Morgan Mangiaruga’s surreal mixed media sculpture installation at Gallery ML’s exhibit, “The Lunatic and the Lover,” immediately caught my eye when I walked into the gallery.  Granted, it was hard not to notice the two human-like sculptures with real taxidermied deer heads.  The initial shock that I felt when I first saw these interesting creatures was really entertaining.  I always like a good surprise.  Since Gallery ML has been completely dedicated to showcasing body art up until this current show, I felt that Morgan’s work served as a great introduction for the direction that Gallery ML wants to go in once it moves into a larger gallery space in April and starts curating exhibits that feature body art and local art of all mediums.

Meeting the artist behind this unique installation was equally surprising for me.  Morgan Mangiaruga is a petite young woman with a bubbly and friendly personality.  I had a hard time trying to imagine her buying cumbersome taxidermied deer heads at her town’s local farmer’s markets and spending countless hours adapting them for her installation.  This interesting dichotomy made a lot more sense once I got to know her a little bit better.  Her artwork is very socially oriented and she is very passionate about the message that she hopes to convey.

Morgan gravitates towards using animals in her work, because she feels it is representational of humanity’s primal instincts.  She also enjoys working with taxidermied animals, because she likes the challenge of bringing emotion and life to something that is so static and literally dead.  I also really respect her notion that she would rather see a taxidermied deer head in a piece of artwork than to see it be a trophy on someone’s wall.  Overall, her work is meant to remind us to not loose the purity of ourselves and conform to something that we’re not.

“A lot of my work deals with social problems or things that I see happen to my friends, family, strangers, or myself. I use animals, because of our primal instinct and our honesty with animals. With this work, it’s about the social behaviors that start to infect us.  These sculptures represent the behavioral infections that we don’t always notice is happening until it’s too late and we start to loose our own selves and the purity of ourselves.  That’s why my one sculpture is running, while the other sculpture is sitting and has accepted it.  We often allow both of these scenarios to happen without realizing it.”

Morgan’s artistic message, free spirit, and desire to be true to herself is uplifting.  She is definitely very wise for her age and I look forward to seeing the progression of her work and artistic career.

For more information about Gallery ML, please read my article entitled, Gallery ML’s “The Lunatic and the Lover” Exhibit.

Written and photographed by Cassandra Hoo: Contributing Writer, SideArts 

Jason Blake’s moody, edgy, playful, and stylized portrait color photography at Gallery ML’s “The Lunatic and the Lover ”exhibit really made my eyes happy.  My pupils danced back and forth as I looked at each photograph and tried to peel back the layers of shadows and light, muted and vibrant color combinations, and scratched, texturized, and blurred image manipulations.  The intermingling of all of these contrasting variables creates a poetic, whimsical, and mysterious backdrop to each portrait’s main focal point, the face.  In all of Jason’s photographs, the face is either dramatically in focus, blurred, in silhouette, or stylized in such a way that it stands out and gives a detailed backstory and narrative.  I felt like each photograph could be the cover of a book; I wanted to open each one up read what was inside.

When I interviewed Jason Blake after the opening reception for “The Lunatic and the Lover ” I learned that my desire to want to “read” each of his photographs wasn’t completely off base.  Jason explained to me that he reads and writes a lot of fiction and was heavily influenced by existential philosophy and Kafka’s abstract short stories while he was honing his craft at the University of the Arts.

“I was fascinated by how, within a few small paragraphs, Kafka was able to expertly craft a narrative that could fill pages of content and story in a person’s head.   For my work in general, I envision and try to capture images that contain a strong narrative that lets the viewer explore a concept in which I hint at. The viewer is free to explore the beginning, middle, and end of each characters’ history and the meaning behind their existence. Hopefully, the viewer can then relate to the subjects in a more personal way and get something out of the experience.”

“The notion of physical and spiritual transcendence is another theme that drives my work.  I like the idea that one can achieve a state of being where they can metaphysically leave their body.  In the same moment, I like to think about what happens or becomes of the body that is being left behind.   I try to capture some of these moments. In the same vein, I’m fascinated with imagery that is blurred, shows movement, or is out of focus.”

The photographs chosen for “The Lunatic and the Lover ” exhibit came from a variety of projects that Jason created over the course of the last two to three years.  The progression of his work, from oldest to newest, literally goes from dark to light (the two online photo galleries on Jason’s website are aptly titled, “Dark” and “Light”).  His older work tends to be more sinister and dramatic, while his newer work is much more vibrant and commercial (with an indie and vintage fashion photography feel).  While I’m impressed with both his “Dark” and “Light” work, I became more infatuated with his “Light” work when he explained his new artistic process to me.

