Superfine! DC Preview

Superfine! DC opened on Halloween night and will go through the weekend - I plan to visit tomorrow and (as I usually do to any art fair that I visit) I will give you my opinions and selection of the best works that I saw there. Here's a blurb from the fair itself:

On Halloween night, more than 600 DC art lovers braved the autumn chill and came out in full force to experience the opening night of the capital's foremost art fair. We're thrilled to be DC's art fair, and can't wait for what the weekend has in store. From a Young Collectors' Ice Cream Social with cookie sundaes (!!!) by Trickling Springs Creamery to our OUTshine Film Festival-curated series of LGBTQ+ art shorts, Superfine! DC has a lot to offer - not to mention hundreds of incredible works of art ready to discover their new homes

Check out an opening night photo recap here.

I've been visiting the fair's online presence regularly, and as the planet's greatest living art fair critic, here are the works which caught my eye (so far...):

Nate by Marin Swift
9 x 9 inches framed. Oil on Panel

Martin Swift oil portraits at Monochrome Collective are spectacular artistic muscle-flexing portraits that showcase this artist's command of the classical chiaroscuro technique while concurrently revitalizing it to a modern context! Each portrait is not only a likeness of some individual, but also a psychological narrative of that individual!

The DMV's longest running gallery, Zenith Gallery (disclaimer: I am represented by them at the fair) is full of DC area blue chip artists such as Anne Marchand, Elissa Farrow-Savos (who will probably sell out), Emily Piccirillo, Margery Goldberg, and many others, but it is Stephen Hansen who (as usual) steals the show with his humorous works, which are in reality superb works of art disguised as the rare "humor in art" genre.

Potomac's RoFa Projects, a key and hardworking DMV area art dealer who does art fairs all over the planet has elegant works by Fabian Ugalde, Jose Margulis and Raymond Romero which not only work wll together, but also should satisfy the appetite of collectors of minimalist art.

They’ll Work It Out by Gregory Ferrand
24 x 12 inches. Acrylic on Canvas, c.2017

Kensington's Adah Rose Gallery, another hardworking DMV area art dealer which travels to art fairs all over the country is also well-represented in the fair, with many DMV/Baltimore blue chip artists such as Gregory Ferrand, who just keeps on getting impossibly better and better as a painter and storyteller, Joan Belmar, Jessica Drank and others.

A Long Way to Go by Susan LaMont
18 x 40 inches. Oil on Canvas

The locals continue to be well-represented by the District's Susan Calloway Fine Arts, where one of my favorite DMV artists of all time, Susan LaMont displays her hyper-realistic paintings, which after all these years continue to amaze me as much as the first time that I saw them decades ago! Art fair pro and my good bud Matthew Langley also stands out with his elegant abstract works, as he always does...

I also liked the sexy and intelligent photographs by Lori Cuisinier, whose sensual wok stands out simply buy the sheer eroticism of the human figure when coupled with compositional elements and props that makes the viewer ask questions.

Superfine! is one of the few art fairs which allow individual artists' booths, and the DC online version is full of talent such as the interesting works by the District's Noel Kassewitz, which I suspect I'll have to examine in person to see get the full impact of their art, but which online look superb nonetheless.

Her Echo Her Shadow by Scott Hutchison
16 x 20 inches. Oil on Linen, c.2017

Another artist whose work I've known and admired for decades is Scott Hutchison. Like LaMont, Hutchison is a master of the realistic brush, but Sott has always veered towards works which stretch the visual senses and modernize some of the ideas of the surrealists of ages ago. Hutchison is one of those artists that in any other city, where local museum curators pay attention to their city artists (as they do not in the DMV), would have been, and should be in the radar of a Hirshhorn Museum curator for a ground-breaking solo.

Susan Jamison and Colleen Garibaldi also caught my eye and will be inspected in person tomorrow!

See ya there! Tickets and info here.

Through Friday till 7:00 PM and Sunday, Nov 4, 2018, to 8:00 PM EDT.

