Silverthorne at 2AM

Alexandra has a great idea!

And she's not even in the shower!

Read her idea here.

Tape Guy in the news

Mark Jenkins' current exhibition in our Georgetown gallery will be next week's "Best Bet" in WETA TV's Around Town program and also the "Hot Pick" of the week by the Washington Times.

MSAC Hosts Visual Artists' Registry

One of the largest registries of its kind, this free resource for regional artists seeking to promote their work and hosted by the Maryland State Arts Council, has been successfully connecting artists with curators, collectors, and buyers for more than 20 years.

With a steadily growing artist membership, MSAC and MAP are able to provide ready access to the images, resumes, and other relevant documentation of nearly 1,800 active artists in the region. The in-house Resource Center is open to the public and free of charge, Tues - Sat, 11am - 5pm. During regular hours appointments are recommended, but not necessary. For info, email them at registry@mdartplace.org or call 410-962-8565.

Opportunity for Artists

Deadline: Friday, October 7, 2005

Arlington Arts Center - Drawing: Tradition and Innovation. Exhibition Dates: November 15, 2005 to January 7, 2006.

All artists living or working in Virginia, Maryland, Washington, D.C., West Virginia, Pennsylvania, or Delaware are invited to enter. Drawings in any media on any kind of ground will be considered. No size restrictions, but work must fit through a standard double doorway. Outdoor works will also be considered.

Artists may submit slides or CD, application form, resume, and application fee. To obtain more information or to download a prospectus, visit their website at www.arlingtonartscenter.org, or call them at 703/248.6800.

For more info:
Arlington Arts Center
3550 Wilson Blvd
Arlington, VA 22201

Prospectus here.

Gallery Talk Tomorrow

Don't forget that the artists in the "Text" gallery of the Seven exhibition will be having a gallery talk about their work tomorrow starting at 2PM. Refreshments, art and art talk! All free and open to the public.

Molly Springfield, JT Kirkland, Denise Wolff, Mark Cameron Boyd and Michael Janis will discuss their artwork and themes. Warehouse Gallery 1021 7th St, NW, Washington, DC 20001.

Drawing Session tomorrow

Mr. Dave Quammen of MOCA in Georgetown, will be hosting an open drawing session at Light Street Gallery, 1448 Light Street, in Baltimore, on Sunday, September 18, 2005, from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm. There will be a live model for this session; the fee is $10.00 per artist.

To RSVP and for more info contact Dave Quammen at 202.966.0366 - 202.361.3810 cell - or email him at figuremodel@verizon.net.

Katzen

Submission guidelines for submissions to be considered for future shows at the American University Museum are posted here.

Submissions should be mailed to:

Jack Rasmussen
Director and Curator
American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center
4400 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20016-8031

Silverthorne on Fitts

Alexandra Silverthorne interviews Seven artist Michael Fitts.

Read the interview here.

Jacobson on Bailey

In the WCP, Louis Jacobson delivers a superb review of J.W. Bailey's current show in Reston.

Read the review here.

Text Gallery Talk

Featured artists from the "Text Gallery" in the current WPA/C group show SEVEN host a reception on Sunday, August 28, 2.00pm.

Molly Springfield, JT Kirkland, Denise Wolff, Mark Cameron Boyd and Michael Janis discuss their artwork and themes. Warehouse Gallery 1021 7th St, NW, Washington, DC 20001. Free to public.

See ya there!

Plane Pics

Herewith some plane shots from the flight from El-lay [The City of Angels] to San Diego.

So we take off from LAX


And we follow the coastline to San Diego


And we're about to land in San Diego


And as we are about to land, I notice how much the plane's engine looks like a shark!



And the plane has almost landed; safe and sound!

Plastic Photos

Herewith some photos from the Mark Jenkins opening last Friday. Later tonite I'm heading to Bergamot Station for some gallery meetings.

