Category Archives: Philadelphia Artists

Philadelphia’s art scene is vibrant, ever-changing, combining technique and technology for new visions of reality, creating a transformative influence on life-style in the urban community and beyond.

Making Beautiful

Making Beautiful Objects, The Art and Life of Stoney Lamar, John Thornton Films

Stoney Lamar makes beautiful sculptures out of wood and his work is traveling the country in a show called A Sense of Balance. His work can be seen at Philadelphia’s Center for Art in Wood and the Synderman – Works Galleries through April 18, 2015. He talks about his life and career and how Parkinson’s Disease is affecting his work. – John Thornton

“What is true is that no matter how striking, unique and evolutionary Stoney Lamar’s career has been, he arrived at its beginning some decades ago by an entirely different path. He learned his geometrical theory in a pool hall; he aggravated his minister-father; he grappled with a war; he set out in a career direction that he neither liked nor decided he was much good at; he almost by accident discovered what he was good at, at long last feeling the call in his hands and soul.” – excerpt artist statement Stoney Lamar

William Stoney Lamar (b. 1951) has contributed exceptional skill and vision to the world of wood turning for over 25 years. Stoney Lamar’s sculpture is created primarily through a unique approach to multi-axial lathe work, giving his pieces a distinct sense of line and movement unlike other works of turned wood. He lets the shape, color and modeling of the wood determine a piece’s finished appearance and employs paint and metal in his forms. Stoney Lamar is a founder of the American Association of Woodturners, teaches and lectures, and has served on the boards of the American Craft Council, The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design, and of the Southern Highland Craft Guild. The Center for Art in Wood is proud to present this retrospective, the final venue on the national tour, in our Gerry Lenfest Gallery.” – Center for Art in Wood website

Stoney Lamar: Standing Forms. On view from March 6, 2015 to April 18, 2015. This exhibit is in conjunction with A Sense of Balance: The Sculpture of Stoney Lamar, a solo exhibit traveling throughout the US, which will open at the Center for Art in Wood in mid-February.

Saturday, March 7, 2015 | 2:00 – 4:00 | Tour of Stoney Lomar: Standing Forms at Synderman – Works Galleries, followed by a gallery talk, tour of A Sense of Balance: The Sculpture of Stoney Lamar, and reception at The Center for Art in Wood with Stoney Lamar, Curator Andrew Glasgow, and studio artist and writer Bruce Metcalf. The Center for Art in Wood is located across the street from Synderman – Works Galleries at 141 N. 3rd Street, Philadelphia, PA.” – Synderman – Works Galleries

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Mystification

mystification, Marco HillMystificationMarco Hill, Yawn Jawn, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

Mystification

A Deeper Look Into the Art of Rebecca Nurick and Marco Hill

Written and photographed by Laura Storck

As a cult practitioner and follower monochromatic image makers, let’s just say I was a little more than excited (okay, I was ecstatic!) to see the exhibit, A Deeper Look Into the Art of Rebecca Nurick and Marco Hill at the Jed Williams Gallery on February 28th.  In addition to the opening reception held 2 weeks prior, this reception offered a variety of additional smaller prints not shown in the exhibit at easily affordable prices for cash and carry.

mystification, Marco HillMystificationMarco Hill, Still Standing, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

According to gallery owner and fine artist Jed Williams, “These unique photographs expand on the themes currently displayed by both photographers at the gallery. The images provide a deeper look into the artistic vision of Hill and Nurick.”

After I was welcomed into the cozy and inviting space by Rebecca NurickMarco Hill, and Jed Williams, immediately I could witness the similarities shared between both exhibits as my eye scanned across the gallery space.  Besides making some interpretations of their respective visions in black and white, I learned that both Nurick and Hill are heavily influenced from their training in film capture and processing. One fitting example is Hill’s Into the Darkness, a black and white 35-mm film capture of an ascending stairwell that appears to rise toward the cavernous and shadowy unknown.

