New collective member Leslie Rogers’ video account of a mugging, “The Meeting,” is undoubtedly the highlight of the show.

Leslie Roger’s “The Meeting,” video stills

A red-painted man with an intimidating mustache stands to the left. A blue-painted woman stands to the right. Red crosses the screen, menacing Blue. He pushes his head against hers and the camera zooms. Cut. They open their mouths. A small puppet of each figure stands on the tongues of the actors. The man’s puppet pulls a gun on the woman. Mouths close. Blue drops a few pennies into the hands of Red, and the video is over.

In “The Meeting” the puppets in the mouths—inanimate things—carry out the main action, while the literal bodies of the actors—the interiors of the mouths—become the stages. Rogers’ inversion of the typical relationship between actors and sets captures the logic of a mugging, where the participant’s material goods—a wallet and gun, respectively—have all the agency, while the participants bodies—an itchy trigger finger and pumping heart—become the sites where action might occur.

In founding member Robert T. Panell’s flash video, “Map of Stereotypes,” the formats of informational documents—history textbooks and PowerPoint-esque flash animated-graphics—are used to present information we typically try not to know. Panell’s map of America names the stereotype, rather than the place, associated with the geographic region corresponding to the position of the text. These words, animated, grow and shrink to showcase one stereotype at time. The word “Liberals” hovers over San Francisco, “Militants” over North Dakota, “Potatoes” over Idaho, and “Corn” over Iowa. The fact that most of us will recognize how these words might be applicable to those regions—regardless of whether or not we truly believe the meanings—forces us to feel a bit implicated in their continuation.

Robert T. Panell’s flash video “Map of Stereotypes,” stills

Rogers’ “The Meeting” and Panell’s “Map of Stereotypes” are slightly rough videos. While video, since the Porta Pak days, has had a proud tradition of DIY-aesthetics, these rough cuts feel particularly today and Philly.  The strategy is often quite successful.

Founding member Beth Heinly’s work in Forecast takes us to another popular mode of contemporary art, the appropriation art, reconsidered. Heinly presents a piece of junk snail mail she received, taped to the wall, as a stand-alone piece: “Mail from the Internet.” It is not devoid of interest—the spammer seems to have mistaken her internet moniker “Berth Heiny,” for her real name. Moreover, the oddly convivial tone of the text—“Dinner Table For Berth Heiny and guest”—coming from impersonal spam mail is undoubtedly funny. Like stolen wifi, just out of range, Heinly’s piece almost ushers us into a web of associations, but fails to provide reliable connectivity.

Beth Heinly’s mail, “Mail from the Internet”

Another Heinly piece in the show is more made, but less ambitious in staking out new territory for art. “Fake Ray Bans” is a pair of light-colored Ray Ban style sunglasses that she painted black then painted the brand logo onto. The hand-done painting fools at 10 feet, but is crude enough to give away the process upon closer inspection. Like “Mail from the Internet,” “Fake Ray Bans” starts to suggest an interpretation: the now opaque painted-over lenses, aiming for “authenticity,” turn the cheap useable sunglasses into the functionless image of “real” ones. Striving for the authentic is truly a road to blindness, or something like that.

Beth Heinly’s “Fake Ray Bans”

Ultimately, it is the choice of sunglasses, rather than the artist’s modifications, that carry the most visual impact. The Ray Ban style, made famous by 1960s American bohemians, but since turned into a global brand capitalizing on its former patronage, is, as its advertisements claim, iconic. Reading Heinly’s piece: (your)-cool-glasses-are-art-duh, rather than as a rehashed critique of authenticity, “Fake Ray Bans” comes off, somewhat for better, as flippant instead of stale.

Collective co-founder Martha Savery’s equally un-makerly piece “Laundry Configuration #4013, Things we won’t be wearing this summer” is more interesting, but feels unresolved. Savery took winter accoutrements and folded those clothes into basic piles at the back of the gallery.

Savery’s “Laundry Configuration #4013, Things we won’t be wearing this summer”

The idea of turning a quotidian experience or item into art through a change in location is a good one, but carries more impact when the relocated thing bears a stronger relationship to the place it is moved to or from. The laundry stacks, while pleasingly un-arty, do not go much further than that. Moreover, the improbable numeration “4013” adds a touch of art-object-fetish, the overall absence of which is the best part of Savery’s piece.