The fair Catriona Fraser


DCAC's Kristina Bilonick and her friend Paula


Plastic Man Assaulting Me


Solarize This' Alexandra Silverthorne having fun

Lots more opening photos here and J.T. Kirkland's review of the show here along with reviews of several other shows.


And the famous car, wearing one of those red clown noses that have been popping in sculptures and statutes all over town

In La-la Land

I'm running on two hours sleep, exhausted and thinking of a yellow moon.

More later... I promise.

Storker Photos

Alexandra Silverthorne has some photos of the Storker opening last Friday.

See them here.

Plastic Opening


In spite of the rain, last night's opening for Mark Jenkins and his plastic tape car was the largest one so far this year. I will have lots of photos up later, but meanwhile above is a shot of Mark being videotaped as part of the art documentary being filmed by Deno Seder.

The car couldn't be fitted through the gallery doors, so it was parked outside on the Square. It was then removed last night and will be parked somewhere in DC throughout the rest of the exhibition.

More photos and the car's location later.

Openings tonight

Don't forget that the five Canal Square Galleries have their extended hours and/or openings tonight from 6-9PM.

The five galleries are inside the Canal Square at 31st Street and M in G'town.

We will have Mark Jenkins.



See ya there!

Jacobson on our Summer Show

The WCP's Louis Jacobson reviews our current Annual Summer Group Show at our Bethesda gallery.

Read the review here.

Jacobson also reviews the current Academy 2005 show at Conner.

Read that review here.

Hsu on Wolov

The Washington City Paper's Huan Hsu has a cool article on Seven artist Samantha Wolov in the current issue of the CP.

Read it here.

Backers

In the last few days I've had a couple of emails from separate artists asking if I knew who the "backers" of a local gallery are.

What's a "backer," you may ask?

A backer is someone, usually an anonymous partner (often with more money than sense), who backs the gallery with money, so that the risky business of staying afloat as a business can be accomplished while at the same time dancing on the leading edge of visual culture.

Anecdote: I was once giving a DC area museum director a ride to his/her home, as the director had come to visit the gallery to look at our show. On the ride home, we started to discuss area galleries, and to gossip about them.

"So you guys are doing pretty well," the director notes, "with two galleries and all."

"It's a lot of work," I answered.

"So," says the director looking at me, "who's your backer?"

I looked at the director with a slight grin on my face, as I've been asked this question a million times before and I have such a good answer.

"For our first gallery in Georgetown," I began to answer, "it was Mr. Visa and Mr. Mastercard."

"For the large, new Bethesda gallery," I continued, "it was Southern Financial Bank's loan officer!" (We paid the entire loan off in our first year at Bethesda, by the way, as I hate owing money).

The director looked at me with a strange look, obviously a little disconcerted by the look of childish glee on my face.

Anyway... back to "backers."

In the last two or three months we have been approached by two separate individuals offering to "back us" in opening a gallery in Florida. One "backer" wanted to back a Fraser Gallery in Miami, while the second one offered to back us in opening a gallery in West Palm Beach.

We turned them down, naturally, it's already too much work running two galleries, and of course, with any "backer" comes a loss of total control of the business; money talks.

Mini Dawsons

Jessica Dawson has a few mini reviews in today's WaPo.

Read them here.

Gallery Director Needed

Artstaffing.com is currently seeking to fill a Gallery Director position for an important Washington, DC client of theirs.

The Gallery Director must have at least five years of experience in contemporary galleries. Excellent client relations, the willingness to develop and implement new
projects and initiatives and the ability to take the gallery "to the next level" are essential. A self-motivated approach and a BA in Art History or related strongly preferred; some experience in NYC or LA galleries and art fairs a plus. Salary $40K plus escalating commission rate.

Please send resume with detailed cover letter and names of three references to recruiters@artstaffing.com or call 212-779-7059 for more info.

Wanna work on a mural?