LOCATION
Union Market
1309 5th Street Northeast
Dock 5 Event Space
Washington, DC 20002

Weekend art listings

Courtesy of East City Art!

Friday, June 1

Gallery Underground – 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

June 2018 Exhibitions (Read More)

Glen Echo Park Partnership – 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

June 2018 Exhibitions (Read More)

Touchstone Gallery – 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

June 2018 Exhibitions (Read More)

Artists & Makers Studios 1 and 2 – 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

June 2018 Exhibitions (Read More)

Corner Store – 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Thom Goertel Finding Light (Read More)

IA&A at Hillyer – 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Gayle Friedman Measuring the Weight of Longing (Read More)

Arts Club of Washington – 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

Members’ Summer Exhibition (Read More)

VisArts – 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

June 2018 Exhibitions (Read More)

VisArts – 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Group Exhibition Power Forward (Read More)

DC Arts Center – 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Renee Marcus Butler Adumbrations (Read More)

Saturday, June 2

Arlington Arts Center – 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Gallery Talk (Read More)

Wohlfarth Galleries – 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Karen Bokert (Read More)

Studio Gallery – 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

June Openings (Read More)

Addison/Ripley Fine Art – 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

E. Brady Robinson It's Complicated (Read More)

Foundry Gallery – 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

Kurtis Ceppetelli and Matthew Malone Model Compositions: (conjunction of the figure) (Read More)

Susan Calloway Fine Arts – 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Katie Pumphrey Five More Minutes Pt. 1 (Read More)

TAG/The Artists Gallery – 5 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Linda Slattery Sherman Prints & Paintings 2018 and Patricia Stockman This Way Through (Read More)

Adah Rose Gallery – 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Joan Belmar Beguiled by Caravaggio (Read More)

Yellow Barn Gallery – 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Olga Bauer Journey of Color (Read More)

Gallery 102 – 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Stephanie Mercedes: The Ring of Freedom (Read More)

WAS Gallery – 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Group Exhibition INTIMATE gathering (Read More) 

Sunday, June 3

Washington Printmakers Gallery – 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Danny Schweers Those Who See Slowly (Read More)
Greenbelt Community Art Gallery – 1 p.m.to 3 p.m.
Anna Fine Foer Collide-o-Scope: Collages (Read More)

Wanna go to an opening this Saturday?

TWIST - LAYER - POUR

Sondra N. Arkin + Joan Belmar + Mary Early
September 5 - October 22, 2017

Opening Reception
Saturday, September 9, 2017, 6-9 PM

Gallery Talk with the Artists & Sarah Tanguy, Curator
Thursday, September 28, 6-7:30pm
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
In Twist – Layer – Pour, the unexpected grouping of Sondra N. Arkin, Joan Belmar and Mary Early yields a dynamic, site-responsive meditation on systemized components and accumulated wholes. Step by step, link by link, their obsessive object-making becomes a metaphor for conscious and intuitive gesture, relational interconnectivity, and the passage of time.

At once public and private, monumental and intimate, the works profess an unswerving passion for their chosen materials: steel wire, synthetic papers, and beeswax. Individual variances and details invite close attention while, in the aggregate, distilled shapes and rhythmic patterns emerge. Whether the viewer roams among the works or stands still, the artwork expands, surrounds and cascades all around.
Together the installations create a kaleidoscope of contrasting perspectives and engage all aspects of their architectural setting—floor, ceiling, and wall, be it double or single height, curved, straight, or glass. The flow of air and the play of light further complicate the interaction between actual and implied motion. From humble materials, and from individual units, the artists create a new way of experiencing the space.

Exhibition catalogue available.

The American University Museum
4400 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington DC 20016
www.american.edu/museum(202) 885-1300

Museum Hours: Tuesday-Sunday, 11am - 4pm
Parking available under the Katzen Arts Center and is free after 5pm and on weekends.

Wanna go to an opening tonight?

