On Sunday the 28th I visited the Rosenbach Museum and Library.  It was a difficult place to find, hidden around Rittenhouse area between a row of other houses.  Besides the difficulty of finding the museum, the place was incredible.  They had on exhibit the original drawings, sketches and pen/iink and watercolors by Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are."

Unfortunately, no photography was allowed.  The final pieces that are done in watercolor and pen/ink were incredible to see in person.  They have a vast amount of details that are not seen at all in the book reproductions. 

Besides the Sendak pieces, the museum in itself is a rare book and manuscript heaven.  They have first edition rare books of anyone you could think of, manuscripts hand written by James Joyce, the original writings by Bram Stoker for his Dracula novel, among countless other treasures.

Of all the artworks and rarities the museum housed, I specifically went to see a painting by William Blake, a very rare original watercolor and pen/ink piece titled "The Number of the Beast is 666."  The painting is from Blake's The Great Red Dragon series, depicting the Revelations from the Bible.  The set of paintings were created between 1805 and 1810 and show Blake's mastery of watercolor painting. 

 

 

This weekend I was in Rehoboth Beach, DE.  I decided to look at the gallery scene in this beach town.  Most galleries I visited had "kitschy" art with the obvious intention to simply sell.  However, I found one gallery with a show I enjoyed.  The gallery was Gallery 50 with a show by Javier Brewster Brockmann.  Brockmann's nine paintings were all completed on recycled metal.  I was surprised to read that the artist was painting on metal because you would assume that oil paint on metal would look like it was sitting on top of a surface.  Howbeit, Brockmann's paintings looked like they were a part of the metal.  It was very hard to tell what was painted on the metal and what was simply the patina of the metal. The subject matter of his paintings were nostalgic: baby blocks, balloons, crayons, a monopoly car, paddle ball, and toy robots.  I felt that all the paintings were easy to approach and enjoy. 

Fleisher Art Memorial Building

Fleisher Art Memorial Building

719 Catharine Street.

If you are in the area of 7^th and Catherine Street you must stop in and see the Fleisher Art Memorial building.  They are currently having their 115^th Fleisher Faculty Exhibition showing more than 55 artists.  The show has large variety of works from sculptures to paintings and drawings.  If you go to see the show I encourage you to make it a point to see if the Sanctuary is open which is located beside the Fleisher building.  Simply an amazing little history church built between 1884 and 1886.  I had the opportunity to walk around and snap a few photos of this beautiful building.  I was so amazed by the building because I wasn’t expecting it to be there.  Walking from the gallery to the sanctuary was like walking back in time.  

The Clay Studio 

Teaser

Teaser for next First Friday at the Clay Studio.  The Clay Studio is currently setting up and will official being opening a MFA show August 2^nd.  The work features MFA students from all over the country as far as California.  I was able to see a sneak peak of some of the work.  The work has some interesting pieces on display.  There are works that focus on pushing the boundaries of functional ware.  Other pieces deal with texture, geometric shape paired with organic shapes.  Unfortunately there were not any name tags so I could take further notes on specific pieces.  I think the work was very good and I enjoyed looking at what the MFA students from around the country have been working on in other programs.  My only problem I was having with the show was that is was similar to other MFA shows that I have seen before.   Here is a fun piece that has a unique combination of colorful texture and balance with the clay body of the form. 

I was able to see the printmaking exhibit at the PMA on Thursday. The show itself was quite impressive. This piece by John Marin was brought to my attention. I Find it interesting because of the way he is able to minimally abstract this building. Marin does this in a playful way. It is almost as if the buildings are dancing. I enjoy the energy and the movement in this piece. I enjoy the roughness and the spontaneity. I have never seen a piece so playful especially without color. I had never heard of this artist before and looked him up and found I really enjoy the way in which he is able to abstract realism without loosing the image completely.

Prints at the PMA

 

 Jill Robostello

I was very inspired by the print show at the Philadelphia Museum of art.  One of the first prints as you walk in the door is Braid by Jim Dine.  It is a large etching with extremely fine details.  Each hair of the braid was delicately scratched to create a very realistic looking gathering of hair.  The mundane subject of a braid that is (almost childishly) labelled "BRAID" at the bottom is somewhat humorous.  The darker gray around the outside edge along with the random light gray spots on the paper create a "dirty" smudged look that reminded me of a charcoal drawing.  This lovely detailed print was by far my favorite in the print show.

Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA)

ICA

Venturing back to the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) I focused my time with the show that is on the first floor.  The show, “White Petals Surround Your Yellow Heart”, has a general theme of fashion.  It is really a wide range when you are talking about art, fashion and creating identities. 