Every Saturday from 3 to 7pm this summer, a mosaic mural is being erected at 13th and Good Hope Road, SE. The mural is made completely of mosaic materials found from around the city. These materials include bathroom tiles, flat colored glass, old china, bottlecaps, seashells, keys and much more.

The project needs volunteers who are interested in helping create the mural. No drawing or art experience necessary!

Material donations are also welcome, especially small bathroom tiles and flat colored glass (scraps are fine too)... especially the color red! All material donations will be picked up and tax receipts are available upon request.

This mural is made possible by a grant from the DC Commission of Arts and Humanities, Facilitating Leadership in Youth (FLY), and Art on the Block.

for more info:
DC Commission on Arts and Humanities
Jill Blankespoor
blankespoor@yahoo.com

Studio Gallery looking for a new director

Deadline: Thursday, September 15, 2005.

Studio Gallery, the longest-established artist-owned cooperative gallery in the metropolitan Washington D.C. area, located in Dupont Circle, seeks a part-time Director to start work September 2005.

This person would be the public face of a gallery known for over 40 years for its standard of excellence as well as its mission to promote outreach and education in the visual arts.

Areas of responsibility : management and coordination of gallery operations, sales and marketing, liaison with artists, exhibitions and public relations . The candidate should have a background in and enthusiasm for the visual arts and good communication, organizing and writing skills. Computer literacy, including familiarity with website and graphic technology, is essential. Base Salary plus Commission

Please contact: Andrea Kraus, ARKRAUS@aol.com or 301.229.7878

Or submit resume, references and one-page writing sample to Andrea Kraus at the mailing address below:
Studio Gallery
Andrea Kraus
7701 Oldchester Road
Bethesda, MD 20817
t: 301.229.7878 or arkraus@aol.com or www.studiogallerydc.com

August

August always gets a bad rap as being a slow month for the visual arts around here. It's not true. There are a few exhibitions around our area that I need to get to in the next few days:

1. Academy 2005: The First Five Years at Conner Contemporary Art. The annual invitational survey of work by recent graduates in Washington/Baltimore area college art programs. The exhibition's curator and founder, Jamie L. Smith has selected paintings, drawings, digital photography, sculpture and performance art by the following artists: Jason Bulluck – Howard University, Andrew Haskell – Georgetown University, Stephanie Hulbert – Catholic University, Patrick Kelly – The George Washington University, Maki Maruyama – Corcoran College of Art and Design, Jenna McCracken – The George Washington University, Julia Rommel – American University, Zach Storm – Corcoran College of Art and Design, Kate Taylor – Maryland Institute College of Art, Bret Webb – Maryland Insititute College of Art, and Virginia Warwick – University of Maryland.

This year’s special anniversary celebration also features new work including video, drawing, and photography from the following past Academy shows 2001 – 2004 alumni: Lisa Bertnick - Corcoran College of Art and Design- Academy 2001; Karin Horlbeck - Maryland Institute College of Art - Academy 2002; Noah Angell - Corcoran College of Art and Design - Academy 2003; and Mary Coble -The George Washington University - Academy 2004.

2. "Burnversions" - Solo Exhibition of "Rough Edge Photography" by James W. Bailey at the Reston Community Center.

3. The Human Form at Touchstone Gallery and juried by Anne Goodyear, Ph. D., Assistant Curator at the National Portrait Gallery.

4. Beyond Synergy at the Anne C. Fisher Gallery in Georgetown.

Bailey on Mark Cameron Boyd

Bailey has an excellent interview with Seven artist Mark Cameron Boyd.

Read it here.

Congratulations


To our area's own Michael Brand, the head of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, who has been selected to serve as the new director of the Getty Museum.

New Washingtonian editor

DCist reports that Garrett Graff, editor of Fishbowl DC, announced yesterday that he'll be scaling back his duties at the Mediabistro blog to take over as editor-at-large of the Washingtonian magazine.

Washingtonian magazine currently does an abysmal job of visual arts coverage of the Greater Washington, DC area. Essentially it consists of a couple of pages of museum show listings.

