Over the last couple of decades or so, I’ve curated or
organized well over a couple of hundred art shows for galleries, museums, art
centers, art fairs, etc. One of things that all of those events always seem to
have in common is the always-surprising degree of difficulty in assembling a
curated or juried group show.
This is always made difficult because (in my experience) the
number of artists available to select from, and the amount of work able to be
selected is always in conflict by a gargantuan exponential factor: there are
always many, many more good artists than there’s space to hang a show.
And thus, one of the true constants of the curatorial
task is the harsh reality of eliminating good work from an exhibition; reducing
the amount of paintings, drawings, photographs, sculptures, etc. simply because
of the finite amount of space to display it.
Competitions and “Call for Artists” are even worse,
because artists are actively “competing” against each other for the selective
nod from the juror or curator.
Let me tell you why: the brilliance of
Artomatic (and
what nearly every art critic and scribe seems to miss) is the mind-numbing
diversity of what happens when 1,000 or so visually-dominant earthlings gather
together to exhibit tens of thousands of work of art.
From the vast resources of the last Artomatic I could
have easily organized a curated show with a strict focus on flowers, or nudes,
or politics, or sex, or robots, or chickens, or music, or green art, or extra-terrestrials,
etcetera, etcetera, etcetera (Note to self: do some of these shows in the
future).
Instead, and drawing from my spectacularly enviable
experience in assembling ass-kicking art shows, I used what I call “The Campello
Group Show Success Formula.”
The formula is brilliant in its simplicity: start with a
core number of well-established, well-known artists that will draw the savvy
artsy crowds in; add some mid-level emerging artists hungry for the rung to the
next level, and stir in some hungry, seldom seen newcomers to the art scene of
the DMV. Because of the sheer size of Artomatic, the competitive factor – and
thus the difficulty of the job at hand – was very high.
And so, the formula brings a tried and true approach to
group show organization – these are not a selection of the “Best Artomatic
Artists According to Campello”; that show would have been easy to organize.
This is instead a show selected to offer you one man’s view of what Artomatic
is all about, but in a manageable space guaranteed not to burn out your sensory
nerves. You will see blue chip DMV artists that you and I know well, you'll see artists that I've never met, you'll see artists whom I represent or have represented, you'll see artists that will raise your eyebrow, and you'll see artists whose work you'll like, and artists whose work will leave you unimpressed.
The results in this show will surprise you, entertain
you, capture your imagination and perhaps even disappoint you here and there,
but overall they will give you this ardent Artomatic lover’s caressing
curatorial opinions and evidence to support my theory that Artomatic is the
greatest art group show on planet Earth.
Location:
Pepco Edison Place Gallery
702 8th Street, NW
Washington DC 20068
Reception Date:
Wednesday, February 13th, 6 - 8 pm
Exhibition Dates:
Friday, February 8 - Friday, February 22.
Gallery Hours:
Tuesday-Friday, Noon to 4 p.m.
