For the month of December Sean Martorana will have brand new ink drawings on display at Cafe Estelle. Above is a film of Sean painting the windows for the opening reception this Friday 6:00 – 9:00.

Bluestone is a fairly new art gallery.  We are located in Old City on the corner of 3rd and Vine.  As you would expect we are trying to grow our business.  Please feel free to contact me or stop in.  We have a web pg, blog and are on FB and Twitter.  I’m looking forward to getting to meet some of you!  Best, Pam Regan  Gallerist

Lauren Rinaldi will be showing work in two shows that open this Friday December 2:

Drink Philly’s First Friday event -

Drink Philly is supporting local artistic talent, local beverages and local restaurants for First Friday! Come enjoy food and beer tastings and check out some great local art and music.

This month, Cavanaugh’s Rittenhouse is bringing mac n’ cheese, cheesesteak spring rolls, and Cav’s pulled chicken sliders, and they’ll be pairing it with Victory Brewing Company’s Headwaters Pale Ale and Prima Pils beer.

ABSOLUTELY NO COVER CHARGE. (Valid ID is required, only 21+ will be admitted.)

The event goes from 5-9 PM and you may come and go as you please.  RSVP here

The address is:
239 Chestnut Street (3rd & Chestnut)
Second Floor, Unit B
Philadelphia, PA 19106

And Highwire Gallery’s annual show “Art For The Urban Collector”

Opening reception Friday, 6-9PM

2040 Frankford Ave

Philadelphia, PA 19125

In 1978 or ‘79, an art student named Robert Leitch was driving around on trash day near Juniper and South Streets, a historically African-American neighborhood, when a pile of objects out on the curb caught his eye.  You can see where this is going.  Leitch salvaged what he could, and the resulting collection includes 1200 small sculptures attributed to an unknown artist known only as Philadelphia Wireman.  Leitch sold the collection to the Janet Fleisher Gallery, now Fleisher-Ollman Gallery, and he, too, remained anonymous until his death to avoid conspiracy theories of himself as the artist.

The only thing known for certain about the Wireman is what can be gleaned from his work, but he does not seem to be a very warm and fuzzy kind of dude.  I say “dude” because the general consensus is that many of these wire sculptures lack marks from the use of tools and therefore were likely bent, wrapped, and twisted by a hand strong enough to manipulate the various gauges of wire into such tight coils and tangles.  The bits of broken pieces of plastic, paper, and metal trapped inside these intricate wire cages evoke feelings of captivity; pointed ends and sharp edges suggest weaponry; and the overall aesthetic of the broken up, rusted out, disintegrated, and discarded being transformed into art certainly did not conform to what the gallery world viewed as Art with a capital A in the late ‘70’s.  Yet, a few of the sculptures bore such a striking resemblance to the human heart, I couldn’t help but notice a more tender side of them: a delicately crumpled plastic wrapper barely contained, a piece of red thread clinging loosely, a few tiny beads emerging from the chaos.

Things That Do shows the Wireman’s work alongside power objects of other unidentifiable artists from West Africa along with the “healing machines” of Emery Blagdon. The most striking of the West African sculptures depict bondage more literally than the Wireman does, and all three collections contain objects that are thought to resonate with the power of their forms, often utilizing concentric circles and other shapes that illicit a sense of radiating energy, transforming the sum of their parts into something much more sacred indeed.

Things That Do is showing at the Fleisher-Ollman Gallery (1616 Walnut Street, Suite 100) through December 10, 2011.  For the story behind another fascinating anonymous Philadelphia artist, check out Resurrect Dead, the recent documentary about solving the puzzle of the Toynbee Tiles.

Written and photographed by Carina Giamerese: Contributing Writer, Side Arts.

Get wire sculpture supplies at Blick Art Materials.

Side Arts has partnered with the Corzo Center for the Creative Economy at UArts (http://corzocenter.uarts.edu) and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) (http://pafa.edu) to offer students and alumni discounts to Side Arts premium services for visual and craft artists.

