Category Archives: Philadelphia Art Installations

Art installations in Philadelphia.

Selections From Cluster @ CFEVA

Jacob Koestler ,Window, Rochester, NY, photograph, 2010.

Jacob Koestler lives in Johnstown, PA. near Pittsburgh where he is a member of a shared art space called 709 Railroad Street, his photographs are included in a group show at the Center for Emerging Visual Artists, his second time showing in Philly. Three years ago Koestler’s work was included in the first collabo with Pittsburgh Center for the Arts in the space on Rittenhouse Square. In Selection From Cluster, the photographer was invited by Amie Potsic to include the group of photos based on a revenge dream narrative where a rich boy who wants to be a rock star inherits the perfect secluded mansion in Rochester, NY, equipped with all required to live the life of the privileged, surrounded by collaborators, a dream home for him in contrast to the suburban dream home his own father is building for himself. The series is like a metaphor for art killing the father, each generation must claim their own turf.

Michael Sherwin, True North, pigment prints mounted to steel. The series of prints explore fuzzy animism & techno-geek virtuosity – mounting the prints on steel is very cool, calculated & hard yet amorphous and squirmy like finding ancient artifacts from Mars.

“This exhibition exchange is part of an ongoing collaboration by CFEVA and PF/PCA Created in order to strengthen the artistic dialogue between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Cluster was originally presented at The Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and curated by Adam Welch. The Philadelphia presentation of this exhibition was curated by Amie Potsic. Participating artists: Dee Briggs, Connie Cantor, Nayda Collazo-Llorens, Kyle Houser, Ben Kehoe, Jacob Koestler, Michael Sherwin, Lenore Thomas.” CFEVA Website.

Dee Briggs

The steel draws lines of shadows in the alcove @ CFEVA Gallery, as the airy shape slowly rotated the play of light & dark created a living drawing. DoN observed people dreamily staring, imagining how they could clear out their living room to make space for Dee Briggs sculpture – the artists website is cool, too. CFEVA @ 15th & Locust Sts.

Nayda Collazo-Llorens, Test 32, gesso, ink & pigmented marker on canvas. The large drawing is engrossing like looking at a Chuck Close. Little blobby shapes coalesce and entwine, connecting dots in the brain, melding mind maps spread out across the canvas like an alien landscape, coordinates marks each other trying to signal and cooperate with all elements to capture your attention. DoN loves marker art.

Selection From Cluster is a unique opportunity to view art from PA’s other big city – Jacob Koestler described to DoN a vibrant downtown art scene/district in Pittsburgh with a fun First Friday. Thanks to CFEVA for opening the lines of communication with artists across PA.

147th Annual Exhibition of Small Oil Paintings @ The Philadelphia Sketch Club

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James Dean Erickson, Portrait of Douglass Carr, oil on board. The model in cap & hoddie can be found wheel-chair bound outside St. John’s, a diabetic, a friend recommended the artist invite him into the studio to pose at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art. James relayed to DoN, “Portraiture can be a vehicle for therapy, highlights the dignity of the individual, and be a channel for excitement and energy.”

Rachel Constantine, Fifteen, oil. The title says it all.

Richard Coach, The Fish of Delos.

Like time traveling to a lost and ancient city, this painting could be anywhere in time and space. Seething with hunger for life, referencing work, culture, taste, serving up skills acquired with trial & error, the exquisite painting and substantial frame is right here in Philly in America’s oldest art club, the Philadelphia Sketch Club.

Kyle Margiotta, Blow, oil. This would be a great picture for a house with kids, imagine how this masterful painting would elevate the taste of growing minds, simple mark-making telling long stories playing out like fairytales, set in the real world, incredulous expressions speaking volumes.

Mark Brough Goodson, Tom Csaszar/Eye of the Critic and Neysa Grassi/Eye of the Critic.

The pair of pairs of eyes, attractive and expressive, are superb examples of how small paintings capture moments in time, filled with emotions, thought and empathy in a medium which will last for centuries. Hundreds of years from now the oil paintings being produced now will still transmit stories from our time, the present, to the future, their past.

DoN overheard a man say, “Why don’t they say where these places are?” DoN pointed out the title does name a place, “Snow Melt, Sand Island“, by Sandra Corpora, it just doesn’t give GPS coordinates. The man asked DoN what he liked about the painting? “The restraint of using the one thick pure white stroke of paint to represent the most distant point in the painting.” He looked hard @ DoN & disappeared into the crowd.

147th Annual Exhibition of Small Oil Paintings is through April 24th with 170 of the best oil paintings in the city hanging together, continuing a long history of excellence in contemporary oil painting.

Envisioning Henry IV, Part 1 @ Lantern Theater – Da Vinci Art Alliance

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Ona Kalstein by her three entries in the Envisioning Henry IV, Part 1 in the Black Box Gallery @ St. Stevens Theater @ 10th & Ludlow Sts, Lantern Theater Company. Ona designed images signified with memes, language and typography in a trio of drawings; child-like blood drops spurt from the cracked crown, a “garment made of blood” is saturated with droplets while the King wails and blood soaks the pea fields of the Battle of Shrewsbury with red tear-drops, the simple shapes communicating on multiple levels. Ona designs hippy-style typography into the image as if they are pages in a coloring book for kids with sophisticated adult language.

