http://pocketutopia.com/ Pocket Utopia, an off-center, away from center, artist-run, alternative gallery. It is a social space and a work of art. en Copyright 2008, Austin Thomas Fri, 16 May 2008 08:31:02 -0400 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">with with public artist in-situ, Graham Coreil-Allen's Visionary Crosswalks</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">May 9 - June 1, 2008</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, May 9, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1420"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/15/15899.jpeg" alt="Brece Honeycutt, Image: Arachne #1 2008 24 x 24 inches homespun wool &amp; stainless steel pins" height="375" width="500" /></a> <p><p>Brece Honeycutt, Image: Arachne #1 2008 24 &#215; 24 inches homespun wool &amp; stainless steel pins</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present an exhibition of artists Brece Honeycutt and Audra Wolowiec. In conversation with the physical space and with an acknowledgement of history, particularly the history of feminist art (materials, production, and execution), both artists create an open dialogue or a presence. </p> <p>Honeycutt, literally in attendance, working as a Pocket Utopia artist in residence, knits and weaves within a cultural context, referencing myth, memory, and the web that may or may not hold it all together. Using her fingers to knit and sometimes incorporating plastic bags, she spins the space into a place of permission.</p> <p>Wolowiec removes and receives space from the architecture and the body, by drawing on the gallery walls, embedding human hair within it and removing circles of it in a wall exchange program or what she terms "points of exchange." Wolowiec also "exchanges" a freckle with a friend by getting a tattoo; here a circle of ink is shared. Certificates and photographs document her process. </p> <p>Wolowiec finds; presenting a series of drawings on discarded lottery tickets, investigates and replaces. Whether made in the space, as in the case of Honeycutt, or drawn on the wall or cut out of it, as in the case with Wolowiec, both artists reside in a pocket utopia. A utopia of the egalitarian hand-made and marked. The resulting social fabric of the exhibition is a work space turned worked space where there is a deeper understanding of an artist space.</p> <p>Pocket Utopia is also pleased to present an our spring public artist in-situ, Graham Coreil-Allen&#39;s Visionary Crosswalks, a series of interactive crosswalk installations throughout the neighborhood of Bushwick. Pocket Utopia will mark the project launch with an opening on May 10th, from 4-6 pm. </p> <p>Visionary Crosswalks will consist of five temporary "crosswalks" demonstrating some of the casual paths that pedestrians take when navigating various intersections in the northwest section of Bushwick. <br /> <br /> Interested participants can find maps and installation locations for Visionary Crosswalks at Pocket Utopia.</p> <p>There will be a salon discussion on Wednesday, May 28th at 6:00 p.m. where the artist will be present to discuss fiber, feminism and ephemera. Refreshments will be served. This discussion is a part of Austin Thomas&#39;s salon series titled, "Excuse me, you have art in your teeth."</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1420 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">solo exhibition</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">April 4 - April 27, 2008</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, April 4, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1364"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/15/15220.jpeg" alt="Zonahedron, 2008 14&quot; x 17&quot; collage on paper" height="314" width="500" /></a> <p><p>Zonahedron, 2008 14" &#215; 17" collage on paper</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present a solo exhibition of artist in residence, Libby Hartle. Since September, Libby Hartle has been transporting her materials and focusing her art-making to a small table at the back of the gallery, transporting her supplies and transforming her ideas to co-exisit with an exhibition program and a visiting public.</p> <p>The result is presented here in the form of found papers (parking tickets, lottery stubs, and other detritus), picked up on her walks to the gallery and turned into, through a sorting, soaking and casting process, a brightly colored habitat. Hartle, working in the space and relating to its visitors has also expanded the floor space into a seating area, or a place to perch and drink tea or sip beer (Hartle is an expert "beeramid" builder).<br /> A visitor can join Hartle as she "hosts" a salon of drawn and collaged structures (homes and bus-mobiles), cut and glued through a semi-architectural drawing process or what Hartle has termed "stickitecture."