This past Saturday Re:View Contemporary Gallery opened its doors to one of its biggest openings yet.
Dennis Hayes IV's first solo exhibit in Detroit, "Square Blue Residue", attracted over 300 people. Both the Main Gallery and Temporary Space were filled with admirers of Hayes' works.
The exhibit included a site specific installation in the Temporary Gallery space.
For more images of the opening reception, visit Re:View's Facebook Page.
The exhibit runs through November 7.
Dennis Hayes IV's interview with Re:View's writer, Krysta Stone, is now available on the gallery's Web site.
Dennis Hayes IV is a collector of found objects, a reclaimer
of that which would be trash in the eyes of others.
“I’d rather try to take these materials and make them useful
as a message and make somebody appreciate what was once going to be trash.
That’s why I try to make it look more refined. A lot of reclaimed materials tend
to have a trashy look and I try to avoid that to a certain extent,” he explains.
A graduate of the fine arts program at Alfred University,
where he studied sculpture and video, Hayes simultaneously reclaims items that
have already been consumed and creates a deeply layered commentary about our
culture of consumption.
Square Blue Residue, opening at Re:View
Contemporary on October 3, 2009, features paintings, prints, sculptural pieces,
and installation works that continue Hayes’ previous explorations of portraiture
of birds and abstract representations of elements of our natural world. Hayes’
birds embody human characteristics, such as eyes ripe with human emotion, and
his paintings are rich with references to geometry and math, religion and
science.
Re:View Contemporary Gallery is one of the galleries participating in Art Detroit Now's Cultural Corridor Art Crawl, taking place October 2, Friday, 5 pm - 10 pm.
As our next exhibit, Square Blue Residue, opens on October 3, the gallery is holding a special Exhibit Preview for the new exhibit on Friday.
Two great opportunities to check out Dennis Hayes IV's first solo exhibit in Detroit:
Square Blue Residue Opening Reception:
October 3, Saturday, 7 pm - 11 pm
Special Exhibit Preview (part of Art Detroit Now):
October 2, Friday, 5 pm - 10 pm
Square Blue Residue is a continuation of Dennis Hayes IV's previous explorations
of the portraiture of birds in surreal graphical landscapes. Inspired by the
works of James John Audubon, and using almost solely salvaged wood and paint as
his work materials, Hayes offers a modern interpretation of classic nature
portraiture to set an aesthetic tone and present the beauty of nature, while
also commenting on the discord in nature caused by humans and the issues that
afflict our contemporary society.
Employing the visual vocabulary of geometry and science, Hayes praises the work of scientists while also prompting a
consideration of the irony of science as a quest for the understanding of
nature in which nature itself is adversely affected. The works in Square Blue Residue showcase a
visual reflection on the deep harm to mother nature caused by our societal
compulsion to utilize science and technology to support our dependence on and
enjoyment of modern human conveniences, while inviting us to consider how we
may live a more harmonious life with our surroundings.
Square Blue Residue, Dennis Hayes IV’s first solo exhibit in Detroit opens at Re:View Contemporary Gallery on October 3, 2009. The exhibit includes paintings, prints, sculpture, and installation work.
By Simone DeSousa, Re:View Contemporary Gallery Owner and Director
Most of us in the Detroit area are familiar with the Gallery Project in Ann Arbor. This theme-based exhibitions gallery, led by founders and directors Gloria Pritschet and Rocco DePietro, has done an amazing job in the past years putting together quality exhibits that provided viewers with great snapshots of art being created today.
This past Wednesday, as the Ann Arbor Art Fair happened outside, I had the opportunity to stop by Gallery Project to see their current exhibit, “Shrines and Altars”, and chat with Gloria Pritschet about the gallery and their plans for the future.
Gloria told me the gallery is currently conducting a fundraiser, which hopefully will allow the gallery to continue to operate past March of 2010. As many other galleries, Gallery Project is working intensively to make through the tough economic conditions that have deeply affected the art world.
Seeing Gloria and Rocco's complete dedication to their art space project, which has brought so much to the community, moved me to write about their cause and the need for each one of us to support it.
As Gloria described her experience with the gallery as "extremely rewarding", even in the midst of all the financial challenges, I kept thinking about how Art continues to reminds us that our human experience is meant to extend beyond the ordinary, that there is something more to be experienced in every facet of life we encounter.
To make a donotion to help Gallery Project continue to bring great exhibits to our area, just go to the gallery's home page and scroll to the the bottom of the page, A Way To Support Gallery Project.
Gallery Project's mission is to "provide a venue for contemporary art that is culturally aware, individualistic, courageous, and thought provoking." Gallery Project is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, located at 215 South Fourth Avenue in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Spring gallery hours: Tuesday through Thursday, noon-6; Friday and Saturday, noon-9; and Sunday, noon-4. The gallery is closed on Mondays.
Simone
Andy Kem's work was featured on Core77's Website today.
The great photos of Laminat, Kem's first solo exhibit at Re:View Contemporary Gallery, are by Amina Horozic.