They do a brilliant job of restaurant reviews, theatre reviews, book reviews, etc. But as usual, our visual arts scene is completely ignored for the most part.

It is my hope that this talented new editor will be willing to augment the magazine's local cultural coverage to include a monthly gallery and museum review column. If anything, I think that he will bring some refreshing new tools, ideas and vigor to the magazine.

Silverthorne on our Summer Group Show

Alexandra Silverthorne checks in with a review of our current Annual Summer Group Show at Fraser Bethesda.

Read the review here.

Opportunity for (some) artists

Deadline: August 29, 2005.

Intermedia Arts is looking for five to seven female artists from Mexico, Somalia, and the former Soviet bloc to exhibit their work as part of the Immigrant Status: Faith in Women exhibition.

Website: www.intermediaarts.org; e-mail: sandy@intermediaarts.org Phone:(612) 871-4444

Publishing company looking to purchase or commission artwork

Deadline: August 31, 2005

American Technical Publishers, a publishing company, is looking to purchase or commission artwork that explores the theme of learning, teaching, apprenticeship, sharing knowledge, technical skills, or vocational/technical trades.

Artwork and subject matter must be suitable for a corporate and diverse environment. Electronic submissions preferred, either by web address or a PC-formatted CD, but slides will be accepted as well. Send work with pricelist and/or proposal and pricing for commisioned art with SASE or contact:
Jennifer M Hines
American Technical Publishers
1155 W 175th St
Homewood IL 60430

E-mail: jmh@americantech.net
Website here.

Coldiron

One of the stitches that make up a city's cultural tapestry is alternative art venues, and smart artists realize this to showcase their work, as the worst place for an artist's work is put away somewhere other than being showcased. There are lots of such alternative art venues all around our area.

An exhibition of sculptural fused glass artwork by Cindy Ann Coldiron will be presented through October 11, 2005 at Cox Communications, 3080 Centerville Road (first floor) in Herndon, Virginia.

This exhibit showcases the movement and rhythm in the unique pattern and designs in kiln fired glass. In this exhibit, one can observe everything from glass "boats" to vivid seaflowers. The focal point of the exhibit is the group of twelve spring inspired glass tiles and glass bars on aluminum.

This exhibit is sponsored by the Arts Council of Fairfax County. Appointments to see the exhibit must be made in advance through Alice Webb, Corporate Art Program Manager at 703-642-0862 (ext 8) or via email at awebb@artsfairfax.org.

Bailey, Bailey, Bailey...

Bailey at his best.

Read it here.

Metcalfe on Tolman

One of the most unique pieces in Seven is a spectacular drawing by Ben Tolman titled "Garden of Earthly Delights."

This is one artist with a singularly interesting Crumbesque vision. The current issue of the City Paper has a terrific piece on Tolman by John Metcalfe.

Read it here.

I bought three Tolmans at DCAC's current Wall Mountables show.

Seven side effects

One of the goals that I had hoped to accomplish for Seven (besides making it a success as a fundraiser and expose WPA/C members' work), was to also drag some of my fellow gallerists through the exhibition in the hope that they could find some artists of interest to them.

Thus far, I am told of at least five artists from Seven who have been signed up or offered contracts or exhibitions by area galleries.

Cool uh?

Mark Jenkins Opens This Friday

TAA Reviews

J.T. has some good reviews of a few area shows.

Read them here.

Torres Interview

Bailey has a terrific interview with Seven artist Alessandra Torres.

Read it here.

Seven on Film

Yesterday an international crew filmed the Seven exhibition at the Warehouse.

They seemed to prefer (and focused upon) Alessandra Torres' installation and photographs, Kathryn Cornelius' video, Tim Tate's glass sculptures, Margaret Boozer's floor "crack" installation and Joe Barbaccia's sculptures.

In the next few days they will be also filming Mark Jenkins' street sculptures around DC, which they also liked a lot.

