Philiput presents: Twentysix Wawa Stores – Eric Weeks Photographic Exhibition, Book and Film : Poetic Finissage
Philiput presents: Twentysix Wawa Stores – Eric Weeks Photographic Exhibition, Book and Film : Poetic Finissage 1901b Washington Ave, Philadelphia, PA. Sept 29, 5pm – 9pm. Curated by Rebeca Martell and Devin Cohen.
Shoutflower Four Poetry reading event happening featuring: Heather Houde Samantha,PiousJohn Pinto,Myene Yanu and more.
Eric Weeks is an artist using photography and video, a curator, and Chair of the Photography & Video Department at the Pennsylvania College of Art and Design in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA. He has exhibited his photographs and short films nationally and internationally, including in Australia, China, Egypt, France, Germany, Italy, Morocco, Singapore, South Korea, Spain and the United States. His work is in the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Maison Européene de la Photographie, Bibliothèque Nationale, Yale University Art Gallery and the Sir Elton John Collection, among others. He is the author of two monographs, World Was in the Face of the Beloved and A Rose By Any Other Name. Portfolios have appeared in FotoNostrum, Dodho, Zoom, Photo +, Fahrenheit and Dear Dave. Awards include a City Corps Artist Grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts; an Individual Creative Artist Fellowship Grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts; Open Call Winner, Art Speaks Out, ikonoTV, Berlin; Finalist, Black Maria Film Festival, Jersey City; and Semi-Finalist, G2 Green Earth Film Festival, Los Angeles. Weeks received a MFA from Yale University, and a BFA from the School of Visual Arts. His work is represented by Galerie Catherine & André Hug in Paris.
Twentysix Wawa Stores examines the Pennsylvania-based convenience store and gas purveyor Wawa. Wawa means wild goose in the indigenous American language of the Ojibwe. The Wawa business started in 1902 as a dairy farm located in Wawa, Pennsylvania, an area first named as such by land owner Edward Worth. The film, photo exhibition, and discussion follows the Lincoln Highway, starting in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and culminating at the farthest north Wawa store in Elizabeth, New Jersey.Made in reference to Edward Ruscha’s Twentysix Gasoline Stations, Twentysix Wawa Stores unobtrusively observes the phenomenon of automobile culture in America in the 2020’s.
Philiput presents: Twentysix Wawa Stores – Eric Weeks Photographic Exhibition, Book and Film : Poetic Finissage 1901b Washington Ave, Philadelphia, PA
Thank you to Devon Cohen for the content of this post.
LikeDoNArTNeWs Art News Blog by DoN Brewer on Facebook
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
CERULEAN ARTS GALLERY 1355 Ridge Ave, Philadelphia 267-514-8647 www.ceruleanarts.com My solo show of 20 rendered collages is displayed at Cerulean from 5 Jul thru 30 Jul 2023. The In-person reception is Sat 8 Jul 2-5 pm and the virtual tour & talk is Weds 19 Jul 2023 at 6pm (must zoom register. Gallery hours are Weds thru Fri 10m-6pm, Sat & Suns 12pm thru 6pm. I may also be at the gallery several Wednesdays. Welcome to come visit.
Theme: As a lifelong Philadelphian (mostly), I explore aspects of the city I love as well as worry about, look at its extraordinary-though checkered- history, and present ideas and images for its future. As an architect and teacher, I can’t stop commenting, pencils in hand. MY PHILLY…for better or worse, for richer or poorer…
JOHN JAMES PRON: ARTIST STATEMENT
I am a lifelong Philadelphian- mostly. I was born in Northern Liberties, raised in the Northeast’s Oxford Circle, rented apartments in West Philadelphia and have lived for over fifty years right across the city’s boundary at Cheltenham Avenue. I went to Philly schools- grammar, high school, undergraduate and graduate. And I worked all of my professorial life in North Philadelphia. My wife has long been intimately connected to this city’s healthcare community and both daughters attended Philadelphia universities.
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
I am also an architect by profession- certainly a creative artist, but one who was trained to balance my willful imagination with an ingrained moral and ethical responsibility to improve the lives of people, of the health of the community, the viability of cities and indeed the survival of this planet. For almost 40 years, I was fulltime professor in Temple University’s Tyler School of Art and Architecture, nurturing students to believe in themselves as creative forces but also to take responsibility for bettering the world. In this case, the artist is also a problem-solver. In my design practice and teaching, I specialized in ‘adaptive reuse’- preserving the essential character of a building (its ‘soul’), while adjusting spaces and functions for changing needs.