</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1364 <div class="exhibition-subtitle"></div> <div class="exhibition-dates">March 1 - March 24, 2008</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Saturday, March 1, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1323"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/14/14283.jpeg" alt="Golden Ratio 2007 c-print 15x20 inches " height="320" width="240" /></a> <p><p>Golden Ratio 2007 c-print 15&#215;20 inches</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Danielle Rubi is a photographer who lives in California and sees the Pacific Ocean everyday from a hill above a lagoon. During the past two years she has spent much time on the Pacific coast of Nayarit, Mexico, hosting friends and musicians at a family house and recording studio. Naturally, she photographs this world; the ocean, tan bodies, sandscapes, seabirds, wind glittering the waves. Coastal photography can easily lean toward clich&eacute; and commercial California imagery. To avoid taking such photographs, Rubi focuses on the details and salient moments rather than showcase the scenery.</p> <p>In Coast, Rubi shows a group of photographs (color prints and cyanotypes) accompanied by watercolors, drawings, and objects that illuminate the magic of where the water meets the land, and its effect on human behavior and mindset. The subject matter comes from her community of friends and environs. The frames of the photographs and the shelves for the objects are made from wood gleaned from the house in Santa Barbara, <span class="caps">CA, </span>in which she grew up. Both the wood and the<br /> objects are the fabric of Rubi&#39;s personal world; they show the context of the images, and are a physical connection to her.</p> <p>A cluster of undeniable, deep-rooted symbols appears in the group of photographs. Water becomes womb-like when a person floats in it (weightless body, weightless mind). Pelicans travel, sophisticated, in a giant,sideways V, a shape that is both the feminine V of earthly fertility, and the phallic pyramid, pointed skyward. The spiral of water off a girls flipping hair draws us into the universal infinity described by Carl Jung, depicted by innumerable prehistoric and indigenous artists, and linked eternally, like the nautilus shell, to the golden ratio.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1323 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">A solo exhibition</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">February 1 - February 24, 2008</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1312"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/13/13792.jpeg" alt="Untitled (X) 2008 4' x 4' x 3&quot; Painted wood and lights " height="472" width="500" /></a> <p><p>Untitled (X) 2008 4&#39; x 4&#39; x 3" Painted wood and lights </p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present a solo exhibition of Rico Gatson. It is Gatson&#39;s desire to modulate the conversation surrounding the iconic, the conceptually efficient and the articulation of identity politics through a series of sculptures, paintings, collages and video.</p> <p>A cross morphs into an "x," a video reloads and repeats a running sequence revealing the "connection," and a painted platform becomes a social construction. Gatson shines a light into our collective blackness and reflects a variety of cultural realities where minimalism and the Black Panther Party are on the same plane. <br /> At Pocket Utopia, Gatson enters a relational conversation in a social space where there are no fixed meanings. His complex compositions are an evolving conversation. Pocket Utopia is also pleased to release Gatson&#39;s limited edition print of the musician Nina Simone. This print is the second in a series of limited editions that support the exhibition and social investigations of Pocket Utopia.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1312 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">Artists selected from the online network where all of the artworks on view are available for adoption</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">January 4 - January 27, 2008</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, January 4, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1260"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/11/11920.jpeg" alt="Announcement Image: NMS -Nature Matching System developed by Tattfoo Tan, 2007, 13 x 19 inches" height="273" width="400" /></a> <p><p>Announcement Image: <span class="caps">NMS </span>-Nature Matching System developed by Tattfoo Tan, 2007, 13 &#215; 19 inches</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Matt Davis</p> <p>Laura Devendorf</p> <p>Danielle Dimston</p> <p>Marcy B. Freedman</p> <p>Ben Godward</p> <p>Jill Henderson</p> <p>Matt King</p> <p>Dave Krueger</p> <p>Jacob Rhodes</p> <p>Analia Segal</p> <p>Jason Simon</p> <p>Tattfoo Tan</p> <p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present an exhibition of the Fine Art Adoption Network (FAAN). <span class="caps">FAAN </span>is an online network that uses a gift economy to connect artists and potential collectors. Pocket Utopia will function as a clearinghouse and will facilitate the adoption process. Post-studio artist and Pocket Utopia intern Audra Wolowiec selected the works on view. The adoption of artworks between the artist and collector will be finalized through the website (http://www.fineartadoption.net/); no purchases will be made.