June Blumberg‘s exuberant composition of the hard partying gang hanging around Prince Hal are a buffoonish bunch of clowns – thuggish, scary clowns with swords and big smiles. Blumberg won an honorable mention for her painting from the jury committee…the naive primitivism & quirky composition is fun but not jokey.

Alden Cole attended Lantern Theater Company‘s Art Director, Charles McMann‘s, lecture @ Da Vinci Art Alliance in late February since the play had everyone scratching their heads, Henry IV, Part 1 is not one of Shakespeare‘s better known plays, and the lecture sent Cole into an exploration of the Seven Deadly Sins and how they relate to the characters in the play – Hal is slovenly, Falstaff is corpulent and Hotspur is haughty – all based on self-portraits. To develop the composition Alden acts out the facial expressions, photographs himself, composes the scene in Photoshop then paints in oils on an enormous canvas. Acedia Luxuria Superbia.

Lilliana Didovic, Lilliana Didovic & David Foss @ Envisioning Henry IV, Part 1. Didovic painted abstract weapons and Foss layered and destroyed paint to visualize wounded flesh, the metaphors and significations are not forced but real. The exhibition is loosely divided between “abstract” and “representational” art, like a battle of the art styles, David’s painting is visceral and scarred like a mutilated warrior and Lilliana’s gentle coloration is a contradiction in terms – beautiful weapons.

Mina Smith-Segal with her award winning painting, the brutalist watercolor truly captures the tension & fear of battle.

Hal by DoN, oil on canvas. Photo by Morris Klein. DoN Brewer used a variety of media to draw from such as fitness magazines, hairy bear blogs and Google to find inspiration for a new painting based on the play, after being creatively blocked around painting, having a theme to work inspired DoN to paint again. DoN saw Hal through Jersey Shore eyes with “the situation” and “GTL” representing the young prince, the hairy bear as Falstaff and a leather bar of conspirators based on a painting by John Cawse.

Envisioning Henry IV, Part 1 in the Black Box Theater in the Saint Steven’s Theater is running in conjunction with the Lantern Theater Company’s production of the Shakespeare historical play.

DoNBrewer light beings @ The Coffee Bar

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DoN Brewer @ his artist reception. All event photos by Peter Prusinowski.

The Center for Emerging Visual Artists hosted an artist reception for DoN Brewer and the Philadelphia Art-erati turned out in full force – friends & colleagues from the past, present & future converged on the Coffee Bar @ 17th & Locust to support DoN‘s explorations into photography. Amie Potsic of CFEVA (& fellow photographer) and Ann Koivunen worked with the Coffee Bar to have a POST (Philadelphia Open Studio Tours) artist show in their recently remodeled cafe – the buttery walls and excellent lighting is so satisfying and easy on the eyes the photos have never looked better – and out of 30 artists the team presented, they picked DoN. What an incredible honor & pleasure to represent Philadelphia Artists in the venerable Warwick Hotel, a landmark & planetary crossroad; DoN overheard languages from all over the world, it is so gratifying to have the work stand on it’s own, this being the largest collection of DoN‘s “light being” series to date.

Muralist David Guinn, his Dad & Plastic Club former President Mike Guinn, the back of Ted Warschal‘s head, Cynthia Arkin (manager of The Plastic Club website), UArts’ Regina Barthmeier, DoN, Ona Kalstein and Rob Stauffer (Rob mounted, matted and framed most of the show, his outstanding presentation skills enhances the work immeasurably) @ the Artist Reception for “light beings“.

Enhabitues of the Philly art scene, Regina & Lisa lounge below light being (Thelma) @ the artist reception for DoN Brewer‘s light beings show @ The Coffee Bar – these intrepid art crawlers have been extremely supportive of DoN‘s career and have been present at almost every art event important to his reputation. Having friends be there when you need them is so important to an artists ego – Merci!

Ann Koivunen of The Center for Emerging Visual Artists manages the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours submissions (going on now) and took DoN’s feeble attempt at image size accuracy and created the terrific transparent labels, a beautiful bio book and documentation – Thank you Ann for your patience!

light being (Leo Seeger), DoN Brewer @ The Coffee Bar, The Radisson Warwick Hotel through July 2010. This image has appeared in several art shows from the Philadelphia Sketch Club’s Absolutely Abstract Show to The University of Princeton Medical Center’s ArtFirst show to The Beauty Shop Cafe @ 20th & Fitzwater – DoN LoVeS it when people start seeing “light beings” in the wild.

Thanks to Shoshana Aron, Alden Cole & Les Howard for helping hang the show, Rob Stauffer for framing and the Center for Emerging Visual Artists for their tireless support of artists in Philadelphia. DoN will be announcing an artist talk date soon.

Special thanks to Peter Prusinowski for photographing the event and his support and friendship, it’s such a good feeling to be recognized as an artist by peers – Philadelphia XOXO.