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
And so, in this solo gallery show, my mode of expression is the juxtaposition of existing images by others (photos or lithographs, archival or current) against my hand-drawn “reimaginings” of the place, the usage, or the meaning. It’s a both/and strategy. While it does make for interesting and unusual images to display, what is more important is that I am using my architectural-art skills to raise awareness of critical issues affecting human lives, even advocating for important social changes. And so, along with the needed information, I am seeking to make an emotional impact on the viewer through my graphics.
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
Picasso did just that in his monumental Guernica- maybe the most powerful anti-war painting in history. More recently, visual artists such as Keith Haring, Banksy and Ai Weiwei do the same on contemporary issues. The viewer may appreciate the artistic qualities, but one is also asked make a personal decision over the content: take a stand, get involved, connect to others, contribute as you can. Do something.
You can view my professional and academic career (including past gallery shows, architectural designs, lectures, etc) and my bio on my website www.johnjamespron.com
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
“PHILLY AND ME: FOR BETTER OR WORSE…FOR RICHER OR POORER…”
This is a city that I love- its parks and neighborhoods, its grand public buildings and cultural institutions, its superlative universities and breathtaking skyscrapers. I also love its diversity…old with young, residents and visitors, extraordinary festivals near quiet enclaves, polished gentility and in-your-face grit. A city of many races, many backgrounds, many beliefs. But I also fret about this city: the things that tear it apart, the endemic problems growing ever larger, the social behaviors that destroy unity and civility. Here are my pleasures as well as my concerns, my savoring of its (sometimes checkered) past, my images suggesting a brighter future. Warnings and wishes….I can only hope the new next mayor can rise to the challenge.
Thank you to John James Pron for the content of this post.
LikeDoNArTNeWs Art News Blog by DoN Brewer on Facebook
Transcending the limitations of the photographic medium, John Singletary creates multidisciplinary installation experiences. His work graces The Gallery at Penn College through March 22. Singletary’s Through Lines/Fault Lines is the first exhibition of multimedia work on screens in the gallery’s history. Located on the third floor of The Madigan Library at Pennsylvania College of Technology, the gallery is in its 17th season.
The exhibition includes two installations: Traces and Anahata.
“John’s new series, Traces, was created specifically for his solo exhibition in The Gallery at Penn College,” said Penny Griffin Lutz, gallery director. “Visitors will be immersed in an audiovisual experience that explores culture, beliefs and the human connection.”
Traces uses video, digital and stop-motion animation, historical footage, and audio. “Anahata” is photography-based and presented as an immersive installation on organic LED electronic canvases.
A photographer and multimedia artist based in Philadelphia, Singletary received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in photography from The University of the Arts. His work has been collected by the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Center for Fine Art Photography, as well as other institutional and private collections.
The artist says the imagery and vignettes in Traces, an ongoing multimedia work, depict “the extraordinary light and darkness in the human condition and life events such as the genesis of our existence and the purpose we serve to each other and ourselves.”
The audio component of the installation consists of a series of anonymously conducted interviews with a range of participants. The perspectives highlighted reveal the universality and individuality of values, the intersectionality of symbolism across cultures and lineages, and the perpetual cycles of life.
“Surveying the myriad and disjointed experiences that make up a life, ‘Traces’ explores the way we construct our internal narratives and create meaning from experience,” Singletary said.
John Singletary, Still Frame from Traces, 22:45 Minute OLED Video/Sound Installation
Anahata explores human relationships and their connection to the divine. Choreographed movement was captured with an open-spectrum camera in a purpose-built, ultraviolet light studio where dancers performed in handcrafted costumes. The resulting dreamlike images are steeped in archetypal symbolism, mythology and mysticism.
A long-term collaboration between the artist and dancers, costume designers, makeup artists, choreographers and other artists, Anahata unveils a “frenetic tribe” that feels of another place and time.
The Gallery at Penn College is open 2 to 8 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays; 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Fridays; and 1 to 5 p.m. Sundays. (The gallery is closed on Mondays and Saturdays and will also be closed March 5-12 during Spring Break.)
John Singletary, Dryads from Anahata, 5′ x 3′ OLED Installation
Thank you to John Singletary for the content of this post.
LikeDoNArTNeWs Art News Blog by DoN Brewer on facebook
Getty Research Institute and Philadelphia Museum of Art Announce Two-Part Virtual Event Spotlighting the Iconic Arensberg Collection and Legendary Couple Who Created It
LOS ANGELES and PHILADELPHIA— The Getty Research Institute and the Philadelphia Museum of Art are pleased to announce a two-part virtual event exploring the display of one of the most important private collections in the United States of avant-garde and pre-Columbian art.
During the first half of the twentieth century, Louise and Walter Arensberg carved out a unique place in the history of collecting. No one before them had made such audacious connections between modern painting, Renaissance literature, and pre-Columbian sculpture; and few, if any, used collecting more forcefully as a medium for artistic creation and intellectual exploration.
