MISS DEMOCRACY | Online Exhibition
I say that democracy can never prove itself beyond cavil, until it founds and luxuriantly grows its own forms of art, poems, schools, theology, displacing all that exists, or that has been produced anywhere in the past, under opposite influences.
-WALT WHITMAN
Welcome to MISS DEMOCRACY, an online group exhibition that includes works by over 20 artists.
CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS: Katie Commodore, Daniel Clarke, Angela Conant, Jeremiah Dine, Elizabeth Duffy, Louise Eastman, Glenn Goldberg, Phillip Hardy, Erik Hougen, Anki King, Michael Krueger, Martha Lewis, Matt Magee, Melissa Marks, Tanya Marquardt & David Smith, John Mitchell, Rachel Ostrow, Janis Stemmermann, Victory Garden, Rita Valley, Chuck Webster, and Diana Weymar, Tiny Pricks Project.
View and download the checklist by clicking here. Thank you for your support. Enjoy the show!
Due to the coronavirus (COVID-19), the gallery is currently closed until further notice.
Wishing all good health and safety,
PLANTHOUSE
Katie Commodore, Wear a Mask While Voting
Wear a Mask While Voting, 2020
Thread on found upholstery sample
6 x 4 inches
Unique
SOLD
ARTIST STATEMENT: Wear a Mask While Voting is taken from a headline in the Monterey Daily Cypress, on November 4, 1918. At the time the U.S. was in the grips of the Spanish Flu epidemic and elections were in peril. 1918 was a midterm election in several states that marked their vote for Women’s Suffrage and Prohibition, both of which were made National law in 1920.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Katie Commodore’s parents could have told you when she was a toddler that she would grow up to be an artist, despite years of her insisting that she was going to be an astronaut and them sending her to Space Camp twice. Never giving up her dreams of painting Martian landscapes and testing low gravity pastels, she went to art school, which surprisingly lacked the rigorous science background NASA required, although she did buy a car once from someone who worked for NASA. And what art school lacks in science and math they make up in spades when it comes to teaching art, which is what she was good at anyway. Commodore recently moved out of Brooklyn for beautiful and way more affordable Providence, RI, where she spends her days painting incredibly detailed pattern-based erotic portraits of her exhibitionist friends and longing for the day when the space program starts an artist’s residency.
Daniel Clarke, Glossary of Terms No.40 and Horseback and Love Affairs
Woodcut
40 x 34 centimeters
Edition of 14
$450
Woodcut and aquatint
70 x 100 centimeters
Edition of 8
$950
ARTIST STATEMENT: Les contours sont brusques, les formes ont cessé d’être douces, couples, nuancées, elles ont une présence crue. Dans sa pratique, l’artiste abandonne un stade contemplatif docile pour accéder à une intériorisation dégagée. Cette nouvelle dimension ne se manifeste pas seulement par l’autoreprésentation en tant que sujet, par lequel et autour duquel les situations sont créées, mais aussi par l’impétuosité d’une création débridée que l’artiste suit presque aveuglement. Il ne maîtrise plus son résultat, il suit un devenir dont il ne connaît pas les aboutissants. Au moyen de couleurs vives, criardes, il restitue cette irruption. La recherche n’est plus du tout dans la contemplation de l’existant, dans sa représentation fidèle dans l’accommodante solution du regardeur attentif, mais regardeur. Il s’agit maintenant d’enregistrer l’acte en devenir, d’émettre une nouvelle forme picturale, plus proche du courant néo-expressionniste, qui donne vie à des figures symboliques, des allégories, renvoyant à des pensées autres. Des figures qui, de par le corps disgracieux, leur gestualité maladroite, leur attitude parfois brutale, parfois résignée, portent l’intensité vitale sur un fonds métaphysique.
Annalisa Rimmaudo, Centre Georges Pompidou, September 2019
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Born in 1971 in Southampton, NY. Clarke graduated from Yale in 1993 and moved shortly thereafter to Paris, France where he has been working and living since. He has exhibited throughout Europe and the USA and his work figures in several prominent public and private collections, notably the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. and the Fondation Maeght in Saint Paul de Vence. He is currently represented by Planthouse Gallery, Line Press Ltd and the Galerie Françoise Besson.
