay pieces here, just 132 sheets of white paper with simple wooden frames.  The sheets encircle the room, and moving from left to right, Leclercq added graphing lines one-by-one to achieve the final row of complete, hand-drawn graph paper.  On the gallery floor at the end of this paper trail: a pile of graph paper, frames shattered, as if the monotony and tension of drawing one line at a time, and watching one line added at a time, became too much to bare.

Little Berlin

“Scene,” an international show organized by Jennifer Woodin at Little Berlin is spare and a little chilly. The grid of ceramic knots held up by wire by Henny Linn Kjellberg (of Sweden) reminded us of how many other grids we had seen that day — at Tyler, up on Amber St. and elsewhere.  Grids are great, but we had trouble conversing with the ceramic knots in the 3-D grid and wondered if the piece had more to say to ceramic artists.

Henny Linn Kjellberg at Little Berlin

Jennifer Woodin, porcelain and copper, at Little Berlin

Jennifer Woodin’s pristine white porcelain urinals all connected via pristine copper plumbing pipes left us hoping for more Duchampian content. But plumbing is definitely in the air since we saw another instance of pipes on the wall at Tyler.

Student work at Tyler with plumbing pipes suggested near the drinking fountain. We think the piece is by senior Colin Magness. If we got it wrong, let us know.

Speaking of echoes, the photo sequence by Ane Fabricius Christiansen at Little Berlin — which flummoxed us but was understandable to the ceramic artists around us — pictured an unfired clay cup slowly disintegrating in water and falling to the bottom of a sink.

A tour member drinking tea and looking at Ane Fabricius Christiansen's photos of a ceramic cup in water.

Later on at Projects Gallery, a piece by Todd Leech, “Drowning” with a figure made of unfired clay lying in shallow water surrounded by medical drip bags showed the real thing — clay in water busy falling apart. We had to flee the scene, whose visual decay and moist almost-noticeable scent did not please.   Likewise, the message about medicine killing seems a bit pat. But folks will disagree, and we note here that at least one of our group thought that Leech’s installation was fantastic.

Crane Arts

Colette Fu, lightbox image from Medium Resistance in the Crane's Icebox

As usual, there was much to see at the Crane. We ran through the place, happy to see a couple of print shows as well as the ceramics.  Medium Resistance — the Southern Graphic Council/Philagrafika print show in the Icebox is very good. We especially love Colette Fu’s light box photo collages which are over-the-top pop culture mash-ups; Carl Pope’s Black power/bad-ass poster wall; and Martin Mazorra’s posters, especially the one riffing on bird poop (ah, pigeons, live in a city do you, Martin?).

Nexus

Michael Beitz, Sofa Legs, cast etching, ink and plaster, about 8" at Nexus -- a print show.

The other print show we saw, Extra-dimensional Printmaking Invitational at Nexus, turned up a couple of cartoon-raunchy drawings on plaster by Michael Beitz. We loved the bent penis piece (not shown-it reminded us of all the plumbing pipes we’d been seeing).

University of Delaware @Crane Arts

Syd Carpenter, in the group show, Catalyze This: Contemporary Ceramic Practices, at UDel at the Crane

Syd Carpenter’s work in Catalyze This at the University of Delaware @Crane space is a knockout.   Carpenter’s compact and abstracted landscapes have virtuoso technique and smoldering content about the past, the body, and the earth.  Our admiration was equalled by the admiration of all the clay aficionados on the tour. The artist has a solo exhibition of related work right now at Sande Webster Gallery and she curated an NCECA exhibit, Fertile Ground, at the Philadelphia Horticultural Center.

Roberta, taking a picture of an interactive, motorized piece by Kenny Delio that cast a dancing shadow.

Downstairs the show has a couple of wonderful mechanical and video works that reminded us that we’d seen smart robotic, mechanical and video works there before — a definite strength of this school gallery.

Affirmation, Adam Abel's computer animation and stop-action animation at UDel @Crane, downstairs.

Bambi

Meanwhile, the boys of darkness, Nick Lenker and Paul Swenbeck, teamed up for a collaborative show at Bambi that proves that unbridled imaginations can often think alike.

Through a mirror darkly at Bambi with Nick Lenker and Paul Swenbeck

The shiny black “mirror mirror on the wall” takes us to Snow White territory as well as to oil slicks and black ice and Elvira, queen of late night tv horror movies.

Nick Lenker, Paul Swenbeck, collaborative work at Bambi

In addition to the predominace of the color black here, and the suggestion of mountains that are castles in the clouds where dark torture takes place (all in good imaginative fun), we love the combination of large installations — and little works that you could definitely buy and take home for your wall or secret wardrobe in the bedroom. Swenbeck also has work at Fleisher-Ollman and as we mentioned earlier, Lenker has a solo show at Pageant.

We were on the tour from 9-2 and covered a lot of turf, but hang in there we’re almost through!

Projects Gallery

Richard Cleaver, Cult of the Tsar III, in To Die For at Projects Gallery

Projects Gallery’s large group show To Die For includes some gems like Richard Cleaver’s altar piece, Cult of the Tzar III, that looks like it may be in honor of rapscallions everywhere. There’s a sense of good old boys standing guard over a precious Faberge egg honoring Marx, Rasputin and …men in beards. We love the piece’s ornate completeness and its odd (to us) subject matter.