 

Opening Reception, Friday, March 17, 7:00-9:00 pm

Benefit Reception, Friday, April 28,

7:00 - 10:00 pm

 Closing Reception, Friday, May 5, 7:00 pm

 All Benefit tickets will go on sale March 1st at

10:00 am

 Log in HERE to purchase your Benefit ticket

       This year not only marks Smith Center for Healing and the Arts' 20th anniversary, but also the 5th Alchemical Vessels exhibition and benefit. This year's concept for A-V-5 is The Night's Journey: 125 artists, chosen by 20 curators, have been asked to create or choose a vessel to tell their story about the cyclical passage from pain to healing - a journey that resonates with all of us.

       Once again we are offering the opportunity to take home one of these unique artworks and this year we've added an additional ticket option based on your feedback. Each ticket sold directly supports our mission as Washington DC's only independent integrative cancer support organization.

This years participating artists include:

        Lina Alattar, Jennifer Anderson, Kasse Andrews Weller, Sondra Arkin, Rushern Baker IV, Julia Mae Bancroft, Marilyn Banner, Joan Belmar, Michael Booker, Lenny Campello, Sally Canzoneri, Elana Casey, Mei Mei Chang, Hsin Hsi Chen, Schroeder Cherry, Vachu Chilakamarri, Travis Childers, Mara Clawson, Irene Clouthier, Ellen Cornett, Brian Dailey, Lama Dajani, Richard Dana, Delna Dastur, Ana U Davis, Rachel Debuque, Rex Delafkaran, Nehemiah Dixon III, Jim Doran, Spencer Dormitzer, Sarah Eargle, Mary Early, Cheryl Edwards, Lauren Emeritz, Heloisa Escudero, Lisa Farrell, Gregory Ferrand, Mary Freedman, Emily Fussner, Ric Garcia, Mark Garrett, Shaunté Gates, Donovan Gerald, Janis Goodman, Stefan Greene, Matthew Grimes, Adam Hager, Mia Halton, Key Han, Mansoora Hassan, Caroline Hatfield, Sean Hennessey, Jeffery Herrity, Mary Higgins, Leslie Holt, Jackie Hoysted, Aaron Hughes, Melissa Ichiuji, Sarah Irvin, Charles Jean Pierre, Wayson Jones, Jessica Kallista, Sally Kauffman, Don Kimes, JT Kirkland, Micheline Klagsbrun, Catherine Kleeman, Reagan Lake, Kyujin Lee, Liz Lescault, Yue Li, Erin Lisette, Nathan Loda, Steve Loya, Tsedaye Makonnen, Marty Ittner, Jenee Mateer, Carolina Mayorga, Freda Lee McCann, Olivia Morrow, Kristine Moss, Minna Nathanson, Nahid Navab, Nasrin Navab, Thien Nguyen, Shanti Norris, Sarah O'Donoghue, Javier Padilla, Anthony Palliparambil, John Paradiso, Nara Park, Judith Peck, Lyric Prince, Susana Raab, Carol Reed, Mojdeh Rezaeipour, Jamea Richmond Edwards, Lisa Rosenstein, Kevin Runyon, Jac Rust, Nancy Sausser, Gretchen Schermerhorn, Alma Selimovic, Samantha Sethi, Alexandra Sherman, Ellen Sinel, Anne C Smith, Michael Snowden, Susan Stacks, Hillary Steel, Dafna Steinberg, Anneliese Sullivan, Martin Swift, Lisa Marie Thalhammer, Mars Tokyo, Patricia Underwood, Andrea Uravitch, Mark Walker, Jenny Walton, Leslie Weinberger, Ellyn Weiss, Josh Whipkey, Millicent Young, Helen Zughaib

Thank you to this year's curators:

Joan Belmar, Adah Rose Bitterbaum, Jim Doran, Nekisha Durrett, Tim Fleshner, Helen Frederick, Judith Heartsong, Phil Hutinet, Jessica Kallista, Kunj Patel, Gloria Nauden, Henry Thaggert, Anne C. Smith, Smith Center for Healing and the Arts, Dolly Vehlow, Zoma Wallace, Ellyn Weiss, Nikki Brugnoli Whipkey

Here's what's new this year:

Benefit Tickets for sale:

Premium - $300  TICKETS # 1-15

Admission for one to the benefit event and a priority ticket number to choose your favorite vessel (1-15).  *Tickets  1-15 are assigned first come, first serve beginning March 10th, 10:00 am – The 1^st purchaser of a premium ticket will receive 1^st choice of a vessel, 2^nd purchaser will get the 2^nd choice and so on.

