Category Archives: Illustration

Art illustration. Illustrations by Philadelphia artists.

Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 – 1241 Carpenter Street

Katie Murken Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

Katie Murkens studio @ 1241 Carpenter Street.  Katie’s shish-kabob-like  sculptures were installed at the Fringe Night Club during the Festival, in her studio they compliment her paintings with Brancusi-like forever-ness.

Katie Murken Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

Katie Murken makes beautiful books, each piece a perfect little world of conceptual nuggets from puns to memes and back.

Katie Murken Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

Katie Murken is working on a book project involving a mathematical formula of color preparation for simple house paint then applied to each page of a phone book.  The translucent paint dries curling the pages, deforming the book into a sculptural element to hang on the wall. Murken shared her code book with lola & DoN, a complicated method of color mixing involving weighing pigment assuring a satisfying tonal transition.

David Donahue Book Restorations Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

David Donahue Book Restoration is just down the hall from Katie Murken‘s studio, his space is a restoration laboratory reviving old and rare books.  The gregarious Donahue explained how his work is not just technical but requires ingenuity, artistic skill and research in order to match bindings and liners, David’s stories about book hunting would make a great TV show.

David Donahue Book Restorations Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

David Donahue Restorations @ 1241 Carpenter Street.

Amze Emmons

Amze Emmons @ 1241 Carpenter in South Philly.

Amze Emmons Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

Amze Emmons body of work describes refugee architecture like the edge cities of Beijing where stalled development is retrofitted by clever scavengers.  Like a William Gibson scenario, Emmons spare paintings with the drawings showing through like pentimenti highlight the refuse and refuge of civilization as communities are built where they don’t belong.

Amze Emmons Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010 - 1241 Carpenter Street

Amze Emmons prints for sale @ the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours 2010, East of Broad Street weekend.  Our final stop of the day @ 1241 reminded DoN of his first show with POST, the opening party was held in the same space when Monica Turtle, a beautiful person & talented designer, curated Art @ Sophi, it’s gratifying to know the 3rd floor walk-up in South Philly is still operating as a creative space for fine artists.

 

 

Photos by DoN.

 

Da Vinci Art Alliance – 7 Deadly Sins @ Noyes Museum of Art, Hammonton NJ

Da Vinci Art Alliance - 7 Deadly Sins @ Noyes Museum of Art, Hammonton NJ

Bobbie Adams. Annette Alessi, Roz Bloom, DoN Brewer, Pat Burns, Lois Allen Charles, Piety Choi, Rachel Christy, Rachel Citrino, Alden Cole, Francesca Costanzo, Lilliana Didovic, Gerard Di Falco, Judy Engle, Linda Dubin, Laura Guzzo, Louise Herring, Ona Kalstein, Maria J. Keane, Gary Koenitzer, Sandi Neiman, Marlon Majette, Lee Muslin, Liz Nicklus, Arthur Ostroff, Anna Pizzoli, Peter Seidel, Rex Sexton, Francine Strauss, Anna Vosburgh, Ted Warchal, Carol Wisker, Wendelyn Anderson, Karen McDonnell, Anthony Cortosi.

 Da Vinci Art Alliance - 7 Deadly Sins @ Noyes Museum of Art, Hammonton NJ

Noyes Museum of Art– Hammonton
5 S. Second St.
Hammonton, NJ 08037
(609)561-8006

The DaVinci Art Alliance: “7” Deadly Sins

Exhibit Dates: October 1 – November 24, 2010
Opening Reception: October 1: 5:00 – 8:00 p.m.
Artist Lecture with Marlon Majette: October 6: 6:00 – 7:30 p.m.

Da Vinci Art Alliance
is a non-profit artists’ organization located in South Philadelphia.  The organization was founded in 1931 to serve the needs of professional artists and artisans in the Delaware Valley.  Da Vinci Art Alliance currently has over 150 members and is supported through membership dues, gallery rentals, sales commissions, grants, and donations.  Da Vinci Art Alliance holds exhibitions of members’ and non-members’ artwork as well as special events, workshops, performances, poetry readings, and lectures.

DoN is thrilled about his museum debut with the Seven Deadly Sins exhibit in the Noyes Museum of Art, Hammonton, NJ for some wack-a-doodle time-tripping reasons; DoN has a history with Hammonton, showing in the Noyes is kind of cosmic.  DoN hung out with GadFly, an early radical blogger who stirred local political shit in a way that not many people have the balls to do today even in our social networked world.  GadFly posted blogs that ended up getting him interviewed by the FBI, radio talk show hosts and the town council, who he called nasty names which ultimately ended up being quoted in his obituary, a final insult to his political enemies.  Before the internet GadFly wrote letters to the editor in papers locally and nationally, ranting endlessly about corruption, when he discovered blogging there was no stopping his vitriolic sarcastic wit.  GadFly‘s blog was the inspiration for DoNArTNeWs. 

GadFly is now known as Dead Larry, a former life guard, since drowning ironically in a gym pool a few years ago.  DoN adopted, his now geriatric, Lady Doofus, the St. Bernard/Chihuahua mix who lived on Dead Larry‘s farm but is now an urbane canine retiree in Marion Anderson Historical Village; Lady Doofus may make a surprise appearance at the art gala in her former home town, along with KaTy the ArT DoG who also enjoyed romps in the Pine Barrens swamps.  GadFly would LoVe that DoN is presenting his art in Hammonton, New Jersey, his home state (DoN was named most artistic, Deptford High School, Class of ’71), especially the 7 Deadly Sins part – gossip with DoN at the opening party, 10/01/10, to get the real dirt on Dead Larry aka GadFly.

