Category Archives: Philadelphia

The Philly art scene is vibrant, filled with characters who create innovative, avant garde art in the 21st Century. New techniques and technologies are converging to develop a new vision of reality.

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe Grand Opening

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Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe Grand Opening, fine home decor, interior design, antiques and vintage.

Mae Downs & Co. has been operating out of the artist studio building 1241 Carpenter Street for years but now they have taken the leap to opening a lovely shop at 1118 Pine Street in Philadelphia. The studio shared by Brian Campbell, the dish and pottery collector/connoisseur and Kevin McLaughlin, the fabulously creative fabric artist was inviting and inspiring but hard to find in the maze of studios.

Now, with a simply gorgeous storefront window decorated with vintage pottery such as Clarise Cliff pots and Kevin McLaughlin‘s own aspirational handmade pillows, the duo have staked a claim for elegant home decor among the galleries, restaurants and antique stores along Pine Street.

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe 1118 Pine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107

Quirky yet homey the collection of elegant china, fun vintage finds and handmade pillows and sachets creates an aura of fine living Philadelphians have longed for after existing too long with Swedish flat-packed furniture. The collection isn’t old fashioned at all with a mix of mid-century modern, art deco and 21st century craft proving good design is timeless and desirable.

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe

Kevin McLaughlin‘s handmade strawberry shaped sachets are made with vintage fabrics and stuffed with luscious lavender. Each piece is unique and have even been sold at The Philadelphia Museum of Art gift shop. When DoN visited the workshop during a Philadelphia Open Studio Tour a few years back, Kevin chatted while not missing a stitch as he assembled each berry from fine flannels, linens, wools and re-cycled knits. The sachets are so popular that design maven Brini Maxwell even featured the fine sachets on her popular webpage and YouTube channel.

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe

Each of these gorgeous pillows are handmade by Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe proprietor Kevin McLaughlin and are affordably priced in the low three figure range. Considering the time and effort lovingly put into each piece, these pillows will need to be re-stocked as Philadelphians discover the beauty of these fine American made products.

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe

DoN had the opportunity to chat with shop co-proprietor Brian Campbell and asked about the challenges of opening a small business in these harsh financial times? “Well, the economy has certainly been a challenge. I started by collecting pottery and turned to china, and I started collecting obsessively. And then I found I had too much stuff so I started selling it on ebay and then opened the studio to keep it all and sell. I share the studio with Kevin McLaughlin of Mae Downs and Co., so we had his shop and my storage and we would have open houses but it wasn’t a retail space with little foot traffic.”

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe

Brian Campbell explained, “We wanted a place where people could come and get to us easily. And we found it. ebay worked out when I first started doing it but after America tanked after 2007, sales started going down. The last year or two it’s been on the rise again, there’s definitely, um, people are paying more for things. So, that was kind of a clue that maybe it was time to start thinking of opening a shop. Whenever I go to a shop I ask them, ‘How’s business?’, because in the back of my mind I was always thinking about opening a shop.”

“As I started getting better reports from small shop owners, I thought, ‘OK, maybe it’s time?’, and this kind of fell into our lap. We saw it in the City Paper and we met with the realtor. I stopped in early on my way to work, I have a job at The Mural Arts Program, and we loved it so we applied and they loved what we do and felt really good about what we were doing. And that it would be a good fit for the street. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect, we found the space in August, we took the lease beginning September 1st. All we really had to do was paint the floor and then move stuff in, we still have some work we want to do but we want it to be open so people can walk around and not feel like they’re in a museum.”

Mae Downs & Co. Shoppe

“I was trying to describe to someone what the feeling was like and the line came up, “Where Sister Parish meets Dorothy Draper“, said Brian Campbell before he was drawn back into the shop to answer questions about the eclectic merchandise by excited shoppers.

Written and Photographed by DoN Brewer

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More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339

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More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Lucas Foglia, Lunea with Deer Rib

“Girls are getting into abstract analysis
That want to make that intuitive leap
They are making plans that have far reaching effects” – Talking Heads, The Girls Want To Be With The Girls, More Songs About Buildings & Food

Gallery 339 at the corner of 21st and Pine Streets is dedicated to fine art photography, the chic space always has something special and inspirational to see. Spending time alone there with the incredible images is one of DoN‘s favorite things to do because there is nowhere else like it to see art by master photographers (except PPAC, of course) but that’s across town. The gallery has become a destination for photography lovers from around the world and it’s right down the street from Haus of DoN. Usually the gallery is dedicated to just a few photographers, focussing on a body of work but More Photos About Buildings and Food is a large group theme show with many of the great photographers who have exhibited in the past at the gallery.

The opening night was more like a party than an opening with a DJ spinning classic Talking Heads songs at ear throbbing volume making it impossible to talk but that only meant the party spilled out into the street. The eclectic mix of images are either about buildings or food, all of them spectacular and special examples of the state of the art in fine art photography. Some are easy to look at, some disturbing and deep, others are pop art or documentary style. The mix is heady and exciting, the crowd was loud and rambunctious – just the way DoN likes it.