Standard - $175                     TICKETS # 16-125

Admission for one to the benefit event and a standard ticket number to choose your favorite vessel (16-125).  *Tickets 16-125 are assigned first come, first serve beginning March 10th, 10:00 am – The 1^st purchaser of a standard ticket will receive 16^th choice of a vessel, 2^nd purchaser will get the 17^th choice and so on.

Benefit only - $50

Admission for one to attend the Alchemical Vessels benefit, a lovely and lively evening of catered food, live music and complimentary wine and beer all night. This ticket does not include the purchase of a vessel.

Please contact our Alchemical Vessels coordinator Deirdre Darden for any questions or more information. Thank you!

ALCHEMICAL VESSELS

March 17 – May 5, 2017

 

Opening Reception, Friday, March 17, 7:00-9:00 pm

Benefit Reception, Friday, April 28,

7:00 - 10:00 pm

 Closing Reception, Friday, May 5, 7:00 pm

 All Benefit tickets will go on sale March 1st at

10:00 am

 Log in HERE to purchase your Benefit ticket

       This year not only marks Smith Center for Healing and the Arts' 20th anniversary, but also the 5th Alchemical Vessels exhibition and benefit. This year's concept for A-V-5 is The Night's Journey: 125 artists, chosen by 20 curators, have been asked to create or choose a vessel to tell their story about the cyclical passage from pain to healing - a journey that resonates with all of us.

       Once again we are offering the opportunity to take home one of these unique artworks and this year we've added an additional ticket option based on your feedback. Each ticket sold directly supports our mission as Washington DC's only independent integrative cancer support organization.

This years participating artists include:

        Lina Alattar, Jennifer Anderson, Kasse Andrews Weller, Sondra Arkin, Rushern Baker IV, Julia Mae Bancroft, Marilyn Banner, Joan Belmar, Michael Booker, Lenny Campello, Sally Canzoneri, Elana Casey, Mei Mei Chang, Hsin Hsi Chen, Schroeder Cherry, Vachu Chilakamarri, Travis Childers, Mara Clawson, Irene Clouthier, Ellen Cornett, Brian Dailey, Lama Dajani, Richard Dana, Delna Dastur, Ana U Davis, Rachel Debuque, Rex Delafkaran, Nehemiah Dixon III, Jim Doran, Spencer Dormitzer, Sarah Eargle, Mary Early, Cheryl Edwards, Lauren Emeritz, Heloisa Escudero, Lisa Farrell, Gregory Ferrand, Mary Freedman, Emily Fussner, Ric Garcia, Mark Garrett, Shaunté Gates, Donovan Gerald, Janis Goodman, Stefan Greene, Matthew Grimes, Adam Hager, Mia Halton, Key Han, Mansoora Hassan, Caroline Hatfield, Sean Hennessey, Jeffery Herrity, Mary Higgins, Leslie Holt, Jackie Hoysted, Aaron Hughes, Melissa Ichiuji, Sarah Irvin, Charles Jean Pierre, Wayson Jones, Jessica Kallista, Sally Kauffman, Don Kimes, JT Kirkland, Micheline Klagsbrun, Catherine Kleeman, Reagan Lake, Kyujin Lee, Liz Lescault, Yue Li, Erin Lisette, Nathan Loda, Steve Loya, Tsedaye Makonnen, Marty Ittner, Jenee Mateer, Carolina Mayorga, Freda Lee McCann, Olivia Morrow, Kristine Moss, Minna Nathanson, Nahid Navab, Nasrin Navab, Thien Nguyen, Shanti Norris, Sarah O'Donoghue, Javier Padilla, Anthony Palliparambil, John Paradiso, Nara Park, Judith Peck, Lyric Prince, Susana Raab, Carol Reed, Mojdeh Rezaeipour, Jamea Richmond Edwards, Lisa Rosenstein, Kevin Runyon, Jac Rust, Nancy Sausser, Gretchen Schermerhorn, Alma Selimovic, Samantha Sethi, Alexandra Sherman, Ellen Sinel, Anne C Smith, Michael Snowden, Susan Stacks, Hillary Steel, Dafna Steinberg, Anneliese Sullivan, Martin Swift, Lisa Marie Thalhammer, Mars Tokyo, Patricia Underwood, Andrea Uravitch, Mark Walker, Jenny Walton, Leslie Weinberger, Ellyn Weiss, Josh Whipkey, Millicent Young, Helen Zughaib

