EXHIBITIONS
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Artist Reception: Sunday, 9/13/15, 3pm - 6pm Jersey City Art 7 Studio Tour (JCAST): Saturday, 10/3/15 & Sunday, 10/4/15, 12-6pm Curated by Anne Trauben and Jim Pustorino, MOSTLY DRAWING will feature works by the following (mostly) Jersey City artists: Alaine Becker, Alan Walker, Anne Trauben, Bruno Nadalin, Cheryl Gross, Doug Madill, Edward Fausty, Eileen Ferara, Gilbert Giles, Greg Brickey, Heidi Curko, Ibou Ndoye, James Pustorino, Jill Scipione, Kim Wiseman, Loura van der Meule, Maggie Ens, Maria Pavlovska, Megan Klim, Mollie Thonneson, Robert Preston, Stephen Cimini, Tuan Tran, William Stamos and pastel drawings by Tim Daly in the TENTH ROOM GALLERY SHOP. At DRAWING ROOMS, we see the act of drawing and principles of drawing as essential to not only drawing on paper, but to painting, sculpture and even at times photography. Artists are always seeking to expand their visual language and express their message in unique ways. This gathering of works in MOSTLY DRAWING, by artists involved in the Jersey City area, offers twenty-five approaches to drawing and drawing-related paintings, photographic images and three-dimensional drawing. Robert Preston’s forceful drawings of Lincoln, conspiracists and confederate generals based on the the conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln. Fascinated by 19th century photography and the politics involved in photographing these subjects, the artist’s explorations of the conspiracy left him with more questions than answers. Greg Brickey’s multiple panels resemble pop/comic strip imagery but explore “ambivalence, identity, loss, and instability.” Vietnamese artist Tuan Tran’s PORTRAITS are a series of bold, calligraphic gestures in black paint with mother-of-pearl for an opalescent, glow that is matched by Mollie Thonneson’s luminesce reassembled strips of colored drawing and writing inspired Sanskrit devotional books. Doug Madill sketches from observation in urban streets, subways, cafes. He cites his love of observation and the spontaneity of the impromptu as inspiration for the cartoonish mode of execution in his sketches. Madill titles his works “streamlines”, in part from the literary allusion to run-on sentences in novels that symbolize internal narration or consciousness. Alan Walker presents a short retrospective of drawing over the years, ranging from his investigations of the 45 caliber gun, to a dark vision of the river surrounding Manhattan, to the schematic, mathematic, ritual-like drawing for his current abstract color works. William Stamos’ tiny, organic-form, color drawings describe an illumined world of mystery and the hope for enlightenment- a concept that permeates all of his artwork. In Jill Scipione’s large drawings, realistically detailed skulls of historical peoples exist with gestural and volumetric forms borrowed from Renaissance painting to create a place where both have new purpose. In the same room, wire becomes the drawn line in Anne Trauben’s expansive, etherial and organic form-changing 3D ‘drawings’ that appear to attach themselves to the wall -blurring the line between dimensions, and then a set of small paintings by Macedonian artist Maria Pavlovska in which paint and canvas become a vital, emotive tangle of writing on pages of an open journal. Gilbert Giles and Bruno Nadalin both work in illustration at times, but their drawing here explores the graphic mark in more adventurous ways. Giles' small works become graphic notes; parts of cartoon panels, writing, stains and folds of paper overlap and overrule one another creating densely secret messages. Bruno Nadalin draws a loosely comic, at times beautifully grotesque, view of his experience and imaginations. Loura van der Meule’s stark oil crayon drawings of the harbor in her native Holland town, a place she says she must record before a coming change, is paralleled by Edward Fausty’s photographic remembrances of ‘drawing’ from the studios, doors and even rooftops of Jersey City’s 111 First St. studio building- a place where both these artists and others in the exhibit started working with one another, which was torn down ten years ago. Alaine Becker is also a sculptor. Her drawings “Seen/Unseen” are ‘derived from organs and other internal structures of the body; some real and some invented.’ There is a soft tactile surface, and at times an ethereal quality is achieved through both the adding and removing of marks on the paper. They might also be drawings of sculptures of an indeterminate material. Megan Klim, in the same gallery, creates ‘drawings ‘ that are sculptural. Using a hand-awl, she punctures very thick paper with thousands of tiny holes. She says “the process was ritualistic and required performing an action repeatedly as a recording of my hand and of passing time where one could sink into a rhythm and get lost in the repetitiveness.” In a gallery concerned with nature, Heidi Curko’s energetic, atmospheric blur of structural pencil lines and shading, spring from her prior study of landscape. Eileen Ferara’s colorful drawn and painted works are a reflection on the experiences of her walks in nature- "a visual poetry; making marks, building textures and exploring different compositions.” Maggie Ens moves the two dimensional surface into 3D by collecting, collaging and recycling common discarded objects into her artworks. “The detritus, while retaining its identity, is transformed. The works are dense with man-made objects that interact with natural items like sand, shells, and plants, investing manic energy in fetishistic objects.” Kim Wiseman painted paper pieces recreate night-life in strong wavy lines, showing us a glowy, richly-colorful world of bright lights and dark corners. Across from these works in detailed ball-point pen, is a wall of Cheryl Gross’ fantastically inventive imagery from her books, Z Factor, an illustrated novel, and Greetings From Karpland continue the story in graphic novel form. Both books are politically and socially charged while telling the story of how the human race was unintentionally altered their adjustment to the world. Two of West African born artist Ibou Ndoye’s books of drawings overflowing with city-life and two of his black-outlined full-portraits on heavy brown cardboard finish the gallery. Stephen Cimini presents a pair of sentinels– large glowing oil and cold wax paintings. In each of his works, the closely toned rectangles of orange or gold are defined by incised lines. The drawing in the painting delineates the forms. James Pustorino’s large horizontal panels of complex layered colors and linear structure, built as in music, through repetition, variation and contrast, with areas of intensity and areas of rest, face off against Cimini’s in a display of color intensity. The TENTH ROOM GALLERY SHOP features a display of crisply rendered sky scenes by Tim Daly. Born in Jersey City, now active in Hoboken, Daly's pastel drawings are surprisingly realistic and evoke the experience of light and place. |
