News
As a sponsor of the Kensington Kinetic Sculpture Derby this year, we’re enthusiastic about any and all efforts to bring attention to our local treasure. Adrienne Justice is currently producing a two-part film for NicJusticeMedia.com showcasing the 8th Annual Kensington Kinetic Sculpture Derby as well as the 9th Annual Trenton Avenue Arts Festival! You can view part one of the documentary, with the other soon to arrive.
For those planning on attending Ed Sozanski’s memorial service, it’s been scheduled for May 31 at 10 AM at the First Unitarian Church.
We have a new Chief Cultural Officer! In a press conference at City Hall this week, Mayor Nutter welcomed Helen Haynes to her new post as the city’s leader of the Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy. Haynes, currently Director of Cultural Affairs at Montgomery County Community College, is also a teacher, arts administrator, presenter, and visual artist, bringing with her years of valuable experience. Congratulations, Helen! We know we’ll see great things from OACCE with you at the front.
DesignPhiladelphia’s tenth anniversary is coming up in October, leaving us plenty of time to anticipate the accompanying competition, auction and festival. Set for the evening of October 8, the Reflecting Design Silent Auction coincides with the DesignPhiladelphia Festival Kickoff Party. The auction plans on featuring fifteen IKEA® mirrors reimagined by notable names including Adam Wallacavage, Shelley Spector, furniture maker Tyler Hays, and Kieran Timberlake Architects.
Of interest to Rodin enthusiasts: Paris’s Musée Rodin has launched a crowdsourcing effort to purchase one of the artist’s rarer drawings. “Celle qui fut la belle Heaulmière,” long coveted by the museum, comes with a €300,000 price tag. The acquisition fund of the museum, which began their campaign last week, is attempting to raise the remaining €40,000 with a “billet mécène” (patron ticket) offering visitors the option to add an extra euro to their entrance ticket that counts towards the piece’s price. They’ll be continuing until the end of 2014, and as one of the city’s most popular art destinations, it seems they’re very likely to achieve their goal.
Opportunities
Sample Studios, a group based in Cork, Ireland whose acquaintance we’ve recently made, is seeking out similar art groups around the world as they prepare to design their own residency program. At the moment, it’s a pretty rudimentary idea; they can only provide the space for someone to work in and a time slot to exhibit in our gallery space, but if you’re able to work with a more bare-bones arrangement, feel free to get in touch and find out what they’re about.
PhilaMOCA’s newly-announced summer show (titled ‘Murica!) is now on the take for submissions. Although their specifications say “all kinds of art, patriotic or not, celebratory or critical, as long as the subject is the US of A,” we’re guessing this will skew towards the more critical side. Art in all 2D mediums is up for consideration, 3D art is not.The exhibit goes up Friday, July 4 through Wednesday, July 30. The deadline for submissions is Sunday, June 22; accepted art must be delivered ready to hang on July 2 between 12pm and 6pm, or beforehand by appointment. There’s a $20 hanging fee, and 100% of the sales go to the artists. To enter, submit photographs of your entries in .jpg or .png format to Jay at: curation@philamoca.org. All submissions must be made to this email – in-person submissions won’t be accepted.
Artist News
Tiger Strikes Asteroid co-founder Alex Paik is up in New York this week, giving a talk at TSA’s NYC location as part of DELVE Networking’s Thursday, May 22 event. Tickets are $10 each.
Alex Da Corte garnered a mention in Art Agenda’s summary of this year’s VOLTA Basel: the “effusive Pop scavenger” is under the banner of David Risley Gallery (Copenhagen), one of two returning exhibitors who have participated in every VOLTA Basel edition, along with VOLTA NY’s debut 2008 fair.
LACMA and the LA Times gave Judy Gelles, Philly photographer on the move, a glowing review for her “Trailer Park” series. Shot in 2004, the photograph is currently on display until August 24 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in its exhibition (see slideshow below) Night in Day.
Jennifer Bartlett’s History of the Universe is now on view at the Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, NY through July 13, 2014. Her activity this year continues in the fall with a solo exhibition at the Cleveland Museum of Art (opening September 7), which includes not only her early-career “magnum opus” Rhapsody, but two more recent monumental room-installations, Song and Recitative.