More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Martin Parr, Turkey Leg, Disneyland, Tokyo, 1998, chromogenic print

More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Vincent Feldman, Shizuoka Shinbun and Broadcasting System Tower, carbon pigment print

Vincent Feldman lives down the block from DoN and it was a nice surprise to see him and his family at the show, it was an even better surprise to see his work in the show with spectacular prints of Japanese modern architecture. Over the roar of the music we chatted about his contribution to the exhibit. DoN asked how Vincent Feldman, a professor of photography at University of the Arts, got involved with More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339?

“Well, I live in the neighborhood near the gallery, so I know Martin McNamara, the owner and director of the gallery and he’s actually purchased some of my work in the past. So the work that he owns is what’s being exhibited but they’re a larger scale. I take pictures of buildings and that’s part of the theme of the show, so, it worked out for this exhibit.”

DoN asked how long Vincent Feldman has been involved in photography? “Thirty-plus years, most of my life.” Not long ago the artist unloaded a bunch of enlargers for people to glean from the street which lead DoN to think maybe he had gone digital. “I still have some enlargers, but the prints I’ve been doing lately, I would say, are mostly digital but I always shoot film. It’s four by five negatives, there’s nothing comparable for me to shoot digitally in that size. I use a large format 4 x 5, Toyo, a Japanese company”

Do you still have a darkroom, they seem to be going away? “Yes. There are still a lot of darkrooms, in fact, they seem to be a growth industry since a lot of them have been decommissioned and I teach, too, and a lot of students want to print in the darkroom. They want to make real prints. It’s a magical process, I love working with the computer but I think you should know what real photography looks like before you try and make it with a computer. You can make anything, you can print out an M16 now, a working gun, so what’s to prevent students from doing that, when you give them a computer you’ve got to focus them and the computer’s not a great thing to focus with if you’re just learning.”

“I have a book coming out in the Spring called Philadelphia City Abandoned about the civic architecture of the city. I’m working with Paul Dry a Philadelphia publisher and he’s been really great and hopefully it’s going to be a beautiful book that will last a long time.”

More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Mary Parisi, Wounded Soup, chromogenic print

More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Ion Zupco, American Homes Portfolio, gelatin silver prints

More Photos About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, David Graham

Gallery 339‘s Martin McNamara has agreed to help jury the upcoming Photographic Society of Philadelphia‘s 150th Anniversary exhibit at the Plastic Club in November, read more about the upcoming show at SideArts.com.

Written and Photographed by DoN Brewer

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Violent Silence

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As DoN listens to DJ PolishedSolid‘s weekly internet radio broadcast on Mixlr.com, the adrenaline from the past few days is dispersing with the music. The set this week is called Violent Silence, a genre hopping music mix with violence as this week’s theme. Maybe it’s the full moon but some folks are acting crazy as a Zombie Apocalypse out there.

As you might imagine, DoN‘s e-mail inbox is maxed out – over 10,000 un-read messages! With house-keeping in mind, DoN un-subscribed to dozens of newsletters and deleted hundreds of messages without malice of intent. All of the newsletters thanked me for my patronage – except one. DoN opened an e-mail thinking it would be another “are you sure?” message and instead it said, “Since you are being such an ass about things please unsubscribe “name withheld” form you banal reviews.” Note the typos.

DoNArTNeWs had reviewed this artist’s work about a dozen times over the years; all posts mentioning the artist have been deleted from this blog. To be clear, DoN receives no compensation for writing this blog. In fact, it costs money to maintain this site, travel to events and post blog stories. Even though the site has advertising through Amazon and CJ.com, the niche market DoN writes about does not produce any income. DoN writes for his own enjoyment, intellectual development and support for the Philadelphia art community he loves.

If you are using social media to promote your art, take it from DoN, insulting your promoters will not bring you more business or happiness. DoNArTNeWs will continue to post reviews about art in the most positive light possible, focussing on emerging artists, small galleries and studios. If a story about you doesn’t get posted, it’s not that DoN doesn’t like you or your work, only that time has run out since DoN is an army of one. Except for the wonderful Jeff Stroud who shares his photography with us with grace and gratitude.

In the coming days DoN will be posting stories about Michelle Post‘s Tronies show at Da Vinci Art Alliance, More Photographs About Buildings and Food at Gallery 339, Robert Bohne at Artists’ House Gallery, the fabulous show of drawings at The Philadelphia Sketch Club curated by Bill Scott and Alex Kanevsky and more, more more…this is the 496th blog post on DoNArTNeWs. Thanks DJ PolishedSolid for the inspiration.

LoVe

DoN

Written and Photographed by DoN Brewer

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Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen

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Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen, photo by Jeff Stroud

Did you ever want to print one of your photos big, really big, like 64″ wide and almost as long as you want? Silicon Fine Art Prints has six Epson wide format printers at their disposal to make your dreams come true, plus they will help you realize your passion with expert advise. That’s why many of Philadelphia’s finest fine art photographers trek to Old City to have their prints made. And for the month of September studio:christensen, on 20th Street, is displaying a collection of incredibly imaginative images produced in the Silicon Fine Art Prints workshop.

studio:christensen is a unique gallery/design space/pop-up shop featuring art, furniture, fashion and photography for the discerning urban dweller. Just walking by the storefront is inspiring, going inside to meet the friendly owner Jt Christensen and his (may DoN say) glamorous assistant Joanna Babarakos is to step into a world of approachable yet unusual design and art.

Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen

Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen, Joel Lederer

When one enters the gallery, the modern art mixed with beautiful furnishings is satisfyingly uplifting. But Joel Lederer‘s bold pair of enormous prints draws you towards them like a magnet. DoN asked Joel Lederer about the luminous prints, “The images are from a game called Second Life, it’s an on-line 3D virtual world, a massive multi-user on-line role playing game. What this project is, is essentially landscape photography, straight landscape photography, inside that virtual world. And it’s like a survey of essentially different styles that are used to create that community. What’s unique about it is that whereas other games have sort of a set narrative, and a set aesthetic, Second Life’s content is built by the users. You can go in there and rent virtual land and decorate it however you want and bring your own content and textures. I thought that was kind of interesting, so my goal was to bring as many different types of styles of landscape photography within that world.”

Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen

Joel Lederer continues, “In the beginning I was like how do I take a survey view? A documentary view? I figured since the virtual world is built from styles of the real world, I’d have to emulate the individual styles.” DoN asked if it’s a screen shot? “It’s a little more difficult than that, but it’s like a high resolution screen shot.”

Silicon Fine Art Prints at studio:christensen

Joel Lederer‘s work is also on display at SITE Santa Fe, in a show called More Real. “A whole show about truthiness and virtuality.”

“More Real? Art in the Age of Truthiness presents work by some of today’s most accomplished and promising international artists who are examining our shifting experience of reality. Over the past century, during a period of unprecedented technological change and global social upheaval, once-established beliefs, or “truths,” have been cast into doubt, changing and shaping our understanding and experience of reality. Through diverse media and in unexpected ways, this exhibition explores the impact and role of deception, play, memory, power, simulation, and new technologies on art and everyday life.” SITE Santa Fe website.

Written and Photographed by DoN Brewer except where noted, thanks to photographer, Jeff Stroud

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Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery

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Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery

Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery is a collection of photographs of desolate scenes of water, eerily beautiful and mysterious landscapes far from civilization. The exhibition is a combination of photographs printed on paper and aluminum, DoN spoke with the artist at the opening about the process to print on metal. Derek Jecxz explained, “About sixteen or seventeen of them are on aluminum and they were very difficult to do. There is probably between five and ten hours work in each one. Cleaning the aluminum, getting the chemicals off of it, sanding the aluminum multiple times and then prepping it again and then coating it with a chemical so that I could then get it through and printed on.”

Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery

“And then it has to dry for five days, then I have to varnish it, and then I have to trim it off the big metal sheet.”

“Wow!” said DoN. “I know!.” said Derek, “I think I bit off more than I could chew. And then you have to try and keep it flat. I’m using an Epson 9800, but I’m not running the metal directly through, I attach it to a carrier sheet, I didn’t have the confidence of running the metal right through. So I tape it to a big sheet of paper and run that paper through, this way I’m not going to ruin the printer on the edges. That was my main fear.”

Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery

DoN asked if it’s such a laborious process how did Jecxz decide which images to use? “Well, I knew the subject of the show was going to be water because that was my predominant theme. When I did a series of tests I noticed that if a picture had a light element in it, it allowed the luminescence of the aluminum to shine through, so that was an easy decision for me. The process was difficult because of a lot of false starts, I tried stainless steel, I tried different sanding techniques – a lot of false starts.

DoN wondered why the photographer didn’t use a commercial producer? “I did find two vendors, one vendor sells aluminum sheets with a max width of twenty inches, I can’t use that with medium format photography for big prints twenty inches doesn’t work. Another company sells very, very shiny aluminum and it’s not what I liked.”

Derek Jecxz, Forsaken Waters, Twenty-Two Gallery

Distinguishing between the aluminum and paper prints is difficult, which is which? Derek Jecxz explained, “Anything with plexi is paper anything that has no cover is aluminum. You can see my hand from sanding it, everything is personal, I stamp each one and everything is unique. So this starts out as a three by three foot sheet, I hand sand it for about five hours multiple times and then the process goes from there. The smaller ones were easier than the larger ones but you can see where the white really came through.”

Derek Jecxz shoots with Hasselblad , some film, some digital but most of the photographs are digital. DoN commented that whenever he takes his camera to the beach it doesn’t work so well because of the humidity. Derek said, “I was standing in the water, probably knee deep or higher, with the waves crashing in. I will risk the gear to take the shot, the gear is irrelevant. You’re there to make a picture not protect your gear.”

The illusion of whiteness in Derek Jecxz‘s photographs is uncanny, the somewhat matte finish to the metal shows through where white in the picture is because printers don’t print white ink. The presentation is exquisite with the photographs mounted in hand-made frames, the room filled with images of distant places and primordial seascapes. Twenty-Two Gallery is located on 22nd Street and has twenty-two member artists, the solo show in the front gallery visible from the street and an intimate gallery with works by the twenty-one other member artists.

Written and Photographed by DoN Brewer

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