It was interesting to me to get a sort of outsider "validation" about the quality of the show and the artists, from an experienced crew and director who have done a lot of traveling, filming, interviewing and art hopping around the world, and still have loads of praise for the artwork being created by our area artists.

Cool uh?

Opportunities for Artists

Deadline: September 10, 2005

The 2005 International Figure Exhibition. Red Dot Fine Art will hold its 2nd Annual International Figure Exhibition November 14th - December 3rd at Red Dot Fine Art located on historic Canyon Road in Santa Fe, NM.

The exhibition call is open to all individuals working in two dimensional and three dimensional work in a realistic figurative style in any media. There is a non refundable $30.00 entry fee for up to three works and additional $5.00 fee for each additional work. Exhibition Dates: November 14th - December 3rd, 2005. Fee: $30 for 1-3 images (slides or JPEG) $5 for each additional image submitted. Prospectus here or send a SASE to:
Red Dot Fine Art
ATTN: Figure Exhibition
616 1/2 B Canyon Road
Santa Fe, NM 87501

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Deadline: November 14, 2005

National Juried Art Exhibition. Slide deadline November 14, 2005. $8500 in cash awards divided in three separate categories for 2 and 3-dimensional Fine Art and Photography completed within the past 2 years. For prospectus send SASE to:
Baker Arts Center
624 N Pershing
Liberal KS 67901.

For more information call: 620/624-2810. E-mail: bakerarts@swko.net

National Association of Women Artists

The National Association of Women Artists is a non-profit organization founded in 1889. They are seeking membership applicants from professional women artists in all media. Members are provided with juried and curated exhibit opportunities in NYC and across the US.

Applications are due Sept. 15 and March 15. Download application at: www.nawanet.org or send SASE to:
NAWA
80 5th Av #1405
New York NY 10011

Moser in Canada

Congratulations to our own Lida Moser, who is currently having two separate solo shows in Canada.

The first is at the La Société historique de Québec, where dozens of Moser's photographs from the 1950's (of the province) are on exhibition.

More details (in English) here.

Lida Moser's works are in the collection of nearly 40 museums worldwide.

Locally she's in the permanent collection of the Library of Congress, the Phillips Collection, the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the National Portrait Gallery.

You can read the WaPo review of her last solo with us here.

Bethesda Art Walk

Tomorrow (Friday) is the Bethesda Art Walk.

The Bethesda Art Walk features 13 galleries and studios that open their doors from 6-9pm on the second Friday of every month. Dowtown Bethesda galleries showcase artwork created locally, nationally and internationally including painting, photography, sculpture and mixed media.

You can enjoy several galleries by walking throughout downtown Bethesda’s fun-filled streets. The free Bethesda 8 Trolley stops within a few blocks of each Bethesda Art Walk gallery, and runs continuously throughout the duration of the Art Walk.

We will have our annual Summer Group Show, which includes new work by David FeBland (his "Circle the Wagons" is pictured below), John Winslow, Tim Tate, Michael Sprouse, Maxwell MacKenzie, and others.

See ya there!

Seven in Art Film

Seven will be filmed this week as part of a documentary on contemporary art being produced by Deno Seder Productions.

Their art films and videos have won top honors at the Paris Art Film Biennial at the Georges Pompidou Center, the Berlin Film Festival, the Taipei International Film Festival, the Chicago and Houston International Film Festivals, the New York Underground Film Festival and others. One of their films, "Andy Warhol," was screened at the Corcoran during their Warhol exhibition.

Arts Agenda

The DCist Arts Agenda here.

Opportunity for Artists

Deadline: September 16, 2005.

My good friend Jonathan Binstock, who is the Curator for Contemporary Art at the Corcoran, will be the juror for Mid-Atlantic New Painting 2006.

The Mid-Atlantic New Painting 2006 exhibition is a juried competition highlighting new developments in painting throughout the mid-Atlantic region.