Hammonton, NJ, once a vital town in South Jersey, is recovering from being hit by the Walmart Bomb, the downtown became a bit shabby but now is truly quaint like a Hopper painting, the Noyes Museum Gallery is a revitalizing force – art to the rescue!

 

“Sculpting Nature” Featuring Career Development Program Fellows Susan Benarcik, R. Noel Shaak and John Woodin @ CFEVA

Susan Benarcik @ CFEVA

Susan Benarcik installed thousands of toothpicks on the walls of the CFEVA Gallery @ 15th & Locust Streets as part of Sculpting Nature, a three person show of CFEVA Career Development Program Fellows .  Benarcik’s wooden installation wraps around a corner paired with hanging tear-drop shaped sculptures made from white wire hangers, some of which were rusted from hanging in a private garden (hmm…do the initials E.T. come to mind?).

Susan Benarcik @ CFEVA

Susan Benarcik @ CFEVA

Susan Benarcik’s wire sculptures are light and airy yet angsty and filled with emotion casting shadows of doubt in the gallery’s alcove.

Susan Benarcik @ CFEVA

Susan Benarcik @ Sculpting Nature.

R. Noel Shaak

R. Noel Shaak‘s pen, ink & marker drawings are goth & Goethe mash-ups each telling an entire movies worth of narrative like some steam-punk Gorey for 2010.

John Woodin @ CFEVA

John Woodin talked about how his vineyard photos are actually Long Island and not some exotic European country.  The large scale photographs have a strange geometry, formal compositions drawn from informal resources like walking through a warm East Coast forest in summer.  DoN knew the photos were Woodin before he knew they were Woodin, that’s style.

The cohesive show is an amalgam of styles each somehow tuned into the concept of nature changed by the gaze of people, Benarcik’s sculptures energize the room, Shaak’s drawings whisper weird secrets and Woodin’s photos traverse space and time.

John Woodin @ CFEVA

John Woodin @ Sculpting Nature in the Center for Emerging Visual Artists Gallery through 9/2/2010.

 

DoN Brewer

CFEVA Introduction 2012
Blick Art Materials

[disclosure]

Casual Show & Salon @ The Plastic Club, Summer 2010

Casual Show & Salon @ The Plastic Club, Summer 2010

Karl Olsen lights the subject of an impromptu critique of Yeoun Lee‘s paintings during the monthly Salon des Plastiques @ The Plastic Club on the Avenue of the Artists.  Lee took up the challenge from a previous meeting to bring out a few paintings on the sweltering Summer evening to stand up to the observations of Anders Hanson, Bob Jackson, Mike Quinn, Alan Klawens – the guys behind the on-going series of exhibitions at one of Philly’s premier artist clubs.  DoN couldn’t help to harken back to the days when air conditioning was a dream yet to be realized.  Yeoun explained the cosmological influence on her current work with light being represented by a subtle rainbow of color.

Yeoun Lee

Yeoun Lee @ The Plastic Club’s Salon.

Casual Show @ The Plastic Club, Summer 2010

The Casual Summer Show @ The Plastic Club showcases artist favorites.

Casual Show @ The Plastic Club, Summer 2010

Members of the Plastic Club are showing works not directed by a theme allowing for a salon like diversity of styles and medium; curators Alan Klawans and Bob Jackson filled the main galleries with a spectrum of light and color.

Marlise M. Tkaczuk, 3 Monkeys, silk screen

Marlise M. Tkaczuk, 3 Big Monkeys, silk screen in The Casual ShowThe Plastic Club has long represented printmaking with a great print room and print shows; Marlise’s confrontational funky monkeys are part clever and engaging, jumping off the wall.  Check the clubs website for info and links to events.

Apocalypse Soon: 2012 @ Da Vinci Art Alliance

DoN Brewer I Was Here Apocalypse Soon: 2012

 I Was Here, DoN Brewer, digital photograph @ Da Vinci Art Alliance‘s Apocalypse Soon: 2012.

With money bombs, pandemics, oil spills, World War III fresh in our consciousness and the 2nd Wave Depression looming, Apocalyse Soon: 2012 is prescient, nihilistic funk-a-rama drama.  Curator Dr Deb Miller and Juror & Awards Judge, Elin Danien, Consulting Scholar, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology gleaned a strange harvest of occult dreamscapes, blob-a-zoid sculptures and paranoid visions of the end of the future.

“I know it’s the last day on earth
We’ll be together while the planet dies
I know it’s the last day on earth
We’ll never say goodbye

Marilyn MansonThe Last Day on Earth

Curator’s Tour, Lecture, and Opening Awards Reception:  Sunday, August 8, 1pm-4 pm(doors open at 12:30)

Brujo de la Mancha, Mexican Identity in the XXIst Century
Debra Miller, PowerPoint lecture, Calendar Cycles of Creation and Destruction in Pre-Columbian Art
Debra Miller, Curator’s tour, Apocalypse Soon:  2012

 

Photo by DoN Brewer.