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick, Train, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

Other similar pieces between both artists follow street themes, such as Hill’s 9th and Mifflin Sunset and Nurick’s Train. Not only do they offer a gritty urban vibe but they are portrayed in the fashion of Kodachrome color. Common themes exist – both artists offer feelings of emotional connection and timelessness, yet both also convey ephemerality and human transience in their story telling. A dynamic interplay can be seen as dotted lines are invisibly connected back and forth amongst their works.

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick, Viaduct, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

Many of Marco Hill‘s street photographs were captured in South Philadelphia where he resides, with this series punctuated by Still Standing, an emotionally moving image of an abandoned log cabin that harkens back to Hill’s native Virginia roots. His sense of humor, quick wit, and sense of curiosity is evident in unusual and quirky captures such as Yawn Jawn, Brick Work, and Abandoned Door.

mystification, Marco HillMystificationMarco Hill, 9th and Mifflin Sunset, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

Marco Hill’s artist statement

“I roam the streets of the city looking for things that are unusual or things that I think would ordinarily go unnoticed…I actually got started in art as a musician, but after I found a love for photography the camera replaced the guitar as my instrument of choice.  I call my approach to photography playing the blues with a camera.”

One of Rebecca Nuricks special prints are quite powerful: a striking image of a fearless mythological sunflower standing heroically in the face of foreboding dark cumulus clouds – with the hint of a silver lining. Her portraitures range from the human form to animal skeletons, expressed monochromatically, printed digitally, but expressed with the look of silver gelatin. I was instantly struck at how Torso, with it’s coppery tinge and grainy cloak has the look and feel of a super sized tintype. Also striking is Viaduct, another moody and cataclysmic image that instantly transported me back in time to David Lynch‘s Eraserhood.

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick, Nude, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

Rebecca Nurick’s artist statement

“I find myself gravitating to photography, as it allows me to capture an image that is interesting to me and alter it in a way that can give it a hyper-real quality while still maintaining its true nature.  The elevation of the ordinary is thrilling to me. The creative post-production of a photo is as enjoyable to me as the act of capturing the original subject.”

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick, Clawfoot #2, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

This exhibit consists of very well-crafted images that will appeal to fans of digital, film, and alternative processing techniques alike. Kudos to Jed Williams for this excellent pairing of photographers in one show, as both artists’ works play off each other and form a dialogue. Mystification is on display through March 15, 2015.

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick, Skull #2, digital print, Jed Williams Gallery

mystification, Rebecca NurickMystificationRebecca Nurick explains her art process, Jed Williams Gallery

ABOUT JED WILLIAMS GALLERY

Jed Williams Gallery is a unique art space owned and operated since 2010 by artist Jed Williams. Jed showcases up-and-coming and inspiring artists from the local area, including his own work, along with providing a look into the workings of an actual artist studio. The gallery shows a variety of thoughtful, cutting edge works ranging from 2D, mixed media and painting, to video, installation and sculpture.

mystification, Jed Williams GalleryMystificationJed Williams Gallery

Marco Hill Photography

Rebecca Nurick Photography

Jed Williams Gallery

615 Bainbridge St., Philadelphia, PA 19147 (267) 970-5509

mystification, Jed Williams GalleryJed Williams GalleryMystification, A Deeper Look Into the Art of Rebecca Nurick and Marco Hill, by Laura Storck

Written and photographed by Laura Storck

Instagramhttp://instagram.com/laurastorck/

Facebook:  https://facebook.com/laura.h.storck

Twitter: @Laura_Storck

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SIMULATE – PERMEATE

Simulate - Permeate, Rowan University Art GalleryInstructions to the Internet, Christopher McManus

SIMULATE – PERMEATE

Exhibition examines materiality, experience, and authorship in technology-based art.

Glassboro, NJ – Rowan University Art Gallery presents Simulate – Permeate from January 20 to March 7, 2015 with a reception and artist’s talk on Wednesday, February 11 from 5:00 to 7:00 pm.