While the new, if still rough, takes on appropriation art in the work of Heinly and Savery as well as the deft narrative gestures of Rogers and Panell stood out to me in particular, there is lots of other art in Forecast. Work by new collective members Maria Dumlao and Kelani Nichole and continuing collective members Kristen Taylor, Alex Gartelmann, Sam Belkowitz, Masha Badinter, and Tyler Kline make Forecast, while a little mixed, well worth a visit. The show is open Saturday afternoons through July 10th.

The medium is mostly 3-D and colorful. The more sculptural and the more colorful the work, the better it looks in the glass cases. The thing about fiber is it’s very populist in its appeal–just the ticket for this sort of public space.

The choices–curated by Kathryn Pannepacker, whose devotion to area fiber artists must deserve some kind of an award–are varied, and at times edgy, at other times traditional, unfettered by any narrow philosophy of what fiber art is. Pannepacker selected a couple of with fibers made of glass, by Martha Savery-Kahn (of Little Berlin). The green book wrapped with glass is scrumptuous at the same time that it suggests the fragility of words, paper, and the ecosystem. The hand-made-paper dresses of Lesley Haas look spectacular in the cases, also suggesting fragility–this time of our past and fashion and our bodies–not to mention offering the pleasure of adornment and the ways that clothing redefines body shape.

Francine Strauss, Looped, crochet yarn of mixed fibers

Also in the clothing category, a crazy crocheted boa or neck warmer by Francine Strauss seems like a dare–as in would you dare to wear this thing, with its mix of crazy shapes and colors and drape! At the other extreme, the exhibit includes weavings that include a traditional Ukrainian skirt and sash by Vera Nakonechny–totally wearable–and Patricia Doran’s Wild Fire hanging, that was lovely for its colors and textures and references to the natural world.

The exhibit includes several wonderful basketry pieces. Duane Weber’s geometric Sphinx is a shield shape that’s an odd mix of peculiarity, fierce control and geometry that set me wondering what he was up to.  Jane J. Wilkie’s basket of fabric and grape vines won me over with its colors, textures and sheer exuberance.

Patty Greenspoon, Along for the Ride, mixed media fiber

Patty Greenspoon‘s poetic Along for the Ride is a doll toting smaller dolls on her shoulders and portraits on the front and back–that’s five figures in one small object that was surely under 9 inches tall! She becomes a Venus of Willendorf carrying all of womankind on her strong shoulders! The doll includes a variety of traditional needlework techniques, from applique to embroidery. Another doll-like piece by Diana Koss is totemic, a sort of tree of life, the figure’s antlers housing a bird’s nest. and Gretchen Slentz’ Beaded cat (and also her Beaded Bra) are exotic, their encrustations suggesting Eastern tastes, from belly dancers to Persian rugs to Russian ethnic garb.

Bette Uscott-Woolsey, Sound Effects, embroidery/dye

Following a system of rules, a la James Siena’s drawings, Bette Uscott-Woolsey created Sound Effects, an intense, small square of markings with threads. The pattern is quilt-like, but the tight structure implies a weight and density that is a nice surprise.

Shelby Donnelly, Document, silk, ink, thread

Uscott-Woolsey’s square is one of several flat pieces that stand up well in the cases. So does June Blumberg’s Yellow Lion & Flower Monkey, really a painting except that it’s made of collage fabric as well as paint. The expressions on the lion’s and monkey’s faces in what looks like a domestic space charmed me. Shelby Donnelly’s notebook page, Document, of pink silk, the page lines and margin line executed as reckless quilting stitches, has three-ring binder holes bordered by what looks like a buttonhole stitch. I was surprised by the choice of pink silk, but the execution was delightful.

Jane J. Wilkie, Bowl in Raspberry Lime, fabric, grape vines

It has been quite a while since the cases received a makeover, with sheetrock backing instead of the old aluminum-slat hanging system, but that transformation from mobile-home aesthetics into something closer to white-box gallery aesthetics has generally not been enough to boost the ugliest vitrines on earth into something art friendly.

So, it must be the art!!!