Thank you to this year's curators:

Joan Belmar, Adah Rose Bitterbaum, Jim Doran, Nekisha Durrett, Tim Fleshner, Helen Frederick, Judith Heartsong, Phil Hutinet, Jessica Kallista, Kunj Patel, Gloria Nauden, Henry Thaggert, Anne C. Smith, Smith Center for Healing and the Arts, Dolly Vehlow, Zoma Wallace, Ellyn Weiss, Nikki Brugnoli Whipkey

Here's what's new this year:

Benefit Tickets for sale:

Premium - $300  TICKETS # 1-15

Admission for one to the benefit event and a priority ticket number to choose your favorite vessel (1-15).  *Tickets  1-15 are assigned first come, first serve beginning March 10th, 10:00 am – The 1^st purchaser of a premium ticket will receive 1^st choice of a vessel, 2^nd purchaser will get the 2^nd choice and so on.

Standard - $175                     TICKETS # 16-125

Admission for one to the benefit event and a standard ticket number to choose your favorite vessel (16-125).  *Tickets 16-125 are assigned first come, first serve beginning March 10th, 10:00 am – The 1^st purchaser of a standard ticket will receive 16^th choice of a vessel, 2^nd purchaser will get the 17^th choice and so on.

Benefit only - $50

Admission for one to attend the Alchemical Vessels benefit, a lovely and lively evening of catered food, live music and complimentary wine and beer all night. This ticket does not include the purchase of a vessel.

Please contact our Alchemical Vessels coordinator Deirdre Darden for any questions or more information. Thank you!

Come to this opening tonight and get free artwork

You gotta come to this group show at American University’s Katzen Art Museum, since I am honored to be part of it... and there's free art involved... buah, ah, ah!


By the way, that gorgeous museum was built thanks to a major gift from Cyrus and Myrtle Katzen, he a brilliant collector of art who could teach lessons on how to collect; and she is a very talented artist with a refined eye for great artwork. 

The Katzen’s head honcho, Jack Rasmussen, continues to shame all other DMV museum directors and curators when it comes to them tending their own artistic back garden.

At the risk of repeating myself: most DMV museum curators would rather take a cab to Dulles Airport to fly to Berlin in order to visit an emerging artist’s studio than to take a cab to the Gateway Artists’ Studios, or to any area artists’ studios, to look at local artists.

Are you hearing me Stéphane Aquin? Taína Caragol? E. Carmen Ramos? Eleanor Jones Harvey?, etc. Learn to tend your own artistic back garden.


The show is titled The Looking Glass:  Artist Immigrants of Washington and it runs June 18–August 14, 2016. It is part of the amazing Alper Initiative for Washington Artists (if you don’t know what that it, and you are a DMV artist, you should! – contact the Katzen).

The opening is June 18 from 6-8PM. There will be plenty of adult beverages and munchies, and the artists will be there to talk about their work. And in a shameless act of free artwork distribution, I will be giving a free limited edition lithograph from a set of various lithos (you get to pick one) that I did in art school in the 1980s if you say: "Hi Lenny, where's my print?"