A great full-page article on the exhibit Volandismo and Mark Dancey's work came out today in the Arts section of the Detroit MetroTimes (page 30):
"Looking up " (read article)
Mark Dancey's new show is sultry and suggestive
by Travis R. Wright
If you are in town, pick up a paper copy, this article truly captures the experience of this exhibit.
This past Saturday was the opening of Volandismo, Mark Dancey's new exhibit at Re:View Contemporary Gallery.
A great crowd came to appreciate the 14 paintings that compose the exhibit, from which 10 are new works never exhibited before.
At the Temporary Gallery, along with a couple of the new painting works, a few of Dancey's popular print works are also available for purchase.
Volandismo is at Re:View Contemporary until July 25.
On the Play section of the Detroit Free Press today, read Erin Podolski's interview with Mark Dancey.
[Mark Dancey is an artist of rare talent, one who's able to make masterful oil paintings -- with a twist -- as well as snarky pop art illustrations. His name has been synonymous for years with satirical mag Motorbooty and his old band, Big Chief, and with the so-cool-it-hurts silkscreen print work that has had him working for everyone from Soundgarden to the Showtime cable network. His work has been in many group shows, including a current exhibit at the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit. His oil paintings will be on display at Re:View Contemporary Gallery from Saturday through July 25 in the solo show "Volandismo," his first in Detroit in six years. "This is a show of all round paintings," Dancey says. "I found somebody to make round frames. They're all figurative paintings in forced perspective, so the figure in each painting is seen from a low vantage point. The paintings are actually going to be hung above eye level so that you have to look up at them." Dancey's Web site, illuminado.com, has many examples of his work.
QUESTION: From the way you describe the show, it sounds kind of churchy in terms of the viewer experience. Did you intend that?
ANSWER: They're not giving out the church ceilings to paint like they did a few centuries ago, so we're doing the best we can. When you look up, you think religious. Anytime you're looking up at a picture on the ceiling and you're looking up at that perspective, it automatically gives it this otherworldly thing. Every culture is looking up at the sky and making up some myth, and they want to put heaven in the sky because it's something that's out of reach.]
View full interview at FreePress.com.
Volandismo, New Paintings by Mark Dancey, opens at Re:View Contemporary Gallery this Saturday, June 13. Opening Reception from 7 pm - 11 pm.
Information compiled by Amina Horozic, Re:View Contemporary's contributor
Continuing our series of posts related to influences on the development of Mark Dancey's graphics style, we picked Underground Comix.
Underground Comix, usually self-published comic books, appeared in the United States in the late 1960s, with the largest community spawning in San Francisco. Some of the more notable names that have arisen from that generation include Robert Crumb, Art Spiegelman, Gilbert Shelton and Vaugh Bode. The movement is widely considered to be among "the most influential art movements ever to originate in the United States."
Typically, the underground comix reflect concerns of the counterculture, stylistic experimentation, social commentary and ridicule of the establishment. Further differing from the mainstream comics industry, the underground comix were usually written, illustrated and edited by a single author instead of a team. This process thus resulted in fewer issues, which were usually highly collectable or were included in anthologies with other comix authors.
Perhaps the best-known underground comix is the Zap Comix by Robert Crumb. It featured a "roly-poly cartoon style" which was "applied to irreverent stories of the anxiety-plagued "Whiteman" and the dubious guru "Mr.Natural"; featuring surreal circumstances from talking eyeballs to a whistling vagina. The "torrent of taboos was employed to mock anything and anyone representative of the establishment.
Within the genre itself, there were two distinct approaches that targeted this similar anti-establishment philosophy. One approach of the movement, typical of authors such as Robert Williams and Rick Griffin, was very visually loaded and surreal, without a specific story line -- very experimental. The alternative, pursued by artists such as Gilbert Shelton and Robert Crumb, had a more traditionally narrative approach, more of a "well thought-out graphic literature."
While majority of the underground comix artists at the beginning of the movement were men, the 1970s women's liberation movement saw a rise in the medium by women artists -- using the outlet for feminist art and agenda. Cartoonist Trina Robbins, being among the more well known female artists of the genre, has edited numerous all-women comix anthologies, including It Ain't Me Babe in the 1970. Today, she is currently one of the foremost historians on the topic and has authored "pioneering books about women in comics and cartooning".
Unfortunately, by the mid 1970s, the movement started to collapse due to several factors. Major reason was an increase in many inferior imitators that over-saturated the market. This reason, combined with local ordinances which closed shops that sold drug paraphernalia, where majority of these comix were being sold, pretty much took the movement to its demise. However, the influence of the movement remained and still continues to trickle down into sub- and mainstream American culture through outlets such as The Simpsons and South Park, as well as "body art"and the "politically confrontational installation art".
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_comix
X-Tra Contemporary Art Quarterly: http://www.x-traonline.org/past_articles.php?articleID=164
Images:
1. Zap Comix. Robert Crumb.
2. American Splendor #1 (1976). Art by Robert Crumb. Written and published by Harvey Pekar.
