Tag Archives: visual art

Sarah Slavick

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Artist’s Statement

My paintings are abstracted interiors of the body made of cells, neurons, blood, milk, veins, wounds, and sutures. They are the stuff of regeneration, of connection, of disease and ultimately of recovery. The visual formal language is one of abstract evocations rather than depictions, but derives from and is inspired by celebrations and lamentations of the social and physical experiences of humanity. The beauty of painting is that it can communicate profoundly and may reflect upon human history. While my paintings are informed by such tragedies as AIDS and joyous events like birth, I do not desire or aim for any specific reading or interpretation. Instead, the works offer multiple possibilities.

With climate change an ever pressing concern, and rising seas, water scarcity, ocean pollution, and other extreme weather patterns becoming the norm, I find myself looking to the vast expanses of water as a source for my most recent body of work. While my work is abstract, I reference nature visually and conceptually. For instance, in the Phylum and other works, I reference cell biology, accretion of geological formations, botanical structures and the taxonomy of the natural world.

During the very physical work of additive and subtractive layering in my work, there are numerous conceptual and physical changes that occur. In past work, I created large wood paintings made up of grids of painted small panels which arose out of my own experience of motherhood and spoke to the sustenance of new life. Some work was also inspired by the miraculous feat of cell division into the journey of creation and birth of new life. More recently, I have made paintings containing hundreds of pieces of wood of various heights, widths, and lengths (as seen in Rime and Phylum). Each piece of wood or paper represents a separate entity but is linked with its surrounding neighbors by various systematic rules and decisions. The small singular elements of the multi-paneled pieces are meant to exist in equal strength to the whole. In effect, nothing is disconnected from the whole. The individual cannot exist without the support of the whole; but, nevertheless, it remains distinctly unique. The singular elements in all of these works ultimately change in form and substance by building into something greater than themselves. A transmutation occurs from part to the whole.

Sarah Slavick (b. Munich, Germany, 1958) received her BA in Studio Art from Wesleyan University and an MFA from Pratt Institute. Slavick received a Massachusetts Cultural Council grant in Painting in 2006, as well as grants from the Artist Resource Trust Fund, the Blanche Colman Foundation and residency fellowships at the Millay Colony, the Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, CAMAC in Marnay-sur-Seine, Kunstnarhuset Messen in Aalvik, Norway, and the Baer Art Center in Iceland. Her work has been exhibited in Big Bang! Abstract Painting for the 21st Century at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, at the Miller Block Gallery in Boston, Giola Gallery in Chicago, Tao Water Gallery in Provincetown and in Natural Acts at the Massachusetts Convention Center. Slavick has lectured about her work at Bowdoin College, the University of the Arts, the San Francisco Art Institute, the Studio Arts Center International in Florence, and the Maryland Institute of Art, among others. A member of a large family, she has five siblings, three of whom are also professional artists.

Don Porcaro

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Artist’s Statement

My work over time has consistently explored the nature of human interaction with the physical world through architecture and man-made objects. Tools, utensils, buildings and machines eventually become artifacts, archaeological sites and cultural signifiers. I have also been inspired by the whimsical possibilities inherent in animation and contemporary culture, from Japanese anime to the satirical figures of late Guston, which stand at the cusp of what I refer to as “the monster and the child,” something purely fictional and innocent that informs our youthful imagination.

My most current series entitled Talismans brings together many of these interests, with a focus on totemic iconography and the human form through stacked layers of limestone and marble. This layering alludes to the passing of geological time as well as cultural history, while the feet firmly place the sculptural form in the realm of abstracted figuration. Finally, the ornamental brass elements adorn the “heads,” making up a complex array of visual associations that bring to mind everything from Middle Eastern hookahs to Venetian perfume atomizers, Buddhist stupas and African jewelry.

