Tag Archive "brent-wahl"
Theory, photos and play – Vox Populi’s May shows
Some of what’s on view at Vox Populi this month is mystifying and theory-driven; some is digitally-savvy and soulful, and some is digitally-savvy and formalist. Happily, there’s also a piece that is downright lovable in the up-from-the-basement DIY way.
Fall go-round, round 2
Friday I went to the Vox building with Cate and a few of my St. Joseph’s students. We were early and so missed the huge crowds which was good for seeing the art. This is in no way a comprehensive review of the many shows on view but it seemed that revolutions were the recurring theme of the evening.
Video Vox
This month’s Vox exhibit is nearly all video and really all pretty great! It looks like more and more video artists are part of the Vox membership, and this show reflects the shift. The only non-video in the show, a sculpture installation, is by Brent Wahl, who also makes videos. Here’s who and what: Black Hole, a video by Matthew Suib and Nadia Hironaka; I had to play with the image to show anything other than a pure black rectangle, so I’m afraid it’s a bit misleading.The first ever collaboration between married video-makers Matthew Suib and Nadia Hironaka is a ... More » »
Weekly Update – Year end roundup
This week’s Weekly has my year end wrap up. Below’s the copy with some pictures. More images at flickr. It Was a Very Good YearIn spite of hardships and lack of leadership, the art scene thrives. Video projection at Little Berlin. The up and coming alternative space carved out a video viewing space curtained off from the rest of the gallery and added seating — getting it right from the start! It’s been a shockingly good year for visual arts in Philly thanks to new utopianism leading the way. Young artists rose up like a wave, opening cooperative venues like ... More » »
Weekly Update – Vox Populi’s New Members Show
This week’s Weekly has my a-list review of Vox Populi’s new member’s show. Below is the copy with a few pictures. More photos at flickr. MY VOX IN A BOX Brent Wahl, Tear, at Vox Populi’s new members’ show. Tear is nicely ambiguous–it’s a tear drop shape but the dance it does is like a tear on a tear. And the red color makes it a blood drop which connotes a tear in the skin…or other bodily organ. Vox Populi’s new members show romps in a playground where the scary, the existential and the humorous are separated by a heartbeat, ... More » »
Treasure trove at the Free Library: A talk with Karen Lightner
Karen Lightner at her desk Museums are not the only permanent collections of art in town. I was reminded of this while I was talking to Karen Lightner, who heads the Print and Pictures Collection at the Free Library. I stopped in to talk with her while I was looking at the Continuum: Photography in Philadelphia, which Lightner curated. The exhibit is an annual show mounted each year to coordinate with the Robert F. Looney Memorial Event. Looney was curator of prints and photographs at the library from 1963 to 1986, and his wise choices are part of the reason ... More » »
Bailis and Abercrombie on the road at Vox
Suitcase, by Leah Bailis A last minute quickie on the shows at Vox Populi, which, two days ago, was still sitting on the fence about where the gallery will move, once it’s are forced out of the Gilbert Building in mid-January. Cinder Blocks, by Leah Bailis With all the stresses of the gallery having to move Leah Bailis’ exhibit The Architecture of Independent People, with its cardboard sculptures of absence and loss in life on the move seemed particularly apt. But it was her cardboard replicas of cinderblocks piled in a corner that stole my heart, partly because of its ... More » »
Innocence lost, innocence found–The Day After
untitled painting by Joe Protheroe Post-Minimalism and Post-Photoshopism and Post-Illustratorism have all joined forces to abhor the straight line and perspective, abhor the mass produced, abhor the slick perfection and abhor the uniformity that Minimalism and computer graphics–and advertising–promised. Those were the formal issues that struck me silly when I walked into Slought to see The Day After, an exhibit of work by recent MFA graduated of Penn, Tyler and PAFA. To put it another way, this show is sad and angry, a declaration of innocence lost and dreams tucked away. The Day After is literal in these students’ lives, ... More » »
Weekly Update – Student shows rise above
[This week's Weekly has my review of some of this Spring's curated student shows. Here's the link to the art page and below is the copy with some added pictures.]School Daze The graduate shows revealed a fascination with entrapment and vulnerability. Blaine Siegel’s Gobdiddlymuck at Slought, a tour-de-force piece with humor and thoughts of society’s decay. Many of the student works seemed to be about decay. I made it to five of the dozen or so graduating student shows in town this spring—Philadelphia Sculptors’ “Five Into One” at Moore College of Art & Design, “Voxumenta” at Vox Populi, Penn’s M.F.A. ... More » »