They are all signed and numbered in tiny editions... all circa 1977-1981.

The exhibition celebrates ten artists who left Latin America for many different reasons over the last sixty years – primarily for safety, freedom, and opportunity – and made their homes, and their artistic careers and contributions, in the Washington region. 

Ric Garcia, Los Santos, 2012.
Acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30.
Photo by Pete Duvall, Anything Photographic.

They include Joan Belmar and Juan Downey from Chile, Carolina Mayorga from Colombia, Ric Garcia, Jose Ygnacio Bermudez, and yours truly from Cuba, Muriel Hasbun from El Salvador, Frida Larios from El Salvador/Honduras, Irene Clouthier from Mexico, and Naul Ojeda from Uruguay. They brought with them artistic traditions that took root and bore fruit here in the United States.

See ya there! Don't forget to ask me for your free artwork!

The Looking Glass: Artist Immigrants of Washington

Let me plug an upcoming group show at American University’s Katzen Art Museum, since I am honored to be part of it. 



By the way, that gorgeous museum was built thanks to a major gift from Cyrus and Myrtle Katzen, he a brilliant collector of art who could teach lessons on how to collect; she a very talented artist with a refined eye for great artwork. The Katzen’s head honcho, Jack Rasmussen, continues to shame all other DMV museum directors and curators when it comes to them tending their own artistic back garden.


At the risk of repeating myself: most DMV museum curators would rather take a cab to Dulles Airport to fly to Berlin in order to visit an emerging artist’s studio than to take a cab to the Gateway Artists’ Studios, or to any area artists’ studios, to look at local artists.


Are you hearing me Stéphane Aquin? Taína Caragol? E. Carmen Ramos? Eleanor Jones Harvey?, etc. Learn to tend your own artistic back garden.




The show is titled The Looking Glass:  Artist Immigrants of Washington and it runs June 18–August 14, 2016. It is part of the amazing Alper Initiative for Washington Artists (if you don’t know what that it, and you are a DMV artist, you should! – contact the Katzen).



The opening is June 18 from 6-8PM. There will be plenty of adult beverages and munchies, and the artists will be there to talk about their work.




The exhibition celebrates ten artists who left Latin America for many different reasons over the last sixty years – primarily for safety, freedom, and opportunity – and made their homes, and their artistic careers and contributions, in the Washington region.




Ric Garcia, Los Santos, 2012.
Acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30.
Photo by Pete Duvall, Anything Photographic.

They include Joan Belmar and Juan Downey from Chile, Carolina Mayorga from Colombia, Ric Garcia, Jose Ygnacio Bermudez, and yours truly from Cuba, Muriel Hasbun from El Salvador, Frida Larios from El Salvador/Honduras, Irene Clouthier from Mexico, and Naul Ojeda from Uruguay. They brought with them artistic traditions that took root and bore fruit here in the United States.


See ya there!

At American University's Katzen Museum

Contemporary North Korean Art:
The Evolution of Socialist Realism

Curated by BG Muhn

The forms and structure of contemporary North Korean art, a central and highly developed dimension of the national culture, are largely unknown to the outside world. This exhibition, the first of its kind in the US, seeks to broaden understanding of North Korean art beyond stereotypes of propaganda and kitsch to show sophisticated and nuanced expressive achievements. It investigates previously unrevealed evidence of North Korean artistic experimentation and the evolution of Socialist Realism within this culturally homogeneous context. The works in the exhibition focus on the development of Chosonhwa, North Korea’s predominant painting medium that is revered as the nation’s most refined. The exhibition is curated by BG Muhn, artist and Professor at Georgetown University.

 

 

South Korean Art:
Examining Life Through Social Realities

Curated by GimChoe Eun-yeong

Examining Life Through Social Realities documents and examines life and the social realities of people living on the Korean peninsula through the Realist paintings of ten South Korean contemporary artists. As explained by exhibition curator GimChoe Eun-yeong, definitions of Realism have changed over time, but the Realism of South Korea closely approximates 19th century French Realist painter Gustave Courbet’s use of the term: to manifest artists’ perspectives of the world through expressive techniques and methods.