Don Porcaro is a New York based artist and Professor of Fine Arts at Parsons School of Design. His work has been exhibited widely throughout the United States and abroad including solo shows in New York, Los Angeles, Kansas City, Atlanta, and Nashville. A 10-year survey of his work has traveled from the University of Florida, Gainesville to the Ringling School of Art in Sarasota. He has also had museum shows at the Dorsky Museum of Art in New Paltz, NY, the D’Amour Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, MA, and The Visual Arts Center of New Jersey in Summit, NJ.

Keren Kroul

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Artist Statement

I mine memories for fragments of belonging and desire, moments of personal identity waiting at the edges of things: patches of summer sunlight on my grandmother’s bedroom floor, streaks of deep indigo in the sea at dusk, the rough texture of an old carpet under my feet. These ephemera are repeated and layered, twisted and tangled, becoming dense formations, map-like places of memory and identity.

Drawing is at the heart of my work. With watercolor on paper, I use tiny brushes to mark the passage of time in a meticulous, repetitive, and meditative process. Lines become shapes, then patterns, and then structures, hovering over the silence of the paper. I am drawn to the immediacy of watercolor, and to the reflection of the hand in the work: irregular and imperfect and of the moment. The play between micro and macro, the fragility of the single line against the physicality of the overall piece, and the fluid interconnectedness of memory, time, and place, drives the work.

Keren Kroul was born in Haifa, Israel, to an Argentinean father and Israeli mother, and grew up in Mexico City and Costa Rica. She currently resides in Minnesota. She holds an MFA in painting from Parsons School of Design (NY) and a BA in fine arts from Brandeis University (MA). Her work was featured in the 2014 Minnesota Biennial at the Minnesota Museum of American Art (MN), and has been exhibited regionally and nationally. Kroul is a recipient of a 2015 Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board.

Mariah Karson

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Artist’s Statement

The photos in this gallery come from two series. Central Structure explores structures of unknown use in relation to their surroundings. Photographed in a static way, the viewer is allowed to create their own dialogue as to what purpose the structure has amidst the surrounding landscape.

School’s Out Forever (Detroit, 2013) was created as schools were being closed in Chicago in early 2013, and the comparison to Detroit arose in the media. What was to become of the physical structures of the schools after they close? If cities began to shutter educational institutions, where would children learn and grow, and how could a community walk away from the citizens of the future? For a child, a school is their second home, where they feel most comfortable. Losing that sense of community and belonging must be a traumatic event for displaced students.

Mariah Karson (b. 1979) is a Chicago based artist and freelance photographer. She studied photography and printmaking at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her work has been published internationally. Specializing in editorial, event photography, and studio portraiture Mariah strives to capture honesty and clarity in order to provide her clients memorable images that tell compelling stories.

Karson was shortlisted for the 2015 Lucie Foundation’s A Photo Made Scholarship, named one of the photographers for Best of ASMP 2015, and is currently working with High Concept Labs (Chicago) as a 2016 Sponsored Artist. She has been a member of ASMP (American Society of Media Photographers) since 2013, currently serving on the Board of Directors and as acting Treasurer and Fine Arts Chair for the Chicago/ Midwest Chapter. mariahkarson.com

Sydney Ewerth

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Artist’s Statement

Focusing on my own oscillating sense of identity and daily insecurities, my practice consists of authenticating the narrative of animated and playfully inefficient objects. The radical presence of line, tactile surface, and color in these sculptures are all a means to attempt communication through the senses. The work reflects a longing to connect and create a physical dialogue between lived and imagined space. This imagined space is where memory and its potential to become distorted over time exist. Our mind can edit or exaggerate what actually occurred in a moment in our histories. I am interested in how these potentially false recollections make up our very real identities. The notion of trying to record presence in everything seems to hold an absurd truth. Physical mapping of line and shadow reflect dissonant repetition and my interpretation of true and secret self. Bright colors and a crude touch present a humorous front that mask coy, obsessive behaviors. Through line and shadow, I hope to define what inhabits the distance imposed between two points and provide a proof of presence in the physical manifestations of growth and time.

