What is the role of an artist when their old neighborhood is gentrified by art galleries and the neighborhood doesn’t want them there? This highly topical question, and others, are examined by Guadalupe Rosales in her splendid “Legends Never Die: A Collective Memory,” at Canter Fitzgerald Gallery, Haverford College. Gonzalez, who grew up in the Boyle Heights, Los Angeles neighborhood, focuses primarily on documenting her Latinx community at the time she was growing up there. And the exhibit captures that archival material in a gallery awash in moody purple light. Outside the gallery space is a riveting 10-minute video exploring the artist’s own anguish about the current Boyle Heights conflict between gentrifying art galleries and neighborhood activists who are pushing back. The video captures perfectly the internal conflict an artist might have when her neighborhood is changing and she is caught in the middle and longs for a way forward.
Read MoreSarah Kim visits the exhibit at the William Way Center and views art whose materials defiantly separate it from traditional mainstream art. Altars made with found materials; altered photo-portraiture; drawing installations and collage, made by six artists, the art is metaphorical and symbolic of the state of being in flux, in transition. Kim’s powerful writing leads you through the exhibit, adding insightful commentary and insights. After considering this show about fluid states of identity, Kim concludes that ultimately, selfhood is the experience itself, and art, which is based in objecthood, can point the way.
Read More“Cornucopia / Urn” is a show at Spillway Gallery that features work by Nora Chellew and Suldano Abdiruhman. Samuel writes about the interplay between these two artists and how they create a dream-like space that evokes the fragmentation of memory and the nostalgic feelings we have towards the past. He also reached out to the show’s Curator, Babs Weiss, to learn more about the thought-process behind the exhibition’s conception. The show closes on February 9th, so make your way on over!
Read MoreGuest contributor Mina Zarfsaz describes the power of “Letter to the Public,” an interactive installation currently on view at Icebox Project Space through January 26th.
Read MoreMichael Lieberman checks out the newest show on view at High 5 Gallery, a relative newcomer to Philadelphia’s always-vibrant gallery scene. The exhibit “Untethered” is tied together by its warm coloration and overarching sense of whimsy. Michael says the work is a steal at its current price, so if you’re a collector on a budget, swing by before the show closes on January 31!
Read MoreLogan Cryer visits “Quality of Life,” Jennifer Packer’s current show at Sikkema Jenkins in Chelsea. Packer, who Artblog founders Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof first met as a student in their senior painting class at Tyler School of Art, composes lush, figurative paintings from an economy of strokes and suggestive erasures. Her show closes January 19, so check it out for yourself while you still can!
Read MoreThe swirling and vigorous ink drawing on the gallery walls by Atlanta artist William Downs is embellished by long strands of Christmas tinsel that swish and sway when humans move near (or away from) it. The remarkable drawing’s life in the gallery lasts only through Jan. 27. Deborah Krieger spoke to the artist at the opening. Read her pithy and elegant review and get to the gallery quick before the mural disappears.
Read MoreBecky Suss’s new paintings on view at Fleisher/Ollman honor the legacy of mid-century craftsman Wharton Esherick, whose home studio is in Chester County. Suss chronicles the spaces Esherick designed and occupied as well as the furniture he is known for, translated through her own vision of the spaces, places and objects. Architect and Artblog contributor Mandy Palasik interprets the show and examines the resonance between these two artists and their bodies of work. “Becky Suss/Wharton Esherick” is open through January 26, so make your plans to visit now!
Read MoreTina Plokarz takes a trip down to WIlmington to view Aaron Eliah Terry’s current exhibit at The Delaware Contemporary. Terry, who is a current member of Vox Populi, (as is Tina), makes collages, prints and sound installations that explore the relationship between music, visual culture and political activism from the 1960s and 70s until today. Get down to The Delaware quick before “Syncopated Samizdat” closes on January 10.
Read MoreSaba Taj’s current solo show at Twelve Gates Arts deftly combines humor, beauty and violence in speculative collage work that explores earth’s social and biological future from a queer, brown perspective. Deborah Krieger takes in the Durham-based multidisciplinary artist’s subversive “of beast/ of virgin” and reports.
Read MoreTaDa! Just for you, our annual curated list of notable people, groups, books, and other art world stuff from the outgoing year: The 2018 Liberta Awards!
Read MoreLike many local artists, Janyce Glasper treks up to New York every now and again to see what’s new. Here she fills us in on the latest from Nina Chanel Abney, who has just started translating the aesthetic of her politically-charged collage paintings into monoprints. If your plans take you to the big(ger) city, you can view Abney’s powerful, ambiguous work for yourself at Pace Prints through December 15, 2018.
Read MoreFor over a decade, Massachusetts-based artist, Gina Siepel has been using woodworking and other craft techniques to grapple with the myth of self-reliance and its relationship to both gender and nationalism. Here Levi Bentley speaks with Siepel about “Self-Made,” her current installation of objects, video and documents at Vox Populi, and pens a thoughtful response to the exhibition’s central themes. We can’t recommend this show enough, so read on and catch it before it closes on December 16, 2018.
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