Hey Greenpointers! How’s everyone’s New Year’s Resolutions going? Excited for the Super Bowl?
If you’re anything like me, you don’t really have any resolutions (just trying to live my best life) and you absolutely despise the Patriots (Tom Brady is a cheater and a T-supporter), so all the more reason to check out some art this weekend!
On Friday, the Greenpoint Gallery is hosting its first open call group exhibition of 2018. Also Friday (and through the weekend), check out the politically-overt exhibition at SHIM/ArtHelix. And come Monday evening, we have two very interesting literature events: Geoff Cobb reading from his book Sugar King and the all-women publishing collective Mag Mob discussing the future of independent publishing.
You see, there’s a reason why you live in the center of the universe, even if it costs you 60% of your income to rent an apartment here!
For “Home”, Westergren combines recent works and two-site specific installations. Recalling a house in the country, the works use elements of elite traditional decor like Murano glass, wallpaper and hunting trophies to explore interior distress amid outer luxury. “Gut Renovation” combines trompe l’oeil and papier-mâché animal heads that glare back at the viewer to create a menacing domestic space. “Carolyn Glasoe Bailey June 25, 1969- November 16, 2015,” titled in memory of a friend, is a taut juxtaposition of images of Scandinavian domestic life with motifs of emptiness and loss. The final piece, “Gardening,” gathers natural forms and vintage glass pieces into a sculpture that invites viewing from multiple angles. Its structure of twisted brass pipe recalls rusted and rotting infrastructure even as its lights rise to transcendence.
Ok, y’all… how we doing with those New Year’s resolutions? It’s been about three weeks, you still with me? Because I know one of those resolutions was to “see more art” or “soak up the culture” or “take full advantage of this great city,” something like that?
Ya basic.
“Don’t be silly, Andy,” you say. “I love art, I see art all the time!”
I double-dog dare you to hit two of these six galleries this weekend.
Microscope is very pleased to present Break The Sky, the first solo exhibition at the gallery by Jeanne Liotta, whose works we have previously shown in “Triple Blind” (2013), “Slide Slide Slide” (2014), and “Dreamlands: Expanded” (2016-17), a series of expanded cinema events presented in collaboration with the Whitney Museum of American Art as part of the exhibition “Dreamlands: Immersive Cinema & Art 1905-2016”.
A recurring theme of Liotta’s practice – which spans the mediums of moving image, photography, collage, installation, painting, drawing and performance – is a personal and poetic interest in the intersection of art and science and the tools and technology thereof.
Wow, has it been cold or what?! I mean, like, we went straight past Netflix-binge-cold to I-hope-the-delivery-man-doesn’t-freeze-to-death-cold. (Also, I know y’all tip heavy so I won’t even get into that.)
This first week of 2018 hasn’t exactly been very welcoming, what with that bomb cyclone. Trendy storm names, though, so that’s cool!
But we’re past that now, y’all. We made it to the other side. It’s gonna be near 60 degress on Friday! Time to get out there and support your local artist community.
We have a ton of openings happening this week and this weekend, starting tonight, so bundle up and get amongst it!
Opening January 8th and on view through February 3rd, this collaboration between Precious Okoyomon and Hannah Black presents a process of digestion, shitting out, decaying and rebirthing, seeking human-like if not reliably human assistance through playful figuration: teddies, dolls, and creatures both cooked and raw.
I Need Help comprises a disintegrating iteration of Black’s recent solo show at the Chisenhale Gallery in London, Some Context, with works by Okoyomon made in response.
Safe Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of sculptures and drawings by John Newman from the last 35 years. The seed of the exhibition is Newman’s completion of 65 drawings, for his 65 years, while in France in the summer of 2017. Newman thinks of, and titled, these drawings as Developing Old Negatives: Bringing extant images to life again. Some are drawings of existing sculptures from Newman’s 40-year career, some are speculative spaces, and others are ideas for future sculptures. Installed in the gallery’s front room, these drawings provide a roadmap to Newman’s ideas about space, structure and form.
Of course, many local artists will be participating and exhibiting. Be sure to catch these Brooklyn-based artists at The Other Art Fair!
Andrea Packard (b. 1984), a fine artist who specializes in portraits and figurative oil paintings from life, was born and raised in Excelsior, Minnesota. She received a BA in Studio Art and Psychology from Connecticut College and additional instruction from The Art Students League of New York, Chelsea Classical Studio and Academia Taure (Barcelona, Spain). She has lived and worked in Chicago and Barcelona and currently resides in Brooklyn, NY.