The show includes 50 artists. The rest of them are: 

Wendolyn Anderson, Virginia Batson, Linda Celestian, Karen Donde, Stephanie Dorfman, Marie Elcin, Elizabeth W. Fram, Adrienne Gale, Alyson Giantisco,  Melissa Maddonni Haim, Ted Hallman, Nancy Herman, Sara Horne, Toni Kersey, Pat diPaula Klein, Maris Fisher Krasnegor, Marilyn E. Lavins, Betty Leacraft, Susan Leonard, Craig Matthews, Emily McBride, Bette McCarron, Leslie Meeks, Nancy Middlebrook, Valetta, Pam Pawl, Christopher Ray, Sheila Ruen, Ellen Sall, Sophie Sanders, Lee Harper Schultz, Kathy Selbst, Marci Smoger, Pete Stevens, Jacqueline Unanue, Helen Webber, and Kiersten Wildermuth.

Kathryn Pannepacker on the windiest day of the year on North Broad

Pannepacker has been one of the driving forces behind the fiber extravaganzas that have been happening in Philadelphia for the past few years. She recently created a new Wall of Rugs, the second version of this idea, on North Broad Street, for the Mural Arts Program. Roberta and I, visiting her as she worked on one of the windiest day of the winter, were struck by how she made the people who stopped by and chatted with her a part of the project. Pannepacker asked about their native lands, researched the rug patterns from those lands, and then followed up on the random conversations by adding those patterns to the wall. She simultaneously had a weaving project right out there on Broad Street, creating a rug from plastic bags! She definitely has her pulse on the people of Philadelphia!

Sound sculptures at Little Berlin

The audio sculptures by McDermott and Murray are charming mash ups of found objects, motors and iPods that play sounds. One of the four pieces wasn’t working but the other three tinkled and jangled and one, with boots, which was interactive, sounded like a fog horn. The spinning, found-object piece evokes memories of the boardwalk, wind chimes and merry go rounds.  The piece with the boots — which you pull down to activate — visualized putting your feet to the fire (or, here, to what looks like a can of worms).  

A wall of found and manipulated objects, priced from low to “priceless”

nuts and berries: objects and not bills itself as a “visual agreement between daniel petraitis and martha savery” and each would-be capital letter was printed lower case as it is reproduced here. I can only assume the use of lower case implies that the artists (or the space) are extremely modest about their craft and its place in society. I think an adept parallel would be when a band chooses to play on the floor, becoming a part of the audience, rather then performing on an elevated stage. If anyone has ever produced or come across an in-depth study of the use of lower cases in text, especially when the capital “I” is replaced with the lower case “i” I would be happy to hear a discussion of it.

One of the objects on display at Little Berlin.

The “visual agreement” between the two artists in question is in actuality a nice way of saying a two-person show with a few collaborative pieces. However, I think the use of the term is especially apt in nuts and berries as the works of Daniel and Martha compliment each other in a seamless way. It would be possible to imagine the exhibition as a one-person show. As the title of the exhibition implies, the artists have gathered objects natural to their urban environment. The phrase “nuts and berries” becomes a metaphor for discarded objects; telephone books, pieces of pallets, old furniture, plastic trash and anything else that one might find abandoned to the sidewalks of the city. After gathering the “fruits” of the metropolis each artist transforms the trash into an arresting visual object or installation. In one collaborative work, the transformation is as simple as hanging the objects on a wall, numbering them, and giving them each a sale price.

A man sits on a piece of telephone pole beside Martha Savery’s stack of yellow pages.

Daniel Petraitis’ stack of pallets.

For me, the “tour de force” of the show was in a slightly separated room housing a mountain of artfully stacked telephone books (by Martha Savery) and pieces of old pallets (by Daniel Petraitis). The pallet ends had been painted bright colors by Mr. Petraitis in a move that immediately called to mind Jessica Stockholder, branded onto the ends of each wooden slat, however, were the initials “dp”. The branding mirrors the industrial process, pulling this stack of wood into a highly Duchampian context, while turning each piece in the stack into a highly individualized artwork produced in multiple.

nuts and berries: objects and not , was a treat to visit, it’s simple modesty and use of recycled materials was a breath of fresh air in today’s decadent climate.