Side Arts is a subscription-based service that offers visual and craft artists DIY online tools to manage the business side of selling art and crafts.  Now with the pilot program launched at the Corzo Center at UArts and PAFA, students and alumni can get a jump start on their creative careers.

(Hey, other art schools and programs, you are welcome to try Side Arts out, too, email us at philly@sidearts.com, we can help you connect with your students and alumni!)

For details on the discounts, current students and alumni are encouraged to contact the Corzo Center at corzocenter@uarts.edu and PAFA Career Services at gmartino@pafa.edu.

Me at the workshop.

At least once a year, usually in the fall, I schedule a five day workshop with artist Tim Hawkesworth assisted by artist Lala Zeitlyn at the Norristown Arts Bldg.in Norristown, PA. The NAB was a beautiful old textile factory converted into studios, two gallery spaces (first floor Pagus Gallery and the lower level Project Space) and a workshop on the second floor.

My first workshop five years ago with Tim turned out to be totally different than I had expected. It was not another class in technique or color theory but a training course in accessing a deeper source of intuitive knowledge about making a painting, from marks and paint to subject matter. Though Tim acknowledges the place of academic training and will help you with technical matters if you wish, he would “rather teach a practice of in-built finding”. He firmly believes in being attuned to “the body’s response”. “Pay attention to the energy shifts, to the glimpses, be open to those nuggets of seeing”, he says.  Noting your body’s response to your mark-making is the best way to gauge whether your painting is good technically as well as being true to your deeper experience.  If the mark-making produces a sense of “uplift” then it’s right; if it produces no excitement or boredom or repetition then it’s not.

The practice calls for focus, receptivity and Self-awareness. Lala calls this “being honest”. As a result, these workshops can be very intense, equal parts euphoria and aching muscles.  I use these workshops strategically to help maintain my own studio practice, scheduling one after a series of shows when energy is drained or around a holiday period when I know it will be difficult to get into the studio.

Each day of the workshop starts with a lecture on how to access the source of your art and “create not just another picture but a meeting”. Tim makes his points with well-chosen readings including powerful poetry, artists’ writings, and the teachings of Eastern and Western contemplatives, all lightened by a self-deprecating sense of humor. There is discussion afterwards, often led by Lala who comments and emphasizes particular points.

As you work, Tim places art books on your table with paintings by artists that resonate with what you are doing. “The best teaching is looking at the paintings you love and reading what artists wrote,” Tim says. “Look at the paintings and see how the artists made the brushstrokes, how their hand moved”. You learn from those who came before, adding your own voice to the art historical continuum.

Towards the end of the week you can move your body of work to his large studio or one of the galleries and you look at it together and learn from it. Tim tailors his teaching to where you are in your artistic journey; you see people with a variety of experience at the workshop, from those without any art training to artists with gallery representation.

It amazes me that after all the years that I have been attending the workshop, Tim is still so enthusiastic and his lectures still so fresh. I asked Tim and Lala what they derive from running the workshops. According to Tim, in the workshops “you just don’t know what’s going to happen; it’s mind-blowing what happens…fresh, exciting stuff”. Furthermore he says, “It helps me with my own centering seeing others get centered”.  Lala puts it this way, “we are lifted as others are lifted”.

Interested in taking a class? See http://drawingworkshops.com/

The Norristown Arts Bldg. workshop space.

The workshop has a central platform which accommodates 2 models. It is surrounded by mini-studios which afford each person extensive wall space, some privacy, and a good view of the models.  The space is also bedecked with natural and man-made objects for study and drawing. The workshop is also served by an extensive art library for pictorial reference. They also serve a great lunch!

EventsFilter is Philadelphia’s newest and most comprehensive site for gallery listings and visual art events. Side Arts artists have a special invitation to make their own Profiles which are free and easy to make. Your Profile will be linked to every event you participate in, linked to Side Arts and other groups you belong to, and will serve as a ‘dynamic resume’ (linking to past events).

Some of you already have Profiles and are in the Side Arts group, for the rest of you simply go to http://eventsfilter.com/, browse around to get a feel for it (it takes some getting used to), then select the ‘Create Profile’ button in the upper right. Five minutes of your time for a lifetime of free publicity.