Atlanta native Sydney Ewerth received her BFA with a concentration in sculpture and ceramics from Augusta University (formerly Georgia Regents University) in Augusta, Georgia. During her candidacy for the MFA at the University of Alabama, she has taught and assisted classes in various topics of ceramics and drawing. Ewerth has been juried into several exhibitions across the United States and is coming off the tail end of her MA solo exhibition, “It’s There, I Swear.”

Editors’ Notes (Posit 9)

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Welcome to Posit 9!

We love this first issue of 2016, which makes us think, in a number of different ways, about the expansive potential of artistic innovation. First, there is the incorporation and re-appropriation managed by the procedural poetry of Carlo Matos and Travis Macdonald, offering glimpses of the erased and remixed words of writers like Simone Muench, Mark Lamoureux, and Paul Killibrew. In addition, there is the implicit dialogue between new and previous work by returning contributors — in this issue: Darren C. Demaree, Howie Good, and Travis Macdonald. All of which reminds us of the extent to which art is, by definition, about incorporation and re-imagination, whether it is Anis Shivani’s Great Wall, Howie Good’s tornado, Robert McBrearty life story, Eileen Tabios’s litany of wonders and horrors, or the alchemical transformation of source material aced by every artist (visual as well as literary) featured in this exciting issue. So, it is with great pleasure that we invite you to peruse:

Darren C. Demaree’s spare, suggestive, “quiet, lowered /. . . roaring/ . . .& ecstatic” probings of identity, intimacy, and the quest for grace;

Samantha Duncan’s smart, tightly-wound, vivid constructions tracking a paradoxical “graduation from the gradient” via “veins that listen” to her extremely telling “curl/ of words;”

Raymond Farr’s wistful prosody, revealing “the sublime the ironic like a 5 o’clock shadow” where “love is a man ruled by the sun & not the itch in his bones” and “even this sad yellow paint has seven shades of itself;”

Howie Good’s somber prose poems populated by “a new god seated on a throne of razor wire,” “gray gulls, their shrieks like symptoms of dementia,” and “words, some bandaged, others still bleeding” mercifully leavened by irony, imagination, and even love;

Maja Lukic’s quietly intense evocations of cityscapes furnished with “gutted wind” and a sky which “promises to rain / money bags and emoji,” or offers snow like “cracked glitter, paw imprints in new dustings, / effigies of our old breath, frozen in the air;”

Travis Macdonald’s compelling remixes of poems by Killibrew and Lamoureux, demonstrating “how all true/going is taking” and raising intriguing questions about the relationship between vocabulary and voice;

Carlo Matos’ haunting erasures of Simone Muench’s Wolf Centos (themselves reconfigurations of other poetic texts), troubling our assumptions about center vs periphery, absence vs presence, and the loud voice of the unsaid, “when tenderness/nestles down/with her she-mask” — “sans teeth, sans/you;”

Robert Garner McBrearty’s impossibly compressed microfiction, in which the task of writing his companion’s life story deteriorates to stunning effect;

Cindy Savett’s intriguing invitation to follow her on “a trip where the babies lie flat/ tracing resistance with their fingertips” leading us careening “down the middle in an instant of delight,” only to stand speechless wondering “how do I sing of white lilacs and pine?”

Anis Shivani’s virtuosic bricolage of allusive musicality and aphoristic insights nailing “art, the fleabite to time,” transforming “partial manuscripts signed/ by the angels of detritus” into “experimental gardens . . . [imbued with] the nuance of musicality;”

Eileen R. Tabios’ masterful litany of all that could never again be forgotten, once she “composed this song that would turn you into ice, so that you will know with my next note what it means to shatter into tiny pieces the universe will ignore;”

and Leah Umansky’s inspired revelations of the “satisfaction in seeing the day as something clear for landing or for sending off” where “once, there was the falling of night and I was alone with its steepness, and . . . felt I was a pooling of light; a door-sliver and golden beam.”

Thank you, as ever, for reading.

Susan Lewis and Bernd Sauermann

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And welcome to the visual art of Posit 9!