Angela Conant, Like Opinions (small)
Silverpoint on panel
8 x 10 inches
Unique
$700
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Angela Conant is an artist, curator, and educator in Brooklyn, NY. Her work in sculpture, painting, and video abstracts bodily form and addresses the transformative effect that representation (in art, written language and journalism) has on cultural perception. She studies art made as a means of survival. Marble sculptures act as matrices: she takes rubbings of her carvings, which yield bodies work on paper. Her own sculptures and paintings function as props and characters in her video work, which parodies science fiction, gender roles and news media. Her practice encompasses curating as well as collaboration on artist-run projects.
Conant’s work has been exhibited at Electronic Arts Intermix (New York City), EFA Project Space (New York City), Planthouse (New York City), SPRING/BREAK art show (New York City); Glasshouse Projects (Brooklyn, NY), Interstate Projects (Brooklyn, NY); the Delaware Center for Contemporary Art (Wilmington, DE), Neter (Mexico City, MX), The Sunview Luncheonette (Brooklyn, NY), ICA Baltimore (Baltimore, MD), La Mama Gallery (New York City), SARDINE (Brooklyn, NY), Galerie René Blouin (Montreal, QC), Agency (Brooklyn, NY) and Assembly Room (New York City).
Jeremiah Dine, From DAYDREAMS WALKING
Digital C-Print on Fuji Professional SuperType PD Luster
20 x 20 inches
Edition of 5
$500 – 100% of proceeds go to White Plains Hospital Covid-19 Relief Fund
ARTIST STATEMENT: Daydreams Walking, published April 2020 by Damiani Editore, is comprised of 196 photographs shot on the streets of New York City by Jeremiah Dine between 2010 and 2017. Dine’s exploration of the daily ebb and flow of humanity follows in the tradition of 20th Century street photography as practiced by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank and Garry Winogrand, among others. The city illuminated is the subject, with the people, objects and streets the supporting cast. Dine has photographed on the streets of New York since he was a teenager, first in black and white with 35mm cameras, then starting in the 2000s in color with digital cameras. The book’s title is derived from the Frank O’Hara poem Music, which is included in the book, as well as a playlist of songs that Dine listened to while walking and shooting. Robert Sullivan, author of Rats, The Meadowlands and My American Revolution contributes an essay.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Jeremiah Dine is a New York City-based photographer. His newest book, Daydreams Walking, was published by Damiani in April 2020. After attending The Cooper Union Dine published his first book, Natural Selection (London/Stuttgart: Edition Hansjörg Mayer, 1983), 104 photographs taken at the American Museum of Natural History. Dine’s work is in many public and private collections around the world, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. Dine is prolific on Instagram and uses it as a virtual open studio. Follow him @jdine, and visit his website: jeremiahdine.com.
Elizabeth Duffy, Guard Tower 1 and Guard Tower 2
Detailed view
Embroidery on paper napkin
16 3/4 x 15 1/8 inches
Unique
$600 (unframed)
Embroidery on paper napkin
16 3/4 x 15 1/8 inches
Unique
$600 (unframed)
Detailed view
Embroidery on paper napkin
16 3/4 x 15 1/8 inches
Unique
$600 (unframed)
ARTIST STATEMENT: I create installations and objects that allude to the apparent comforts of home, to reveal its contradictions, pathos, and bewildering humor. The fragility of the outside world compels us to create refuge, but that refuge is porous and unstable. My installations explore this contradiction through making invented controllable worlds. Compulsive process and obsessive repetition are part of what makes me tick. I am fascinated by how things are made and how taking them apart reveals hidden worlds and the ingenuity of the human imagination.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Elizabeth Duffy has exhibited widely including at the Drawing Center, The RISD Museum. the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, White Columns, Wave Hill, and DM Contemporary. She has held residencies at the Bogliasco Foundation in Italy, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Yaddo, the MacDowell Colony, the Sirius Art Centre in Cobh, Ireland, VCCA and Ucross. She is the recipient of awards from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Pollock Krasner Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts, where she was awarded grants in both Sculpture and Craft in 2018. Her work has been written about in the New York Times, Art News, Art on Paper, the Boston Globe, the Village Voice, and many other publications. Duffy received her MFA from CUNY/Brooklyn College and her BA at Rutgers College. She lives and works in Providence, Rhode Island.