Much has been made of the significance of how the Arensbergs’ collection took shape in their Manhattan apartment following the Armory Show in 1913 and of their influential role as patrons in the New York Dada circle. Until now, less has been understood about how their collection expanded and changed in character after their move to Los Angeles in 1921, particularly after they purchased their Hollywood home and turned it into a house museum and research institute. For the next three decades, prior to the establishment of a public modern art museum in the region, the Arensbergs put the European avant-garde, the English Renaissance, and Mesoamerican civilizations into dialogue in dense and playful displays that shocked and inspired visitors—including some of the period’s leading artists, writers, and curators. In 1950, the couple gifted their collection of avant-garde and Pre-Columbian art to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. When Louise and Walter died in 1953 and 1954, respectively, their rare books, manuscripts and personal papers were gifted to California’s Francis Bacon Library (now housed at the Huntington Library).
In this two-part event, Mark Nelson, William H. Sherman, and Ellen Hoobler, authors of the recently published book Hollywood Arensberg: Avant-Garde Collecting in Midcentury L.A. (Getty Research Institute), discuss and illuminate the Arenbergs’ fascinating collection.
Part I: The Arensbergs’ Hollywood House-Museum: Tuesday, December 15, 2020, 6:00–7:30 p.m. EST. Arcadia Library Lecture.
Matthew Affron, the Philip and Muriel Berman Curator of Modern Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, will moderate a lively discussion with the authors as they share how they mined archival materials, including at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, to uncover the unpublished history of the Arensberg collection on the West coast, and ultimately reconstruct how the works of art were displayed in their Hollywood home. Drawing from this new research, the discussion will also examine how this display reflected the collecting tastes and worldview of the Arensbergs.
Part II: The Arensberg’s Collection: Space, Place, Time: Tuesday, March 9, 2021, 3:00–4:30 p.m. PST
In the second of two conversations, Mary Miller, director of the Getty Research Institute, and authors Mark Nelson, William H. Sherman, and Ellen Hoobler will explore how the context of the collection shaped how it was assembled, displayed, and interpreted.
MATTHEW AFFRON is the Muriel and Philip Berman Curator of Modern Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
ELLEN HOOBLER is the William B. Ziff, Jr., Associate Curator of Art of the Americas at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore.
MARY MILLER is the director of the Getty Research Institute.
MARK NELSON is an author, design director, and partner at the book design firm McCall Associates in New York.
WILLIAM H. SHERMAN is director of the Warburg Institute in London.
Sponsor
The Arcadia Library Lecture at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is generously supported by the Arcadia Foundation.
About the Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection in Philadelphia
Louise and Walter Arensberg’s extraordinary gift to the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1950, together with that of A. E. Gallatin, forms the cornerstone of the institution’s modern art collection. Their path to becoming collectors was set in 1913 after a visit to the legendary Armory Show in New York, where they encountered Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2), a painting they would later acquire. In 1915 they eagerly opened their home to Duchamp, inaugurating a forty-year friendship and collaboration between the artist and the collectors.
During their collecting career, the Arensbergs purchased works by Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Salvador Dalí, Marc Chagall, and Vasily Kandinsky, among others, and assembled the largest collection of Constantin Brancusi’s sculpture outside Paris. As their interests extended well beyond Western art, their holdings of pre-Columbian art were displayed alongside contemporary works. The couple amassed the foremost collection of Duchamp’s work in the world, contributing to making the museum in Philadelphia a place of pilgrimage for generations of artists and lovers of the avant-garde.
About the Getty Research Institute
The Getty Research Institute is an operating program of the J. Paul Getty Trust. It serves education in the broadest sense by increasing knowledge and understanding about art and its history through advanced research. The Research Institute provides intellectual leadership through its research, exhibition, and publication programs and provides service to a wide range of scholars worldwide through residencies, fellowships, online resources, and a Research Library. The Research Library—housed in the 201,000-square-foot Research Institute building designed by Richard Meier—is one of the largest art and architecture libraries in the world. The general library collections (secondary sources) include almost 900,000 volumes of books, periodicals, and auction catalogues encompassing the history of Western art and related fields in the humanities. The Research Library’s special collections include rare books, artists’ journals, sketchbooks, architectural drawings and models, photographs, and archival materials.
About the Philadelphia Museum of Art
The Philadelphia Museum of Art is Philadelphia’s art museum. A place that welcomes everyone. A world-renowned collection. A landmark building. We bring the arts to life, inspiring visitors—through scholarly study and creative play—to discover the spirit of imagination that lies in everyone. We connect people with the arts in rich and varied ways, making the experience of the Museum surprising, lively, and always memorable. We are committed to inviting visitors to see the world—and themselves—anew through the beauty and expressive power of the arts.