At least $2000 in awards will be distributed. An exhibition of the selected works will be on display in the Ridderhof Martin Gallery from January 26 to March 3, 2006. This will be the fifth contemporary art competition held by the University of Mary Washington Galleries. Entry fee is $30.

The deadline is September 16, 2005. Details and prospectus here.

Capps on Seven

Kriston Capps polices Seven.

Read his review here.

Bailey on Wolov and Brooks

Bailey interviews two of Seven's more controversial artists:

Samantha Wolov here

and

Scott G. Brooks here.

Wanna go to an Opening?

Tomorrow, Wed. Aug 10, from 5-8PM, Spectrum Gallery in Georgetown will be hosting an opening for Under the Influence: Photography by Tom Wolff & Friends.

Wolff taught photography at Glen Echo Park for 30 years, from 1975 until 2005, and this show showcases his work as well as some from his star students: John Borstel, Presscott Moore Lassman, Leta Osteen, and Emily Whiting.

Subject Matter

The visual arts carry a monkey on their back that none of the other genres of the fine arts have to deal with: the proprietarization of subject matter.

So, no contemporary artist would dare to, let's say, paint ballerinas (sorry but Degas closed that subject), or harlequins, etc.

And some subject matter, by the nature of the subject itself, would be labeled as saccharine by the nicest of critics. Say kittens, horses, puppies, mermaids.

Do we have a screwed up sense of what makes the visual arts tick or what?

This powerful painting, titled "Allegory of a Gay Bashing" by Scott Brooks has been receiving a lot of attention in the "nude gallery" in Seven. It is an homage by Brooks to the brutal murder of Matthew Sheppard.

And this painting swings representational painting's most formidable weapon (and the one that keeps painting as king of the hill in spite of all the critics and curators trying to kill it): The ability to convey an entire and diverse range of emotions with just one glance.

"Allegory of a Gay Bashing" delivers horror, beauty, politics, history and homage all in one swoop.

And this tremendous work will probably never be sold to anyone by Brooks, because it would take immense courage to display this work of art anywhere in this nation; not just DC, but anywhere. Someone can prove me wrong and buy it from Brooks and display it in their home, or office or even a museum somewhere - but I doubt that there's a collector or museum in the USA with the cojones to hang this work.

And to get to the beginning point of this ramble, in spite of the horror delivered by "Allegory of a Gay Bashing", many people get stuck on one area: the cute puppy and kitty at the bottom of the castrated nude.

I've been in the room when I hear people discussing it. It seems like the cute puppy and kitty sitting on the ground, and staring at the viewer, evoke a higher sense of revulsion than the castrated man himself.

I've noted people's sense of repulsion caused by juxtaposing the two disparate sets of images. I think that they are repulsed by the cute animals being forced to share a scenario with a tortured man. Why are they there? people ask each other, a note of discomfort in their voices. Even the eloquent Amy Watson was disoriented by the presence of the animals and (in her terrific review of the show) felt that they undermined the painting.

Cute kitty and cute puppy... taking the attention away from disturbing image. How dare Brooks paint cuteness, especially in this context?

I don't know why Scott did it, but I think that it is the key that makes this painting truly repulsive and immensely successful all at once. Take them out, and you have a strong, powerful painting. Put them in, and you create a million questions, enormous angst and a desire to physically remove the creatures from the canvas itself.

And maybe without even realizing it, Scott has also reclaimed an artist's right to paint or draw anything that he or she so desires, and take the unjustified saccharinity of a subject and turn saccharine into anthrax with a few deft strokes of a painter's brush and a disorienting sense of juxtapositioning of subject matter.

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Update: Sam Wolov has some thoughts on this subject.

Bailey on the WPA/C

Bailey jumps in on the issue raised last week by the City Paper on the subject of the WPA/C Directory, and in the process James gives a rousing endorsement to the WPA/C's current interim Executive Director (Kim Ward), which I second vociferously.

Read Bailey's posting here.