Keren Kroul’s complex and beautiful paintings evoke maps of imaginary countries or the pathways of the brain. The individual sections stand strongly on their own, but conjoined in the large grids presented here, they make a statement that is simultaneously bold and intimate. The sum is as beautiful as the parts.

The mixed media sculptures of Sydney Ewerth turn our expectations about space and materials topsy-turvy. Her play with the object and its painted shadows confounds our expectations even while her materials and colors delight the eye. Her aesthetic is clear and the work masterful.

Don Porcaro choreographs an elegant dance between the two- and three-dimensional pieces presented here. It is evident how his work in one medium reverberates into another. His colorful and almost playful forms belie the serious artistic concerns that underlie this evocative body of work.

The lyrical paintings of Sarah Slavick are reminiscent of the movement of water, wind and sand. The rhythm and dynamism of her patterns are mesmerizing, with light and color moving through and around them, underscoring their complexity.

Mariah Karson presents a fascinating vision of landscape, whether it be the interior landscapes of abandoned school buildings or the poetics of isolated buildings in desolate settings. The solitude in her photographs is profound, and perhaps a little lonely. However, she frames this vision with a clarity that is elegant and precise.

Cheers!
Melissa Stern

Katarina Wong

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Artist’s Statement

I began this series after my father unexpectedly died in 2009. I was unable to work for several months after his death, and when I returned to my practice I was surprised to see a radical shift in the work. These paintings emerged from this personal experience of grief and loss.

Sumi ink holds a special place for me. My father and I learned traditional Chinese painting techniques together, so this medium is infused with those memories of us being beginners together.

I began by splashing sumi ink against the surface of paper or clayboard. From there, working without self-censorship, I excavated images revealed by my subconscious. They are, in a sense, DIY Rorschach tests and became ways through which I could begin to understand the impact of profound chaos – what happens to us when the existential rug is pulled out from under us.

Katarina Wong is a NYC-based visual artist and also the founder of MADE, a consultancy dedicated to helping a wider-range of collectors discover and acquire art. Her work has been shown nationally and internationally, including at El Museo Del Barrio in NYC, The Bronx Museum, The Fowler Museum in LA, the Nobel Museum in Stockholm, Sweden and Fundacion Canal in Madrid, Spain. Her work is in numerous private and public collections including the Scottsdale Museum of Art and the Frost Art Museum in Miami, FL.

She has received numerous awards, including the Cintas Fellowship for Cuban and Cuban-American artists and a Pollock-Krasner grant, as well as residencies at Skowhegan; Ucross Foundation; Ragdale Foundation, the Kunstlerhaus in Salzberg, Austria; and the Open Art Residency in Eretria, Greece. She holds an MFA from the University of Maryland at College Park and a Master in Theological Studies (Buddhism) from the Harvard Divinity School.

Heather Wilcoxon

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Artist’s Statement

always challenge yourself
take risks
don’t be afraid of change
fail……..a lot
nothing comes easy
it’s the work that matters

Heather Wilcoxon lives and works in the Bay Area . She received her MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1988. She has exhibited both nationally and internationally. Her work is in several permanent collections including The American University Museum, Washington DC, The Fine Arts Museum, Auchenbach Foundation of Graphic Arts in San Francisco, the De Saisset Museum and Triton Museum in Santa Clara and the Di Rosa Preserve in Napa, California. She has received several fellowship awards. Two from the Pollock/ Krasner Foundation, New York. Three painting grants from the Buck Foundation in Marin County and a residency fellowship from the Djerassi Artist Residency Program and The Stonehouse Artist Program in California. She has also been nominated 3 times for a SECA from SFMOMA, as well as 2 nominations from the Eureka Fellowshop Program. She has taught at the College of Marin, UC Berkeley Extension, San Francisco Art Institute, Kennedy University, California College of the Arts, Center for the Book, National Institute of Art and Disabilities and The Richmond Art Center. She has been a visiting artist at and lectured at Rollins College, Orlando,Florida, Dominican University, Sonoma State College and Maine College of Art. Her work can be seen at Jack Fischer Gallery in San Francisco.