Louise Eastman, Dice and Snake Eyes
Ceramic
7 x 9 x 7 inches
Unique
$300
Ceramic
6 x 6 inches
Unique
$75 per tile
#1
#2
#3
#4
#5
#6
#7
#8
#9
ARTIST STATEMENT: I started making dice as a reaction to our threatened democracy. A pair of dice can be loaded, a gamble, a reminder of having something at stake. The snake eyes tiles, double ones, are smiling in a field of clover- saying “let’s not have another crapshoot election” so let’s:
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Louise Eastman is an artist working in weaving and ceramics. In her current body of work, Eastman weaves sets of long, highly detailed pieces on a floor loom, and contrasts them with clay bricks that frame smaller weavings and knit pieces. Other works include large-scale weavings that are undeniably akin to the brightly colored woven potholders of the 1950’s. She combined boldly colored natural wool, acrylic wool and felt to create a textured 3D mass of vibrant geometric abstraction. She also weaved folded toilet paper that has been stitched for strength into a seven-foot square painting, minus the paint and canvas. Trace lines of colorful thread playfully punctuate the reductive composition. Despite their Claes Oldenberg-esque physicality, the formal qualities of these artworks resist a Pop Art association.
Eastman is an artist living and working in New York City. She focuses on weaving and ceramics. Eastman received her MFA from Pratt Institute, NY, and has recently shown at Silas Marder Gallery, Planthouse Gallery, and Russell Janis Gallery. She’s a member of the Victory Garden Collective, founded in 2016. Previously, she received a MacDowell Colony Fellowship.
Glenn Goldberg, Stop the Hate
Pencil, ink, and collage
11 x 7 1/2 inches
Unique
$750
ARTIST STATEMENT: What shall we do, what do we aspire to, what impact does our behavior have, what do we value?
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Glenn Goldberg was born in the Bronx, works in Brooklyn, and lives in Manhattan. Goldberg makes non-literal narratives using icons of his own making and selection. They exist in drawings, paintings and assorted objects fueled by the desire for honor and deference. His sources of inspiration include dinnerware, team uniforms, house plants, billboards and decorative rugs. Goldberg is an artist and a shy musician. He attended James Monroe High School and received his MFA from Queens College CUNY. Goldberg has shown his work in the US, Europe, and Central America. His first one-person exhibition was at Willard Gallery, NY, and two of his recent solo shows were also in NY, at the Jason McCoy Gallery and the Betty Cunningham Gallery. Goldberg’s work is in numerous museum collections including the Brooklyn Museum, The National Gallery, M.O.C.A. in L.A. and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY. He is a Guggenheim Fellow and a Professor at Queens College CUNY.
Philip Hardy, Noodle Painting (Green, Purple, and Orange)
Oil on canvas
9 x 11 inches
Unique
$1000
ARTIST STATEMENT: I am very pleased to be included in the virtual Miss Democracy exhibit by Planthouse Gallery. The work I have included is from the Noodle Painting series. The Noodle paintings are inspired by the practice of producing ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) video content commonly found on YouTube. Although my work is heavily invested in the history and language of painting, I am also interested in digital mediums. I aim to invent new ways of interacting through the internet, new ways of engaging with each other, and more equitable relationships for sustainable art practices and creative economies. My work considers the influence of smartphones and digital media outlets, such as Facebook, youtube, and Instagram has impacted society as well as artists.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Philip Hardy is a multimodal artist interested in digital mediums of photography, video, and primarily painting. He has been involved with art galleries and art institutions, including Planthouse Gallery as an art handler since he earned an MFA from the New York Academy of Art in 2009. Philip briefly established an apartment gallery project called East Third Street Gallery in the East Village and contributed written and video artist interviews to BatteryJournal.org. Currently, he is involved in the art collective Walter’s Cube, a virtual reality art exhibition archivization project.