Curated by Mat Tomezsko, Curator and Program Manager at InLiquid Art & Design, the exhibition features the work of eight Philadelphia-based artists and artist groups making innovative use of new media that collectively examine concepts of materiality, experience, and authorship in technology-based contemporary art.

  • Lyn Godley makes use of naturally occurring responses to particular light wavelengths and imagery in her photographs of water, which are altered digitally and threaded (by hand) with optic fiber and lit with LEDs to achieve an undulating effect.
  • Juggling Wolf, a multidisciplinary collective dedicated to creating video and animation that is technically challenging and visually rewarding, offers two versions of a new video: one full length playing in the gallery and a shorter version broadcast across campus using the technological infrastructure of the university.
  • Christopher McManus’ work is a sculpture and a 20 second video that plays in reaction to the audience’s interaction with the sculpture, which is a piece meant to be a physical representation of the internet: friendly, cute, and enticing while simultaneously being completely repulsive, mean-spirited, and horrifying.
  • A collective of artists, engineers, and designers dedicated to bringing engaging and empowering art to the public, and to encouraging a sense of ownership to community spaces, New American Public Art has created an encounter with a monitor of a live video feed with a temporal delay. The delay is just long enough to create a disconnect, yet remain familiar as viewers are faced with images of themselves from the near past, but just beyond immediate memory.
  • Maria Schneider’s work begins with a pencil on paper drawing, which is then scanned and laser printed onto layers of polycarbonate and illuminated with LED light. The drawings evoke a common experience and a familiar medium, but are transformed by the technological process to become something new.
  • Jody Sweitzer’s outdoor sound and video installation is triggered by the movement of pedestrians on the patio after dark. The seemingly sinister messenger subverts the familiar recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance and emphasizes the tendency to insert religion into what is supposed to be a secular context.
  • Chris Vecchio’s work is about interaction and meant to be touched, and contains more than 500 samples of audio that can be triggered by the angle of movement, ensuring that every interaction between the viewer and the sculpture is unique and questions the traditional role of the art object.
  • TangenT is an artist collective dedicated to mixed-media, project-based immersive art environments exploring socially relevant and politically current themes. At Rowan, their immersive installation of disparate physical, visual, and sound elements seeks to examine the simultaneous connection and disconnection of experience, perception, and knowledge using government reporting on individuals and institutions as a meditation on information control, privacy, and truth.

Simulate - Permeate, Lyn GodleyLyn Godley, Waterwall

InLiquid Art & Design is a nonprofit organization committed to creating opportunities and exposure for visual artists while serving as a free, online public hub for arts information in the Philadelphia area. By providing the public with immediate access to view the portfolios and credentials of over 280 artists and designers via the internet; through meaningful partnerships with other cultural organizations; through community-based activities and exhibitions; and through an extensive online body of timely art information, InLiquid brings to light the richness of our region’s art activity, broadens audiences, and heightens appreciation for all forms of visual culture.

Admission to Rowan University Art Gallery, talks and reception is free and open to the public. Regular gallery hours are Monday – Friday, 10 am to 5 pm (with extended hours on Wednesdays to 7 pm); and Saturday, 12 to 5 pm.

Rowan University Art Gallery is located on the lower level of Westby Hall on the university campus, Route 322 in Glassboro, NJ. Directions can be found on the gallery or university websites. For more information, call 856-256-4521 or visit www.rowan.edu/artgallery.

This program is made possible in part with funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.

Thank you to Mary Salvante for the content of this blog post.

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Before Me

James B. AbbottSpring Tide at Newcomb Hollow Beach, Cape Cod National Seashore, James B. Abbott

The Landscape Before Me: Cape Cod

The Photography of James B. Abbott is Always in Season

Currently on view through February 6, 2015, St. Joseph’s University Gallery, Merion Station, Pennsylvania.