 

Art Cart:
Honoring the Legacy

Curated by Pamela Harris Lawton and Adjoa Burrowes

This exhibition ties together two cities - Washington, DC and New York City - in an inter-generational, inter-disciplinary project. Professional visual artists aged 62 and older are matched with students of art, healthcare, and aging to document and preserve their artistic legacy. The exhibition includes painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, and installation by ART CART artists that highlight turning points in the artists’ lives including the Civil Rights and Women’s Movements.

ART CART: SAVING THE LEGACY is a DC and New York based project that helps older professional artists and provides mentorships to students. ART CART: HONORING THE LEGACY features Alonzo Davis, Cheryl Edwards, Annette Fortt, Cianne Fragione, Pauline Jakobsberg, E.J. Montgomery, Annette Polan, and Terry Svat.

 

 

The Looking Glass:
Artists Immigrants of Washington

Alper Initiative for Washington Art

This exhibition celebrates ten artists who left Latin America for many different reasons over the last sixty years—primarily for safety, freedom, and opportunity—and made their homes, and their artistic careers and contributions, in the Washington region. They include Joan Belmar and Juan Downey from Chile, Carolina Mayorga from Colombia, Ric Garcia, F. Lennox Campello, and Jose Ygnacio Bermudez from Cuba, Muriel Hasbun from El Salvador, Frida Larios from Honduras, Irene Clouthier from Mexico, and Naúl Ojeda from Uruguay. They brought with them artistic traditions that took root and bore fruit here in the United States.

 

 

 

Bandits & Heros, Poets & Saints:
Popular Art of the Northeast of Brazil

Curated by Marion E. Jackson, Ph.D. and Barbara Cervenka, O.P., Curators

Bandits & Heroes, Poets & Saints explores how the ancient cultures of Africa blended with indigenous and colonial Portuguese traditions to form the vibrant and complex cultural mosaic of modern Brazil. This eclectic collection of popular art—photography, sculptures, paintings, religious objects and books of poetry—depicts the vibrant culture of the Northeast of Brazil and the Nordestinos. The exhibition explores the coming together of diverse traditions of the region through work by historical and contemporary artists.

 

 

SAVE THE DATE

 

Opening Reception
June 18, 6-9 p.m.

The Looking Glass: Artist Immigrants of Washington

This is my latest work and it is heading to the The Looking Glass: Artist Immigrants of Washington show at the Katzen Museum at American University.

The show, curated by Jack Rasmussen, runs June 18–August 14, 2016, and opens to the public with an opening reception (free and open to the public) on June 18 from 6-8PM.

The exhibition celebrates ten artists who left Latin America for many different reasons over the last sixty years – primarily for safety, freedom, and opportunity – and made their homes, and their artistic careers and contributions, in the Washington region. They include Joan Belmar and Juan Downey from Chile, Carolina Mayorga from Colombia, Ric Garcia, Lenny Campello, and Jose Ygnacio Bermudez from Cuba, Muriel Hasbun from El Salvador, Frida Larios from El Salvador/Honduras, Irene Clouthier from Mexico, and Naul Ojeda from Uruguay. They brought with them artistic traditions that took root and bore fruit here in the United States.

As the show focuses on immigrant artists to the DMV, in this piece, the embedded video component plays a video loop (6.5 minutes) covering my life so far, with a special focus on why my family had to leave the brutal world of the Castro Brothers' Workers Paradise in the 1960s. The small boy to the left is me (as a four year old) running around my grandfather's farm just outside of Guantanamo

As I usually do, I've used the "cracks" on the background wall to employing the Navy's Falcon Codes as the first encryptor) double encrypt a background message... more on the show later... You can see the embedded video here.