</p> <p> "Ideally, the work is going to people who would not otherwise own the artwork," says Adam Simon, the Brooklyn, <span class="caps">N.Y. </span>artist who set up Fine Art Adoption Network (FAAN) with the support of Art in General. Adopters might be institutions with no art budget, individuals with little disposable income, or families who haven&#39;t considered making art a priority.</p> <p> One of the goals of <span class="caps">FAAN </span>is to help increase and diversify the population of art owners and to offer artists new means for engaging with their audience. The artist determines who can adopt the artwork.</p> <p> Adam Simon got the idea for <span class="caps">FAAN </span>when his mom moved from a house to an apartment, and he found himself regaining possession of two large paintings he had made years before. That&#39;s when the light bulb went on: Artists have more art than they can store, while plenty of people who love art have no way of owning it. So why not use the Internet to facilitate art adoptions?</p> <p>This exhibition of <span class="caps">FAAN </span>is the third in a series examining creative pocket utopias that began by opening a file at Pierogi (The Pierogi Show at Pocket Utopia in September 2007). Then in December 2007 with a show titled "Etsy," Pocket Utopia ventured into the crafty commerce of the online place to buy and sell all things handmade with the same name (http://www.etsy.com)</p> <p>There will be a salon discussion held on Wednesday, January 23rd at 6:00pm where Adam Simon and <span class="caps">FAAN </span>artists will talk about money and its role in the art world. Refreshments will be served. This discussion is a part of Austin Thomas&#39;s salon series titled, "Excuse me, you have art in your teeth."</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1260 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">A selection of artists from the hand-made artworld from the online site by the same name (http://www.etsy.com):</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">December 2 - December 23, 2007</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1185"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/11/11265.jpeg" alt="The Face of Nature, 2007 by Etsy photographer Irene Suchocki" height="644" width="430" /></a> <p><p>The Face of Nature, 2007 by Etsy photographer Irene Suchocki</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present a selection of artists from Etsy, an online marketplace for buying and selling all things handmade. Etsy was launched in 2005 with the vision of building a new economy and presenting a better choice:&#8232;&#8232;Buy, Sell, and Live Handmade. Operating like an unregulated art world of ceramics, photography, zines, paintings, wood objects, and origami (just to mention the media presented at Pocket Utopia), Etsy gives over 100,000 artists a "shop" to display and sell their work. These Etsy artists are real artists with real names but choose to identify themselves only by screen names on the site. (Just tracking down the actual names of these artists from their geodesic-domed craft rooms was a feat in itself.)</p> <p>The artists--only one chose not to reveal her true name--from the incredible place called Etsy are presented in a real space. It&#39;s eye candy, not hand candy and a lot more.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1185 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">a reading room, a re-creation, and a text piece</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">November 2 - November 25, 2007</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, November 2, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1161"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/10/10674.jpeg" alt="" height="423" width="400" /></a> <p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to organize an experimental salon of conceptual art&#39;s key figure Lawrence Weiner. The salon will feature a reading room, a re-creation ("A 36" &#215; 36" Removal to the Lathing or Support Wall of Plaster or Wallboard From a Wall," 1968) and a text piece. Weiner has long pursued inquiries into language and art-making and posits a radical redefinition of the artist/viewer relationship and the very nature of the artwork. Here too, the venue or gallery and its relationship to the artist also gets redefined.