“In most of my newer work I’ve started to return to shooting film.  Some I will shoot on 35mm film, sometimes push the film to achieve thicker film grain, and then rub the negatives in dust and then scan them into a computer. Sometimes I shoot on 120mm film using a plastic camera and then roll the film under a gel to get light leaks on the film.”

 The scratched and rugged texture of his newest work fondly reminds me of the Avant-Garde films that I watched in art school, which specifically tried to film the art of manipulating and deconstructing the medium of film itself.  Given that we live in a digital age, I like and respect that a young artist like Jason mixes old technology techniques with new ones.  I hope it inspires others, both young and old, to respect and learn film photography before they go and buy a digital camera.

If you haven’t already, please go and read the article I wrote on Gallery ML’s exhibition, “The Lunatic and the Lover.”  I also recommend that you read the article I wrote on Bill Hoo, the other photographer featured at the show.  He is another shining example of a photographer that integrates traditional photography with modern technology.

Written by Cassandra Hoo, Contributing Writer, SideArts

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Last First Friday I pulled legwarmers on under my pants, stuffed gloves in my pockets, and donned a fuzzy hat with earflaps as I got ready to spend the night hopping from gallery to gallery.  The problem was that as soon as I stepped outside I realized I’d made a grave mistake in assuming the beginning of January meant winter weather!  Did anyone else end up with pockets crammed full of extraneous knitwear last First Friday??

I started my rounds at The Clay Studio, where Yinka Orafidiya’s “All or Nothing” exhibition was the main event.  I was in awe of her courage in transcribing her journals on the walls of the space and exploring her struggle with chronic depression through her pottery.  Orafidiya is a Leeway Foundation grantee, and she will give away the cups she made at the end of the exhibition to symbolize her healing while simultaneously spreading the message of awareness to a wider audience.  There were many other artists exhibiting recent work at The Clay Studio, though, and the two pieces I really fell in love with were these two incredibly different pitchers.  I love the modern “coloring in the lines” look of the pitcher by Brian Jones, and that little square on the lid is the perfect touch!  Adam Posnak‘s pitcher is reminiscent of the popular rooster motif for kitchen designs, but instead he’s depicted a buzzard.  That’s my kind of kitchen motif!

Brian Jones // Adam Posnak

Next, I stopped by The Knapp Gallery to see Karl Frank Slocum’s exhibition “Following the Lines.”  As the title implies, Slocum’s approach to furniture making in this exhibition relies on following the natural lines, shapes, and “imperfections” of the wood slab in both the construction and design of his pieces.  Instead of imposing his own shapes and structures on the wood, Slocum’s method allows the wood to speak for itself, and the resulting pieces are functional celebrations of the natural character of the medium.

Karl Frank Slocum

Karl Frank Slocum

Over at 309 Gallery was the near-closing of an exhibition called “The Conjurer” featuring JL Schnabel’s Bloodmilk Jewelry and Christina Brown’s photography for the line’s lookbook.  The crystals, chains, and metal claws are shown in cases alongside natural artifacts such as bones, eggshells, and wood which enhance the mystical theme of the line and give the show a bit of a Mütter Museum vibe.  Brown’s photography is the perfect complement to the jewelry, her images all at once shrouding and revealing and tricking the eye.   This show is only running through January 15th, so make sure you check it out THIS WEEKEND!

JL Schnabel's Bloodmilk Jewelry

JL Schnabel's Bloodmilk Jewelry

JL Schnabel // Christina Brown

I was perhaps most excited to check out Jay Hardman’s “Unsustainable” show at Space 1026.  I’d heard from a reliable source that his cake sculptures depicting construction sites still emitted the sweet, sweet smell of cake and frosting.  And I was not disappointed!  Space 1026 definitely smelled the best last First Friday.

Jay Hardman

Finally, I made one final stop at Vox Populi to see how much more art I could feast my eyes on before getting stuffed!  My favorite exhibition belonged to Brie Ruais, who showed a series of work called “Unfolding: Performing Sculpture”.  Demarcating the boundary of the space was a long piece of malleable clay that stretched down the wall and smeared its way across the floor.  I was pretty sure the point was to create a new performance sculpture with various imprints of the people who tread upon it, but I admit to stepping over it like almost everyone else – just in case.  There were a few faint footprints across the piece, but mostly I thought it looked pretty good the way it was originally!

Brie Ruais

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

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Here is December’s leaderboard of top artists and businesses in Philly!