Peter Gourfain, Sophie Scholl, 1943

Elsewhere, Peter Gourfain’s muscular statuette, Sophie Scholl, from 1943, breathed like something out of Kathe Kollwitz come to life. Gourfain, an activist artist, made the work in honor of Scholl, who was a Nazi resister.

Wexler

Sergei Isupov, the piece in Wexler's window that we just had to go in and see. There's another complete (female) head on the back.

Finally, back in Old City we’re off to an appointment to see Luella Tripp at her brand new gallery LGTripp, but passing by Wexler Gallery,  a standout ceramic bust by Sergei Isupov in the window drew us right in. The zen/ghetto/putti affect coupled with that intense Krishna-blue skin is quite a winner.  You can’t quite tell the scale but the piece might be 20-30″ tall.  Inside, the piece keeps on giving–there’s a relief bust of a woman.  Nice one.

Irina Zaytceva, Cat's Cradle, 2010. porcelain, handbuilt, handpainted and 24K gold lustre, 4-1/2 x 9 x 10 1/2"

Upstairs we tiptoed through the masses viewing the hotbed of erotica in “The Hermaphrodites,” noticing lots of red gumdrops on the pedestals which we assume means the piece sold.

You may know, NCECA has brought some 6,000 registrants to Philadelphia to talk about ceramics this weekend.   There are many more ceramics exhibits in town and artblog will be covering more of them in the next week.

Gail Cunnningham, Army Ant Couch, 44 x 36 inches, card stock

I was thinking something girly and domestic and small. But the work is surprisingly large in scale, and the home-inspired environments and objects are far from safe. Buildings twist, an army of ants belches from the stuffing of a settee, stool legs bend and blueprint-like cross-sections of buildings look unsafe, with chutes and ladders, piles of debris and doors to nowhere.

Gail Cunningham, Detention Center II, 27.5 x 22 inches, charcoal paper, 2009

Cut paper is quite the trend these days, but this work is more personal and modest than the cut paper work of Philly’s boy cut paper wizards Hunter Stabler and Joe Boruchow, or the exuberant street art and sculptural cuttings of New York artist Swoon.

But Cunnningham is fierce, using the process of cutting to express anger. Her work is intimate. There’s also a generous dose of broader content–the fragility of life, the difficulty of relationships, the vulnerability of all of us and how we struggle to build safety around ourselves. The delicacy of the medium seems a good fit for work that’s not so safe after all. I’ve got two small quibbles. The main one is  the frames that domineer over the work’s edginess. The other is the missed opportunity of using the natural tendency of this medium to explore artistic issues of positive and negative spaces.

As far as the cut paper itself and the imagery go, what’s not to love? The exhibit runs to Sept. 27.

319A North 11th Street–5 worthy venues

Kate Stewart's collage Room with a View: Dueling Chairs, at Vox Populi

The new hub of Center City art at 319A N. 11th St. has five openings that could occupy your whole evening: Vox Populi, Screening, Copy, Tiger Strikes Asteroid and AHN/VHS. Everything looks pretty interesting. Here’s one that particularly caught my fancy:

Screening’s 90-minute video, Two or Three Things I know About Gas Station MiniMarts, with footage of five minimarts looping while appropriated movie dialog from Godard’s 1966 film Two or Three Things I Know About Her is the soundtrack. It sounds odd and oddly compelling.

Little Berlin

Postcard image for Bone Tail, group show at Little Berlin

Bone Tail, curated by Tyler Kline. Four artists with sculpture, installation, paintings and prints on the theme of myth and fables. I love the postcard image for its illuminated manuscript reference.

Bambi

Postcard image for Andrew show Spectatorship at Bambi

The army medic got in touch with Bambi’s Candace Karch via her website pitching a show of his work. The artist, Andrew Abbott, has a degree in art but his images come from a visionary spot inside that is akin to the space outsider artists make from. The artist, who lives in Maine, will be at the opening and Karch says she’s hoping some army brothers stop by to talk with him.

Sage

Mugshots of artists participating in Dragnet at Sage

Dragnet. With 48 artists in an open call show, this should be a wild opening. The postcard image showing mugshots of each of the artists shows how much fun the Sage organizers are having with their South Street space. May it last another 6 months!

First Friday Talks

National Constitution Center

In conjunction with the Slought-organized architecture exhibit Into the Open (first featured at the Venice Biennale), a group of big-name architects and planners will speak about architecture and civic engagement. Free and open to the public but reservations required. Call 215 409 6700

5 PM in Posterity Hall. Jonathan Kirschenfeld, principal of Jonathan Kirschenfeld Architects; Laura Kurgan of the Spatial Information Design Lab at Columbia University; and Damon Rich, founder of the Center for Urban Pedagogy in Brooklyn, NY, who also serves as an urban designer and waterfront planner for the City of Newark, NJ

6 PM  in F. M. Kirby Auditorium. Teddy Cruz, whose photo narrative of the U.S.-Mexico border is prominently displayed on the front lawn of the Center, and Michael Sorkin, respected architecture critic and professor

Basekamp

Genesis Project Opening event
Friday, August 7th, 2009
6 – 8 PM
Talk by Douglas Repetto (Dorkbot NYC, Columbia University)