View of some of the work currently on display on the first floor of the ICA

This show was hard to really enjoy what I was seeing.  In my opinion there are a lot of different styles of art and they do fit into the theme of fashion.  I personally did not care for the show, but after I heard a little bit about the show from the ICA Director I had a better appreciation for it.  Maybe it is because I’m not one for shopping and looking at clothes designs or fashion art.  I still believe that if you are in the area you should take some time to check out the show to form you own opinions.  

Morse’s Gallery of the Louvre Painting at PAFA

The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts is more than a school. The Historic Landmark Building has a vast collection of painting and sculpture treasures. Having attend CE classes at PAFA I had free access to the museum. When I heard about the Samuel Morse Louvre painting I was thinking, "Is viewing one painting worth the visit?" ...Yes it was! Sitting in the bench in the center of the exhibit room I was drawn into the paintings in the Louvre Painting. My eye viewed each little painting Morse copied from the masters in detail. The gallery room is hung salon style. So it's like you are sitting in the painting within the painting. The sad and interesting story about this artist is that Morse's painting was not accepted by the critics when it was exhibited so he abandoned painting however he went on to invent the telegraph.

From the PAFA website... http://www.pafa.org/About/Press-Room/Press-Room/1003/month--201208/search--morse/vobid--9433/

The exhibition is a collaboration between PAFA’s Senior Curator and Curator of Modern Art, Robert Cozzolino, and PAFA’s Curator of Historical American Art, Anna Marley.

Morse meticulously copied 38 paintings spanning five national schools and three centuries, including works by Rembrandt, Leonardo da Vinci, Titian, Caravaggio, Rubens and Poussin. The artist himself is shown in front, leaning over his daughter in a space where visitors study, sketch and copy from the masters.

A New Look: Samuel F. B. Morse’s Gallery of the Louvre tells a fascinating tale about art education, mentorship and practice, and learning from historical art. PAFA’s Morse installation will set the painting into an environment that will mirror what is shown in the picture. While the Morse painting will be on one side of the gallery with objects that help provide a broader context for the themes of artistic practice and identity, the other half of the gallery will be hung salon-style with paintings from PAFA’s collection that highlight the four academic genres taught and exhibited at PAFA in the first half of the 19^th century. 

Finally got this to work!!!

For my work of art I went and saw "Lion crushing the serpent" located in Rittenhouse Square.
The sculpture is a large bronze work by French artist Antoine-Louis Barye. 

Barye was a member of the group known as the animaliers, which consisted of artists who focused mainly on animals.  Baryes' image of the lion subduing the snake is a powerful image of strength and ferocity, and has great detail from the lions teeth to the incredible rendition of the hair.

According to the Philadelphia website visitphilly, they state that, "The lion [...] is not an ordinary beast.  It represents the French monarchy, and the serpent is a universal symbol of evil."

Works on Paper-Benjamin Montague's Photos

 Works on Paper is a small gallery located above American Apparel on Walnut Street.  The gallery holds original pieces by Chuck Close, Jim Dine, Richard Serra, and Andy Warhol to name a few.  They specialize in prints from the 1960's to today.  Benjamin Montague "A Photographic Reflection" was showing in the front of the gallery when I visited. 

The three pieces I spent the most time with was his "Memory" collection.  The photos are all out of focus pictures of children.  When I first looked at these pictures, I found them not very inventive, unoriginal, and sort of a stereotypical thing for a photographer to do: taking fuzzy photos and entitling them "Memory." However, I still found them very easy to access and relate to, which can be a nice quality in a work of art.  I laughed to myself when I decided if this was my collection of photos I would entitle it "My Life Without Glasses."  I began to think that there are so many different reasons why a memory can become fuzzy when time passes.  Then I read the artist's statement on the "Memory" collection.  He decided to take these photos as a reaction to the fear of getting Alzheimer's disease - which is common in his family.  After reading that,  I felt that these photos were much more sad and chilling.  

Bridgette Mayer Gallery

Bridgette Mayer Gallery

709 Walnut Street.

Benefit Exhibition for BalletX

Great show that just opened in this delightful little gallery.  The show contains more than 200 artists and has about 400 works on display.  The show benefits The Philadelphia Dance Company BalletX.  Each artist was given two 10” x 10” square panels and can create what ever the artist would like and interpret the panel however they feel appropriate.  The panels are each valued at $500 or $1000.  The way the pieces are displayed was very stimulating to the eye.  It definitely took a few laps around the gallery to view the works and try to process every work. 

I found this show to be particularly exciting because of the idea to benefit an organization; also I had a chance to talk with the gallery director, Bridgette Mayer.  Listening to here story about how she started this gallery was very inspiring.  I strongly suggest checking out this exhibition and if you are looking to invest in a piece of art then this is a good show to start.  