</p> <p>By transporting his investigations to Bushwick&#39;s Pocket Utopia, the viewer will discover a comfortable and unobtrusive means to read and experience Weiner&#39;s work and make their own assumptions about the nature of the art object. Working with the Weiner&#39;s grateful acknowledgment , Pocket Utopia democratizes access to his work. Although the artist here is all but invisible, the viewer will be able to see even farther, think a little more and read a lot.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1161 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">A solo exhibition of painting, photos, and film</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">October 5 - October 28, 2007</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, October 5, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1126"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/10/10158.jpeg" alt="“Production Still” (photographed in collaboration with Kevin Hunter, from the film “Trees in Los Angeles”) 2007" height="373" width="249" /></a> <p><p>&#8220;Production Still&#8221; (photographed in collaboration with Kevin Hunter, from the film &#8220;Trees in Los Angeles&#8221;) 2007</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present the work of Los Angeles based artist Lucas Reiner. In Reiner&#39;s neighborhood in Los Angeles there are trees from every continent of the world and as a result he has become fascinated visually by one thing often overlooked about them-curbside trees are trimmed, often radically, by the Department of Transportation to accommodate buildings, commerce, and traffic.</p> <p>Reiner discovers trees while driving. By visualizing the trees against a neutralized but smoggy background, Reiner finds subject for portraiture. He is constantly impressed in Los Angeles by the insistent dedication of nature to grow in spite of the restrictions placed upon it, and by the forms that result from this contest. </p> <p>By limiting the context and environment that surrounds the subject matter, a street tree, Reiner invites the viewer to focus and meditate on forces that shape its ordinary forms in unseen ways. He began his exploration of trees in Los Angeles in the fall of 2001. Since then, Reiner has produced paintings, drawings and a film of street trees. This exhibition at Pocket Utopia brings many of these elements together for the first time.</p> <p>The Silverlake Film Festival commissioned the film, Trees in Los Angeles, in 2007. It is a work in progress. The photograph is culled from his selection of over 3,000 source photographs of trees. The painting - oil and wax on canvas - depicts a radically trimmed tree near the artist&#39;s studio on Washington blvd.</p> <p>Pocket Utopia is an away-from center, off-center, exhibition, salon and social space run by artist Austin Thomas.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1126 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">A selection of artists from the esteemed Pierogi Flatfile</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">September 7 - September 30, 2007</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, September 7, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/1099"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/9/9515.jpeg" alt="image: Fred Gutzeit Otter Fall 14P 2007" height="241" width="240" /></a> <p><p>image: Fred Gutzeit Otter Fall 14P 2007</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>A selection of artists from the esteemed Pierogi Flatfile:</p> <p>Hildur &Aacute;sgeirsd&oacute;ttir J&oacute;nsson<br /> Clement Bagot<br /> Claudia Barthoi<br /> Lee Boroson<br /> Bethany Bristow<br /> David Brody<br /> Tamar Cohen<br /> Guy Corriero<br /> Peggy Cyphers<br /> Kate Drendel<br /> Miriam Dym<br /> Bruce Edelstein<br /> clyde forth<br /> Manfred Fuchs<br /> Bill Gerhard<br /> Fred Gutzeit<br /> Michelle Ha<br /> Theresa Hackett<br /> Michelle Marozik<br /> Mike Miga<br /> Team Lump<br /> Mika Yokobori</p> <p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to begin its inaugural season with a selection of artists from the esteemed Pierogi Flatfile. Although there might be a Pierogi Show part 2 next year, this year Pocket Utopia opens the file and presents 20 artists and their various styles, all works on paper, and one site-specific installation.</p> <p>As an artist-run space, Pocket Utopia seeks to pay homage to a pioneer of artist-run spaces in Brooklyn, Joe Amrhein. The Pierogi Flatfile, which now holds art from over 900 artists, also started by showing 20 artists in 1994 at Four Walls, another artist-run space. Pierogi is very much the same place it was 13 years ago yet it is also a very different place in an aggressive contemporary art world. Joe knows all 900 artists. I am presenting a pocket of Pierogi for us to get to know anew (a different 20), in a new artist-run space doing things in a very similar vein in a similar neighborhood, Bushwick, filled with artists. We serve egg rolls, not pierogies.