Our features add context, depth and breadth to our reviews and make our community more connected to each other and to the art world.
We go to International Art Fairs and Biennials and cover important gallery and museum shows outside Philadelphia. We provide a platform for opinions in our Reader Advisor and essay features. We report on studio visits and public lectures by visiting artists. Our podcasts humanize art by introducing the voice of the artist. In 2014 we began commissioning original works by amazing Philadelphia comics artists. We are proud to support these artists! And we love providing a platform for their smart humor.
Every day, Artblog celebrates the DIY spirit of Philadelphia’s independently run art galleries and collectives. Today we’re excited to share an interview about that same spirit in our city’s poetry scene. Contributor Levi Bentley interviews fellow poet and local curator of the reading series, “Frank O’Hara’s Last Lover,” Jason Mitchell. This near-monthly reading series, named for the celebrated mid-century New York poet and art critic, who died in a tragic accident at age 40 in 1966, is all about bringing poets into direct contact and conversation with each-other. Read on, poetry lovers, artists and art lovers! P.S. We believe that poetry and art are siblings. They use different tools, but they both speak in metaphors and create “safe” spaces to explore complex and often controversial life issues. We love them both.
Read More“Hale County This Morning, This Evening” is an emotion-charged, poetically non-narrative exploration of stereotypes of African American males in the South. The film, a Sundance favorite with many accolades, is a contemporary look at Hale County, Alabama, chronicled by Walker Evans and James Agee in their book, “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men,” (1941), which in turn inspired Aaron Copeland to write an opera. The film screens, FREE, on Monday, Nov. 12, 2018, at 6:30 PM at the Annenberg Center on the University of Pennsylvania Campus. Registration is at Eventbrite, link in the post.
Read MoreBaltimore-based photographer and writer, Chuck Patch, attends the media preview of the John Waters exhibit and catches the wit, wisdom and lively gestures of the local phenom and beloved Baltimorean, now getting his art world treatment as an artist, yes, didn’t know that? Us either. And, of course, groundbreaking movie maker of Pink Flamingoes, Hairspray and other great, funny and raunchy movies.
Read MoreOlivia Jia spent time in China earlier this year, visiting with family and touring some of the country’s major archaeological sites and cultural museums. In this, her travelogue from Shanghai and Xi’an, past, present and future collide.
Read MoreIn answer to a question about impartiality or objectivity in critical writing, Ask Artblog’s Advisor, Beth Heinly, talks about the value of criticism, and the human need to communicate and how it’s probably not possible to be objective. There is good criticism and bad. And she shouts out several of the critics she admire and explains why. She also attacks ego-fueled criticism, explaining that the critic whose ego gets in the way of telling the story is doing a disservice to art and artists. Have a question about the Art Life for Ask Artblog? Email ask@theartblog.org. Or submit a Google form with your question at the link at the bottom of the post below. All names kept anonymous.
Read MoreIn this November 6, 2016 “From the Vault” post, 2016 Art Writing Challenge finalist, Justin O. Walker, takes a somewhat sardonic stroll through the then-newly-constructed Mormon Temple at 18th and Vine. Writers! Apply to the 2018 Art Writing Contest, OPEN NOW! Did you know that some of our most creative entries in the contest have been about local architectural landmarks? Read on and submit your unpublished writing about a space or place in your community before the October 31st deadline!
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We are very pleased to announce a new comic on Artblog, Toxic Toons, by Matt Kalasky! Matt’s first Toxic Toon appears this Wednesday, stay tooned…
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