Clothespin

Clothespin

Claes Oldenburg

Jill Robostello

"Clothespin"  by Claes Oldenburg is located right outside of city hall in Center Square and is positioned above the stairs to the Market-Frankfort line.  It was finished in 1976 and Oldenburg described the shape to look like two lovers intertwining.  I found the most interesting view to be underneath the sculpture on the stairs down to the subway.  The sculpture is made of a weathered steel, black-brown in color, with obvious dripping water stains on it.  The weathering is truly beautiful.  I thought it was lovely that you could access the sculpture at an extreme below angle.  I found everything else about the location a bit unfortunate.  To see the sculpture at a distance, I had to cross the street.  The crowd sitting on the stairs and in front of the sculpture were a bit shady - making the sculpture less accessible.  No one on the street noticed the sculpture, cars driving by did not take a moment to look at it, and even when I was taking pictures of it, no one took a glance. 

Locks Gallery, Jennifer Bartlett

Jennifer Bartlett

Locks Gallery

128 North Broad Street

This particular show was actually closed, or in the middle of being taken down.  It is located on the second floor of the Locks Gallery and after I was upstairs viewing the show that I find out the show was actually closed.  At any rate, I still had a chance to snap a few photos and spend a little time around the work. 

Something interesting that I noticed with Jennifer’s work is on the sides of the paintings.  She has some of the dots painted in some spots and not painted in others areas.  It appears as if she either forgot, which I’m sure was not the case, or she felt that it was unnecessary to finish painting.  The paintings are large and I thought that maybe she painted them on the floor but you can clearly see drips on the canvas from the brush.

Notice the edge of the panel

See the light green dot isn't finished

Her work seems unfinished and not fully refined with the pencil marks showing and thin layers of paint.  From a distance these blemishes are not noticeable and I really like the way her work plays with your eyes and has good push and pull with the different colors.  

I went to the Brandywine River Museum last weekend and I was especially struck by this piece by Jamie Wyeth. I had seen prints of it before and was not particularly impressed, however seeing it in person it was exceptional. The face of the pig is playful and almost comical. The layering of colors on the pig  and the amount of colors in it combined with the detailed brushstrokes makes it extremely visually stimulating. I stood there and looked at the brush strokes for a very long time. I was interrupted by the security guard who shared with me a funny story about how this pig was left alone when Jamie was painting in his friends barn and ate Jamie Wyeths oil paints! They are supposed to be toxic to animals so he was sure the animal would die, but she never did. ( She did have technicolor poop for a few days however)! When the time came for the pig to go the slaughterhouse, Jamie had developed a relationship with the pig and bought her off his friend and created this painting. I enjoy the smooth texture of the background combined with the extreme detail in the subject. In this painting, the pig is  lifesize making the viewer want to reach out and touch it. The playfulness of this work combined with the mastery of skill is truly one to see in person. 

Crane Arts Building

Crane Arts Building

 Monday July 8, 13

I recently found my way to the Crane Arts building located at 1400 N. America Street.  The one show that I visited was the Novis Oculi: Pennsylvania State University School of Visual Arts MFA Exhibition.  The space was laid out very well and you could move freely around the work without the sense of it being to crowded.  There is a lot of different work to see, which is obvious because it is a MFA Exhibition.  There are many pieces that I found to be interesting to look and really spend some time studying.

On particular piece caught my eye instantly as I walked in the room.  A piece by Christina Erives titled “Pan de Vida”.  It is a large table made entirely of ceramics.  Every item is ceramics even the table.  What impressed me was the size and the fact that the entire piece was made of ceramics.  There was so much going on with the details and what was on the table I found myself walking around it multiple times.  After a while of pacing I began to really pay attention to the detail that were applied to different items on the table.
 was not the only piece in the show that stood out to me.  There were many others and I strongly suggest taking a trip to the Crane Art building to see what other MFA students have been working on in there program. 

The Center for Art in Wood

The Center for Art in Wood 

Friday July 5, 2013

During the First Friday events I made my way around the streets of Philly and landed in a place that I have never been to before. The Center for Art in Wood is a beautiful gallery space nestled at 141N. 3rd Street. The space is open and inviting with many large windows and excellent lighting.
The show is featuring Susan Hagen who shares with us her interest in the human condition with her sculptures primarily carved from wood. As she describes, Susan’s recent work involves unique attributes of individuals and definingfeatures. Her sculptures are around 14inches in height and include strong details and playful gestures that make each sculpture unique yet carefully pulls each one together as a group.If you are looking for something a little different, fun and playful check out The Center for Art in Wood featuring Susan Hagen.

Here's your invitation to post about art you see each week!

Please make a weekly blog post about any work you encounter here in Philadelphia or online, or in your travels to New York City or elsewhere (Washington D.C., Wilmington, DE, etc.). The work you post can be broadly defined as visual culture, so surprise us (performance, painting, installation, multidisciplinary work, conventional work) — and upload a photo or link when you can.

Thanks!