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/1099 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">A group exhibition of six photographers</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">July 6 - July 29, 2007</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, July 6, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/953"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/8/8331.jpeg" alt="image: Eric Hairabedian, DJ Armando, 2006" height="621" width="500" /></a> <p><p>image: Eric Hairabedian, DJ Armando, 2006</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>A group exhibition of six photographers:</p> <p>Eric Hairabedian <br /> Dana Gentile <br /> Terry Girard <br /> Kristopher Graves <br /> Jersey Walz<br /> Tricia Zigmund</p> <p>Pocket Utopia is pleased to present 6 brave photographers who courageously make a space within a raw and demolished storefront. Where some gallery&#39;s present shows in recently renovated yet not quite finished interiors, Pocket Utopia is simply sweeping aside the debris and putting up work. </p> <p>Eric Hairabedian theatrical color photographs, are carefully posed and Dana Gentile&#39;s site-specific collages, personable and composed, creatively and delicately cover the raw space. Terry Girard&#39;s Polaroids explore aspects of undefined and uncomfortable places. Kristopher Graves&#39; disarmingly descriptive images of solitary adventures reference nature but are not about the natural environment and Jersey Walz&#39;s black and white photographs glisten with sausages and other beautiful arrangements in light and space. Working in color, Tricia Zigmund hangs images created during the shooting of a film, along with other provocations and transgressions.</p> <p>What&#39;s inherent in all the work presented in this demolished space is that the show becomes a sculpture. Photographic imagery, portrait or collage, expands from the actual picture and floats off into the space, just for a moment, before renovation and change occur and the next image is captured.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/953 <div class="exhibition-subtitle">the SALON of the COVERED BRIDE</div> <div class="exhibition-dates">June 1 - June 11, 2007</div> <div class="exhibition-opening">Opens Friday, June 1, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM</div> <br/> <a href="/exhibition/view/929"><img border="0" src="http://pocketutopia.com/static/dyn-images/7/7968.jpeg" alt="Salon of the Covered Bride, invitation image" height="580" width="400" /></a> <p><p>Salon of the Covered Bride, invitation image</p></p> <br /> <div class="exhibition-description"><p>Jonathan VanDyke&#39;s provocative site-specific installation with performance on June 1, 2007, pays homage to an abandoned hair salon and the future salon and exhibition site of Pocket Utopia. His pre-demolition intervention in the space, titled "The Salon of the Covered Bride," is inspired in part by an image of "the runaway bride," Jennifer Wilbanks (who staged her own kidnapping in 2005 to prevent her wedding).</p> <p>Jennifer Wilbanks, the runaway bride, and the police officer become a strange couple. The cop is escorting "the bride" as if she is being walked down the aisle. The blanket, resembling the flag or a Kenneth Noland painting, or even a burka, becomes a veil that signifies shame. Jonathan VanDyke turns the blanket into an object of investigation. In an old hair salon, he sets the stage: where beauty, everyday routine, and societal ritual get the "Jennifer Wilbanks" treatment. </p> <p>The walls, encountered them the way the former proprietors left them, drip. The fake vaulted, almost A-frame-like ceiling gets netted with fencing. Flowers "grow" above a minimal geometric structure placed center stage for the "groom" to catch blessings from well-wishers. A left-over cashier&#39;s booth becomes the site for another performer, the "bride," preparing for coupledom. Other testaments to the world of coupledom display themselves in the form of altered photographs. The installation will continue outside in the backyard and our possible future together is revealed.</p> <p>Jonathan VanDyke received his <span class="caps">MFA </span>in sculpture from the Milton Avery Graduate School of Bard College. In 2005 VanDyke exhibited at the Islip Art Museum and Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, New York.</p></div> http://pocketutopia.com/exhibition/view/929 <p><a href="http://bloggy.com/mt/archives/007042.html">link</a></p> http://bloggy.com/mt/archives/007042.html