The top Philly artists for December:

1) Suzanne Comer
2) Lauren Rinaldi
3) Susan Moloney
4) Jenna Hannum
5) Lilliana S. Didovic
6) Dave Glass
7) Jon Bandish
8 ) Pia De Girolamo
9) Jennifer Talarico
10) Amy Scheidegger
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2) Paradigm Gallery + Studio
3) Prelude Gallery
4) GEDO
5) RAW: Natural Born Artists

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Currently showing at the Asian Arts Initiative is an exhibition titled Witness: Artists Reflect on 30 Years of the AIDS Pandemic.  After visiting the show, I was fortunate to be able to speak with David Acosta, the curator of Witness and a central figure in countless Philadelphia arts organizations and community arts projects.  In this, part one of our conversation, Mr. Acosta speaks about his experience curating “Witness”, the purpose of the exhibition, and importance of utilizing art to start conversations about the social and political effects of HIV/AIDS on our communities.  Stay tuned for part two of our conversation, in which he offers advice for artists interested in producing their own community arts projects.

George Apotsos - Faces Unseen

“Getting a really broad section of artists across age, race, gender, sexual orientation was a really important consideration [in curating Witness], and the other critical consideration was anchoring the show with some work that had been produced during the most difficult years of the epidemic. A lot of the artists were proposing new work which was very exciting, but I was really seeking artists who had worked through a period of very heightened preoccupation with AIDS and the politics of AIDS with federal policies, [or] the lack thereof, and so I went out very specifically to look for that work. I know HD Ivey who had done a lot of work in that period, [and] I specifically wanted some pieces I remember seeing many many years ago that had been produced in the 80s during the Reagan and Bush years at a very important juncture in the AIDS epidemic politically in this country, as well as socially.  I really needed them to be in the show because I wanted to create that plane and that continuity.”

HD Ivey - The Victim // Corral

Acosta described Witness as “powerful and moving but not in a very in your face kind of way. A lot of people came to me and said, ‘[Witness] is not sad, it’s just really beautiful.’  Gabriel Martinez’s “Anthology” for example, which is a lovely piece – those are the 12 albums. He took his Donna Summer LPs and basically destroyed them to create this piece. But it’s just beautiful, and it’s a very moving piece because it’s red, and it’s evocative of blood and body fluid. There’s almost a danger to it, but then it’s also celebratory in the fact that this was the music that a lot of gay men were dancing to in the midst of the epidemic. I think even many gay men were dancing to this music unaware that HIV/AIDS had entered these community circles and would wipe out almost two generations of gay men. So there was an implicit trust in myself that the artists [might] create stuff that could be sad [but] I trusted them to be able to have some reflective distance about the epidemic.  So the show allows people to reflect and to go into personal spaces about remembrance and love and loss but not in a way that’s overwhelming.”

Gabriel Martinez - Anthology

He explains that his purpose in curating this exhibition was “not necessarily to call communities to action but to ask communities to bear witness in their own way.  Because there’s been 30 years of the epidemic, it’s difficult to draw people’s attention to something that’s been around for so long, [even though it] remains so incredibly central and devastating to some communities where its still having a huge impact – young gay men in this country, for example, [and] specifically young gay men of color. The infection rate [and] the prevalence in some of these communities is high and rivals in many ways some of the numbers that we see coming out of specific parts of Africa. And so it was a way to also have people recognize that it is still present, that it’s still very much a part of the fabric of our communities, however we define those.  And also the title was [inspired by] a very important exhibition that was held in NYC [in 1989] curated by Nan Goldin called “Witnesses: Against Our Vanishing.” And that show remains one of the first and most powerful shows [addressing HIV/AIDS]. So in a sense I was also paying homage to that exhibition.”

Kwaku Osei - Untitled // Marta Sanchez - The History of Cascarones

 

Susan DiPronio - The Last Witness // Tay Cha - Helping Hands

 

“Witness” is showing through January 25 at Asian Arts Initiative (1219 Vine Street).  It will be open for First Friday festivities on January  6, and the show will culminate in a closing program on January 25 that features performances by the “Shout” writing workshop participants, which is taught by one of the exhibiting artists, Susan DiPronio, and is offered in conjunction with “Witness” as a means to continue  dialogue and reflection about HIV/AIDS in yet another expression of art.

 

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

 

W. David Smith at Galleria Deptford, Deptford Municipal Building, NJ

In the lobby of the Deptford Municipal Building is a display case for art, this year super-curator Pauline Jonas discovered artist W. David Smith right in the neighborhood with an incredible art collection in his garage and offered the multimedia artist the prime spot near the Christmas Tree.  My first impression was the nostalgic boyhood wonderment of model making, my Great Uncle Dave had dozens of airplane models hanging in his attic studio when I was a kid.  I myself favored monster models like the Creature from the Dark Lagoon.  But these are no ordinary hobby shop models, W. David Smith says, “Actually what it is, is Man Cave Art.”  Confirming my intuition of Smith’s art from a particularly male gaze, but it’s not kid’s stuff or just for boys.  “This is a Chess set, I learned to play Chess back in the 1980s and I was going to buy a set with a traditional theme but I was into space at the time, so I decided to whip up a few pieces, this took some time to do.  This is one of a kind but I also made a larger one that’s more detailed with prototypes for casting.”