ART OPENING: Toxic Gardens
Featuring works by Caroline Larsen, Christian Little, Jack Henry, Sarah Weber, Sarah Zapata
at Greenpoint Terminal Gallery
67 West St., Suite 320
Opening reception: Friday, July 21 (7pm-10pm)
July 21st – Aug. 25th
Curated by Brian Willmont & Alison Sirico
Greenpoint Terminal Gallery is pleased to present a group show evocative of the season, including work from five artists – Caroline Larsen, Christian Little, Jack Henry, Sarah Weber and Sarah Zapata. Entitled Toxic Gardens, the exhibition embodies traits of a secret garden—a space that is secluded, paradisiacal, entangled in foliage—abundant in layers and depth. The artists in the show are united by an interest to intermix materials and subjects not traditionally tied. Continue reading →
With this week’s new moon, our celestial vibe is one of renewal, rebirth, and restoration. This Taurus new moon tells us to live in the now, be grateful for what you have, enjoy the healing energy of nature, and celebrate your artistic endeavors!
There’s sooooo much going on in Greenpoint this weekend, really. But here’s just a few suggestions to get you started.
Spring has sprung, y’all! Get outside, celebrate your gifts, make and create!
April Open Studios
Saturday 4/29 and Sunday 4/30, 1PM-6PM
Various locations, featuring: Stephen Eakin, Roberto Jamora, Alison Kudlow, Dain Mergenthaler, and Rosalind Tallmadge
Featuring… AUXILIARY PROJECTS, CALICO, GALLERY AWA, GREENPOINT HILL, GREENPOINT TERMINAL GALLERY, THE GREENPOINT GALLERY, THE JAVA PROJECT, THE OVERHANG, OWEN JAMES GALLERY, YASHAR GALLERY
Perhaps only art speaks truer to the soul than the spring. So, here’s a few things to hit this weekend, ya know, between drinks at bars with sidewalk seating.
As a feature of The Lumiere Series, Gallery AWA presents an exhibition of the sculpture of Susan Pullman Brooks, Sacred Luminosity: Goddesses of the Vedic and Celtic Pantheons.
Sacred Luminosity seeks to examine the divine feminine energy that was once an integral part of ancient belief systems, and to reassess and re-imagine this energy in the modern day.
Showcasing a variety of multi-genre experimental and interactive prose and poetry across mediums, this exhibition is hosted and curated by Lana C. Marilyn.
The Lit Exhibit is a project that launched in July 2016. The show returns in Spring 2017, this time at New Women Space, for its second iteration. The gallery will feature several contemporary emerging writers and artists.
For The Lit Exhibit: Spectrums, participants have been asked to reflect on the subject of “fluidity” as it applies to daily life, and to produce work that illuminates this theme.
Check out 80-minutes of musical shorts “both ecstatic and sublime,” including vintage jazz, pop, country and gospel performances, Soudies and television and film performances ranging from the late 1920s to the early 21st century. This program is curated by Brooklyn-based film/video archivist Russell Scholl, known best for producing a compact disc by noted American folk artist Howard Finster, “The Night Howard Finster Got Saved.”
Throat Chakra features three artists who engage in concrete wizardry, re-forming elemental material into transformative objects. Insistently abstract, these art objects are interventionist – protruding, bulging. They take up space.
Syria…as my mother speaks, Christine Gedeon, site-specific installation at Textil Museum, Bocholt, Germany, 2014. Photo by: Robert Vogel
I was first introduced to multi-media artist Christine Gedeon through her site-specific installation at the new Greenpoint events space Dobbin St. and soon learned her wealth of work includes complex sound installations referencing her Syrian heritage and family, stitched cartography, and celebrity “blueprint drawings.”
We recently discussed her process and approach when working in these various mediums, specifically her relationship to Syria and her family there during this now 5-year civil war. We also talk about Greenpoint, naturally, and how it reminds Gedeon of mid-90s Prague.
Greenpointers: What is you favorite thing about Greenpoint?
Christine Gedeon: What I love, especially about Greenpoint are the low buildings, the light, and the mix of cultures. The Polish community that was of course more present in the 90s and earlier, also for me had it’s charm, as I was living in Prague in 1996-97 and felt immediately comfortable in Greenpoint. If there had been a better connection to public transportation, I probably would’ve stayed there, but then again, so would many others, and that would’ve made it lose it’s character…
Christine Gedeon
You were born in Aleppo, Syria, and raised in New Jersey… Can you tell us about the inception and process to create your work Syria..as my mother speaks… The 5-year civil war there is just devastating… can you give us some insight to the country and culture and how that fits into your work and everyday identity?
Yes, well, seeing what was happening as the war started, and how affected I was by it, I felt compelled to do a piece that had a more personal story, than what one was just hearing on the news… We left Aleppo in the 1970s when I was three years old, and moved to the U.S, for no other reason than my parents getting divorced, and there were more opportunities [in the U.S.] for my newly divorced mother. It was quite easy to move to the U.S. as Jimmy Carter was president, and my uncle sponsored us, so we obtained our green card right away, and became citizens some years later.