Public Reception on Thursday January 22, 6:00 – 8:00pm

In his largest exhibition of this work to date, James B. Abbott presents a timely meditation on Cape Cod across time. Large scale, multi-image panoramas display the drama of shifting tides, dunes and seasons while more intimate prints examine the subtleties of the moors and marshes. Taken over 15 years, this collection of images moves audiences into a contemplative space where time, place and scale are in constant flux.

The Landscape Before Me, is on display at St. Joseph’s University Gallery through Friday, Feb. 6, 2015. A reception for the artist will be held on Thursday, Jan. 22, from 5-7 p.m.

“The space of the Outer Cape has an inherent ambiguity of scale with little reference to familiar things, which makes it very malleable from a photographic and optical perspective,” remarks Abbott of his work with this landscape. “The dunes, tides, light, and water are never the same and they combine in so many different ways that I continually find new and interesting approaches to recording them.”

The cross section of images presented in The Landscape Before Me is from an ongoing body of work started in 2000 in South Wellfleet, Massachusetts while the artist was vacationing with his family. The work took on full commitment after he was accepted the Outer Cape Artist-in-Residence Consortium, managed by the Peaked Hill Trust. Through volunteers, the organization facilitates artists spending two weeks in a primitive dune shack with no electricity or no running water. The shelter was 400 feet from the ocean, isolated in the Peaked Hill dunes of the Cape Cod National Seashore, and provided unparalleled concentration and immersion in the landscape. This opportunity placed Abbott in the epicenter of an extraordinary environment, gave him the solitude to think, and came with a mandate to create. With this increased knowledge and appreciation of the place, his work took a new direction with increased momentum in the years following the first residency. Abbott has returned independently over 20 times since the May 2003 residency and in the summer of 2007, was awarded a three week C-Scape Dune Shack Artist Residency. This second residency was situated in a shack in the dunes of Race Point, for an intense three week period, and provided another unique time and situation to produce work.

The images are taken mostly in the Outer Cape region of the Cape Cod National Seashore in all four seasons. Abbott works with polaroid positive/negative multi-image panoramic and single wide-angle images printed and toned in a darkroom on conventional silver gelatin paper. Working in black and white allows the artist to approach the landscape without obvious tourist references, focusing instead on structure and nuance as he attempts to record a changing landscape. The ever-shifting sand dunes act as a three dimensional model as they record the primary forces and rhythm of nature. The sandscape seems to capture everything from the most minute shift of wind and tide to events of catastrophic force. The vocabulary of this landscape reflects permanence and mutability: where sea meets sky and land, where human intervention imprints the environment, and where the sky, sea and land often blend and/or mirror each other. The effects of currents of air are as evident as those of the sea in this place. At the most basic level, Abbott makes two dimensional photographic interpretations of these highly transitory three-dimensional records of natural and inflicted change.

Abbott’s goal is that the work will deal not only with how one perceives a place or thing but how one thinks of that place after encountering a visual representation of it. With emphasis on simultaneous micro and macro views or layer of information, the artist exploits the inherent descriptive nature of the photographic medium. He works on long term projects in one location and usually towards complex and diverse interpretations of a subject.  In many ways, his collected works form a comprehensive and sincere portrait of a place. The artist learns and builds from each trip, so that as it grows, each body of work takes on a life of its own.

The work in Cape Cod is one of four long term, photo-based investigations of specific locations; he has also worked extensively in Berlin, Germany, on and around the Benjamin Franklin Bridge in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and currently in Florence and Venice, Italy.

James B. AbbottPeaked Hill Dunes in Winter, Cape Cod National Seashore, James B. Abbott

James B. Abbott is a photographer who has maintained a studio in Philadelphia on North Third Street since 1983 and is a resident of Ardmore,Pa.  Abbott earned a degree in Photography from Cranbrook Academy of Art, interned at the Light Gallery in New York, New York and completed an apprenticeship with renowned American photographer Burk Uzzle. Abbott has served as photographer for the Stieglitz Center at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Gallery Director of the Burden Gallery at Aperture Foundation in New York City. Abbott has held faculty appointments at Penland School of Crafts, Moore College of Art and Design, the University of the Arts, Philadelphia University, Tyler School of Art, Temple University, and currently teaching in Italy for East Carolina University.