W. David Smith, Chess Set at Galleria Deptford

W. David Smith, Chess Set at Galleria Deptford

“The thing behind it, the light up board, is the actual table top, it sits on top and kind of has a glow to it. The bigger sculptures are actually from a Japanese anime called Star Blazers that came out back in the early eighties, I guess, and it really was an adult cartoon.  Subsequently when they brought it over to America they kiddy-fied it, but it still has a really cool, militaristic, all these battles in space and stuff, the same old themes of good and evil and all that stuff.  But the designs are Leiji Matsumoto, I think the gentleman’s name is who designed all this.  Now, I’ve taken a little bit of liberties with his designs only because there’s not enough reference materials out there.  So, I watched a couple episodes on YouTube and I started cutting the pieces out with band saws.  All the pieces are hand made.  There are probably 220 pieces in that ship alone, probably close to eighty in this one likewise 90 to 100 for that larger one.”  How did you get involved with model making?  “I got a job with a model builder where I would be given jobs to create prototypes, like ‘here I need this in an hour!‘  So he kind of gave me ideas, you know I could make these pieces with a vac-u-form or cold cast or along that line, so, all the models I’ve done can actually be used to make a larger scale model for a builder to build.”

W. David Smith, Concept Designer, Galleria Deptford

The installation of W. David Smith‘s art is on display through January along with an excellent exhibit of photography by New Jersey regional photographers.  Galleria Deptford is located in the Deptford Municipal Building 1011 Cooper Street, Deptford, NJ 08096 (856) 845-530 Directions only 15 minutes outside Center City Philadelphia.  The ongoing art exhibits are supported by the community and highlight the cultural diversity of the region but right now is a perfect time to experience unique art work that has not been displayed in public since 1991!  W. David Smith has been keeping it in his Man Cave.

DoN Brewer, Contributing Writer, Side Arts

Photos by DoN Brewer

Jordan Griska, Center for Emerging Visual Artists

The Center for Emerging Visual Artists spotlight exhibition season for this year ends with a two-person show featuring Tim Portlock and Jordan Griska.  Jordan Griska was introduced by the Director of Career Development Amie Potsic at the opening and the artist spoke about his work.

“My most recent body of work I’ve been manipulating objects that are common or, you know, commonly found and manipulating them in an esthetic way that allows people to interpret their context in a common culture or geo-political climate or reflecting more upon the critique of that rather than just straight up the object.  So for these works I took an honor box, which is the title for this type of newspaper dispensing device, and the idea behind it is that you take one newspaper on the honor system.  So, there are honor boxes, then I’m cutting them and fabricating so they have a mirror reflection.  The idea behind the work stemmed from, um, media’s reflection of what’s going on in natural disasters.”

Jordan Griska, Honor Box 1(Blue), Center for Emerging Visual Artists

“So, I was taking this idea of something tragic that was turned into spectacle filtered through the media.  I saw a lot of images of houses half under water or cars and have that idea of that being reflected upon itself.  I can see that in these sculptures and then the idea kind of transformed into something that is inspired by natural disaster into it’s own esthetic and kind of separate itself from its concept and expands into using it in different works.  Other recent projects I’ve done, I took a WWII plane and manipulated that construction and re-purposed it as an active greenhouse over at Lenfest Plaza at Arch Street and Broad.  The idea behind that work is kind of similar in that I’m manipulating something and changing it meaning, allowing people to interpret it in their own way.  And also reflect on its place and role in common culture.”

How do you acquire your objects?  Do you take them?  “No!  The company that makes these is called Showcase and they’re based in Texas, so I had a palette of honor boxes shipped up from Texas.  I’ve made five of them up to date.”

Do you cut them in half and weld them?  “Yeah, fabrication and craft is very important to my work.  Something I try to achieve is a high level of craft so people can focus on what the concept I’m trying to convey or the idea and a minimal interpretation of the craft.  So I took a normal newspaper box, two of them, cut them and using geometry had them fabricated into what you see.”

“It’s a broad audience that can interpret this, from someone at a previous exhibition, they came up here and they were a Katrina victim and they can relate to it in such a personal way to somebody who sees this as the death of paper media.”

Jordan Griska, Honor Box 1(Yellow), Center for Emerging Visual Artists

Jordan Griska‘s work is on view at the Center for Emerging Visual Artists, a non-profit arts organization dedicated to the career development of Philadelphia artists and the arts in Philadelphia, located in the Barclay building on Rittenhouse Square through December 20th, 2011.  Read about Tim Portlock on the Side Arts blog.

DoN Brewer, Contributing Writer, Side Arts

Photographs by DoN Brewer