Getty Research Institute and Philadelphia Museum of Art Announce Two-Part Virtual Event Spotlighting the Iconic Arensberg Collection and Legendary Couple Who Created It
Jedediah Morfit: Adapting to Change A solo exhibition of new work by sculptor Jedediah Morfit
Jedediah Morfit, Gills: Grow A Pair, 2019, Mixed media, 8.5 x 9 x 33”
Paradigm Gallery + Studio is pleased to present Adapting to Change, a solo exhibition of new sculptural works by Jedediah Morfit, opening* May 29, 2020 and remaining on view through June 27, 2020. Known for using traditional techniques to create contemporary interpretations of historical forms, Morfit explored new digital fabrication processes specifically for this exhibition. The resulting busts are raw and vibrant, but still preserves Morfit’s signature precision.
Morfit’s artistic practice subverts traditional figurative sculpture and mirrors his own lived, contemporary experience. By combining old-world techniques with modern material, his past works created a juxtaposition between old and new, sculpture and sculptor. That tension is still at the heart of Morfit’s practice, but it has evolved to reflect new artistic technologies. In Adapting to Change, the muted busts Morfit is known for have gone through a total contemporary, bordering on futuristic, transformation. Digitally crafted, embedded with mixed media, dosed in color, manipulated, these works are a major departure for the artist. Unlike his last exhibition at Paradigm in 2017, the pieces in Adapting to Change are not about a modeler’s sensibility, but rather focuses on the intricacies of process, color and material.
Jedediah Morfit: Adapting to Change, Paradigm Gallery +Studio
While Morfit’s new process uses digital tools, there is still evidence of the artist’s touch. The final pieces, while incredibly detailed, do not look manufactured or automated in any way. While many of the pieces in the exhibition started with existing 3D scans of Greek and Italian busts, they were realized through a combination of 3D fabrication tools and traditional modeling and casting techniques. Many of the pieces are embedded with found objects, like plastic beads and cake doilies, which act as a part of the piece’s DNA; exploited for their texture and bright colors. Morfit takes the intact busts, cuts them up and puts them (almost) back together again. The ensuing works are presented slightly off kilter, hanging upside down or teetering off an edge.
The works in Adapting to Change are intended to look and feel disjointed. Countless hours were spent composing the busts, only to be deconstructed, modified, rebuilt, and reimagined. The shifting process mimics Morfit’s own sense of having lost and scrambling to keep his balance, as the ground shifts beneath his feet.
*Due to COVID-19, “Adapting to Change” will be on view at https://www.paradigmarts.org/ until further notice. During the exhibition, Paradigm hopes to be able to allow a limited number of viewing appointments, but this is dependent on the current policies of the CDC, WHO and the Governor and Mayor’s offices. Paradigm Gallery’s number one priority is the safety and wellness of their visitors. For live updates on the exhibition and appointments, please visit the Paradigm website and socials. For any questions on Paradigm’s current policies, please email info@paradigm-gallery.com.
About Jedediah Morfit Jedediah Morfit received his MFA in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2005, where he was awarded the Sylvia Leslie Herman Young Scholarship and the Award Of Excellence. He was a Fellow at the Center For Emerging Visual Artists from 2007-2009, and received a New Jersey Council On the Arts Fellowship for sculpture in 2009. He received the Louise Kahn Award for Sculpture from the Woodmere Art Museum in 2006, and was awarded the Dexter Jones Award for Bas Relief from the National Sculpture Society in 2011 and 2012. In
2013, he was commissioned to create a series of new work for Artlantic:Wonder, which was named one of the 50 best public art projects in the Public Art Network’s Year in Review. His work has been shown in numerous group and solo exhibitions, and featured in The New York Times, Sculpture Review, Artnews and American Craft Magazine, as well as on NJTV’s State Of the Arts. He lives in New Jersey with his wife and three (count ‘em, three) children.
Jedediah Morfit: Adapting to Change, Paradigm Gallery + Studio
About Paradigm Gallery Paradigm Gallery + Studio® exhibits contemporary artwork from around the world with a focus on Philadelphia-based artists. Established February 2010, the gallery began as a project between co-founders and curators, Jason Chen and Sara McCorriston, as a space in which to create artwork, to exhibit the work of their peers, and to invite the members of the community to create and collect in a welcoming gallery setting. Now open 10 years, the gallery still aims to welcome all collectors, from first time to lifelong, and continues to support accessible work that welcomes a wide audience.
Location: 746 S 4th St Philadelphia, PA 19147
Thank you to Madison Fishman for the content of this post.
LikeDoNArTNeWs Philadelphia Art News Blog on facebook