Over the course of the past twenty-five years Abbott has received many residencies and commissions; exhibited regularly; curated notable exhibitions and has built a successful international freelance photography and fine art practice. He has been a visiting artist and lecturer at Cranbrook Academy, a resident artist at the Cape Cod National Sea Shore, and lectured at the Griffin Museum of Photography in Winchester, Massachusetts. Abbott has been commissioned to create photographs for many projects and organizations including the Fairmount Park Art Association for their New.Land.Marks project, Rutgers University and NJN Public Television, and the Marriott Hotel. Abbott’s extensive exhibition history includes solo exhibitions at Harvard University, the Wellfleet Public Library, Free Library of Philadelphia, and the Lishui International Photo Festival in Lishui, China. Significant group exhibitions include the Atwater Kent Museum for the Museo Bardini in Florence, Italy, State Museum of Pennsylvania, The Print Center, and the National Constitution Center.

Abbott’s work is included in many public and private collections including the Federal Reserve Bank, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Abbott’s curatorial endeavors brought outstanding and stimulating work to Philadelphia through his gallery/exhibition space Exhibit 231. He put together exhibitions by Carl Toth, John Geard, Joel Katz, Geanna Merola and Sandy Sorlien.

Abbott has also received a number of grants and awards for his work: he is the recipient of three Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Individual Artist Awards, a SOS grant, and an Independence Foundation Fellowship in the Arts.

A solo exhibition of select images from this body of work will be on view at The Saint Joseph’s University Gallery featuring work from nearly two decades of working on Cape Cod. The Landscape Before Me will be on view from Monday December 22, 2014 through Friday February 6, 2015. There is a public artist reception on Thursday, January 22 from 6-8 pm. Saint Joseph’s University Gallery is located in Merion Hall on the James J. Maguire ’58 Campus at 355 N. Latches Lane in Merion Station, PA. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. – 7 p.m., and Saturday, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m.  More at www.sju.edu/gallery or by calling 610-660-1845.

Thank You to Ann Peltz at akkoivunen@gmail.com for this press release.

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Serious

Serious Play, ARTsisters, Center on the HillResilient Retreat, monotype by Linda Dubin Garfield

Center on the Hill8855 Germantown AvenuePhiladelphia, PA 19118 invites you to SERIOUS PLAY, a group exhibition featuring artwork by ARTsisters Priscilla Bohlen, Linda Dubin Garfield, Karen Leibman and Ruth WolfUsing a variety of styles and media, these artists make you smile and make you think. The exhibit will run November 1- 26, 2014Center on the Hill Gallery is open to the public Monday – Friday 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM.

ARTsisters is a group of professional women artists who empower each other and the community through their artARTsisters was founded in December 2005, by Linda Dubin Garfield who realized that her long-time friend and fellow artist Leslie DeBrocky (since deceased) functioned as more than a friend when it came to discussing and helping with her art. She was really an ARTsister, one who understood the process and could really understand the highs and lows involved with the challenges of a professional artist. Together they opened membership to other women and, through word of mouth, now have 24 members and an email list of more than 75 interested women artists. Sharing resources and offering support to each other, the members now have shown, both individually and in groups,  including shows in Chestnut Hill, Old City, Manayunk, Wayne, Wynnewood, the Wilmington Arts Commission in Delaware, the Widener University Art Gallery and the City of Philadelphia Board of Ethics. This spring ARTsisters will have their 10th Anniversary ART Show at Jenkins Arboretum.

Some of the non-profits we have collaborated with include: Adopt A Pig, Endow-A-Home, Philadelphia FIGHT, Juvenile Diabetes, The Cancer Support Community (formerly The Wellness Community of Philadelphia), The Food Trust, The Heart Association, Child Advocates and Laurel House.”

For more information, visit www.ARTsisters.org

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