American University Museum
202-885-1300     
Fax: 202-885-1140
museum@american.edu

4400 Massachusetts Ave NW
Washington, DC 20016

Admission Free
Tue-Sun, 11:00-4:00
Fully Accessible
See Directions

"Cuban by Ancestry, But American by the Grace of God."
Charcoal and Conte and Embedded Video. 18x24 inches, circa 2016.



"Cuban by Ancestry, But American by the Grace of God."
Charcoal and Conte and Embedded Video. 18x24 inches, circa 2016.

"Cuban by Ancestry, But American by the Grace of God."
Charcoal and Conte and Embedded Video. 18x24 inches, circa 2016.

"Cuban by Ancestry, But American by the Grace of God."
Charcoal and Conte and Embedded Video. 18x24 inches, circa 2016.

Tonight

Come talk to the critics and meet the artist for the closing of 'The Critiqued' at The Otis Street Art Project.

We are honored to have our distinguished critics F. Lennox Campello, Adah Rose Bitterbaum, Michael O’Sullivan to return. We will revisit common artistic issues discussed throughout the year and the critiqued experience.

Doors open at 6pm
Panel 6:30-7:30pm
Party 7:30-8:30pm

Exhibiting Artists:
Zofie Lang
Christian Tribastone
Ceci Cole McInturff
Amy Hughes Braden
Jose Fernandez
Alexandra Silverthorne
Fallon Chase
Amber Robles-Gordon
Joan Belmar
Katie Pumphrey
Steven Durow
Jacqui Crocetta
Stephanie Booth

If you have not seen this show yet it's a must see. They are open Saturdays 12-5, Tue-Fri by appointment.

 See the review in the Washington Post here.


Otis Street Arts Project
3706 Otis Street
Mount Rainier, MD 20712
202.550.4634
mailto:Info@OtisStreetArts.org
OtisStreetArts.org

Wanna go to a cool panel + closing party this Saturday?

Come talk to the critics and meet the artist for the closing of 'The Critiqued' at The Otis Street Art Project.

We are honored to have our distinguished critics F. Lennox Campello, Adah Rose Bitterbaum, Michael O’Sullivan to return. We will revisit common artistic issues discussed throughout the year and the critiqued experience.

Doors open at 6pm
Panel 6:30-7:30pm
Party 7:30-8:30pm

Exhibiting Artists:
Zofie Lang
Christian Tribastone
Ceci Cole McInturff
Amy Hughes Braden
Jose Fernandez
Alexandra Silverthorne
Fallon Chase
Amber Robles-Gordon
Joan Belmar
Katie Pumphrey
Steven Durow
Jacqui Crocetta
Stephanie Booth

If you have not seen this show yet it's a must see. They are open Saturdays 12-5, Tue-Fri by appointment.

 See the review in the Washington Post here.


Otis Street Arts Project
3706 Otis Street
Mount Rainier, MD 20712
202.550.4634
mailto:Info@OtisStreetArts.org
OtisStreetArts.org

The Looking Glass: Artist Immigrants to Washington

The Looking Glass: Artist Immigrants to Washington

June 18–August 14, 2016

Opening Reception: June 18, 6-8PM

 

Naul Oleja, Fleeing From the Storm, 1981

The Alper Initiative for Washington Art presents the work of ten artists who immigrated to Washington, DC from Latin America under duress during the past fifty years, found homes in Washington, and made or are making positive contributions to our artistic culture and quality of life.

 

The exhibition features work by artists:

• Joan Belmar
• Jose Ygnacio Bermudez
• Lenny Campello
• Irene Clouthier
• Juan Downey
• Ric Garcia
• Muriel Hasbun
• Frida Larios
• Carolina Mayorga
• Naul Ojeda

Artists who left their homes in Chile, Colombia, Cuba, El Salvador, Mexico, and Uruguay.

 

American University Museum

Tel: 202-885-1300

Fax: 202-885-1140

museum@american.edu

 

4400 Massachusetts Ave NW

Washington, DC 20016

 

Admission Free

Parking Free (weekends)

Tue-Sun, 11:00-4:00

Fully Accessible

See Directions