Helena Starcevic

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Artist’s Statement

My natural state of observation and inquiry informs both my perspective and my process. Beginning with the construction of multiple smaller forms, the elements are then assembled into larger compositions or installations. This repetitive study becomes a meditative exploration of each as an individual or idea. The surfaces are unadorned, monochromatic. Each component is imbued with a symbolic, ritualistic aspect that gives it its own identity, strength and purpose. Combined, a new meaning and purpose occurs. They reference the spine, the air we breathe or a cellular structure. Some hang in space; but they are all communities.

It was camping expeditions in the California desert which formed my appreciation for the stark beauty of nature’s deceptively barren landscapes. My ultimate goal is to bring this deference to my work.

Originally from Southern California, Helena Starcevic moved to New York City in the eighties, working as an RN. She has lived in Paris, traveled extensively in Europe and Latin America, and calls Mexico her soul’s home. She just had her first major solo show at Five Points Gallery in Connecticut, and is currently included in the Northeast Ceramic Sculpture Exhibition. Her studio is in the South Bronx.

Meryl Meisler

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Artist’s Statement

These photos are from my book Purgatory & Paradise: SASSY ’70s Suburbia & The City. Here is an excerpt from my introduction:

My grandparents came from Eastern Europe to escape pogroms and persecution. It was the Great Depression and both families were poor. My dad, Jack Meisler, married Sylvia Schulman on furlough from the Coast Guard during WWII. Thanks to the GI Bill, they bought a home on the site of a former Chinese vegetable farm in Massapequa, Long Island. They helped found Congregation Beth El, were Presidents of The Knights of Pythias, Pythian Sisters and Temple Sisterhood. Best of all, they co-founded The Mystery Club: eleven couples that went on adventurous outings to places like a haunted house, séance, nudist colony, and gay bathhouse. Brother Mitch arrived during 1st grade, and soon after, I got my first camera, The Adventurer.

In 1969 I went to Buffalo State and studied Art Ed. In In grad school at the University of Wisconsin I studied illustration and photography. After graduation, I moved to New York and studied with Lisette Model. The city was in fiscal and social turmoil, and I was in transition and chaos myself. My parents were divorcing, and I’d recently ‘come out.’ My cousins introduced me to artists, writers, musicians, feminists, activists and intellectuals in East Harlem and the Lower East Side.

In 1977 I went to The COYOTE Hookers Masquerade Ball, Mardi Gras in New Orleans, CBGB, discos, Fire Island, and the Hamptons. The gay and feminist movements were in full swing. I photographed the streets by day and the clubs at night. I received a Comprehensive Employment Training Act (CETA) Artists Grant, and began working for the American Jewish Congress, photographing Jewish NY and my own family roots. I got a hostess job at Playmate, then Winks and The Magic Carpet.

CETA ended in 1979. I did freelance illustration and taught art in public schools. I also began a relationship with a Massapequa girl — the designer of My ‘70s: Sweet and Sassy.. The book encapsulates my coming of age: The Bronx, suburbia, The Mystery Club, dance lessons, Girl Scouts, the Rockettes, the circus, school, mitzvahs, proms, feminism, Disco, Go-Go, Jewish and LGBT Pride, the New York streets, friendship, family and love.

Meryl Meisler (merylmeisler.com) is a photo-based artist. She has received fellowships/grants from New York Foundation from the Arts, Puffin Foundation, Time Warner, Artists Space, CETA, China Institute and Japan Society. Her work is in the permanent collections of AT&T, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Brooklyn Historical Society, Library of Congress, Islip Art Museum, Metropolitan Transit Authority, Pfizer, Reuters, Columbia University, and YIVO. Her artist books are in the collections of Carnegie Mellon, Pompidou, Chrysler Museum, Metronome, Museum of the City of New York, MoMA NYC, and the Whitney Museum. Meryl is the author of A Tale of Two Cities: Disco Era Bushwick and Purgatory & Paradise: SASSY ’70s Suburbia & The City.