Erik Hougen, Cognitive Dissonance
Inkjet on paper
20 x 15 inches
Edition of 12
$275
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Erik Hougen (b. 1982) was born in Bismarck, North Dakota, and lives and works in New York City and Maplewood, New Jersey. He graduated from Pratt Institute with his MFA in 2008. Hougen has been a resident with the Artist in the Marketplace (AIM) program at the Bronx Museum, and a SIP Fellow at the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop in New York City. Hougen has had exhibitions with the Bronx Museum, the International Print Center of New York, and Kunsthalle Galapagos in Brooklyn. Hougen was also a finalist in the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition, at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. in March 2013. Currently, Hougen is a Master Printer and Artistic Director at Lower East Side Printshop in New York City.
Anki King, Back to Back and Body
Mixed on paper
30.25 x 22.25 inches
Unique
$850
Mixed media on paper
26 x 19 3/4 inches
Unique
$750
ARTIST STATEMENT: I paint and sculpt life-sized figures that act as symbols for feelings that can’t accurately be described in words. They are often characterized by the object symbols with which they share space. Each figure, or fragment of a figure, stands still in readiness for a charged meeting with the viewer. The viewing activates a series of responses, where identity is projected onto the faceless figure, similar to a reflection that offers the gazer another view of him-herself. This frees the narrative from being contained within the subject matter of the artwork and allows it to exist in the viewing space.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Anki King grew up in a small village in Norway. After completing her arts education in Oslo, she moved to New York City in 1994. King exhibits frequently both in Europe and in the United States. Her work is included in private and public collections including the Appleton Museum of Art, in Ocala, FL. King has also exhibited at the Katonah Museum of Art, NY, the Las Cruces Museum of Art, NM, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Tokyo. In 2010 she was the winner of the Artist of the Year Award in the London International Creative Competition (LICC). She was recently featured in the book Kunstnerliv, a collection of 19 Norwegian contemporary artists. She is also featured in the documentary Artists in NYC, available at Amazon.
Michael Krueger, Freedom Fighters
Colored pencil
8.5 x 11 inches
Unique
$200 (unframed)
ARTIST STATEMENT: Art is the truest measure of freedom.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Michael Krueger is an artist and a teacher, a Love Librarian, a Tamarind Artist and an Honorary Resident Dropper. Grounded firmly in drawing, Michael works in a variety of media including, painting, drawing, printmaking, animation, and ceramics. Michael’s artwork reflects a deep interest in American history, contemporary American culture, art history, the human experience, and personal memoir.
Martha Lewis, Suffrage Garland
Digital inkjet Print on Paper
Length of handcut garland
Edition of 300
$375, includes a signed 11 x 17 inches wall print
Wall Print
11 x 17 inches
Garland and wall print
ARTIST STATEMENT: The Suffrage Movement in both the UK and the USA had a long, violent history. It was deeply tied to the abolition movement and had moments of unity and division. The fight for equality and justice and the need to actively protest continue to this day with Race and Gender being
the defining issues of the moment, even during the COVID 19 Pandemic. One of the things that struck me when researching the History of the 19th Amendment was the many massive parades and spectacles that were involved. To honor the spirit of taking to the streets together, and those who marched for us in the past, I have made this hand-cut printed garland.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Martha Lewis is a visual artist, curator, educator, and radio presenter who has exhibited nationally and internationally. Her artistic practice focuses on drawing, Site-Specific Installation, books, knowledge, and the history of science. Martha’s work has been exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, The Tricycle Gallery and The Oxford University Botanical Gardens in the UK., and in the USA at The DeCordova Museum, Central Booking Gallery, Geoffrey Young Gallery, Planthouse Gallery, RealArtWays and The Tides Institute and Museum, to name a few. She is included in the collections of Nuffield College, Oxford, The Boston Public Library, Boston, Ma., and Chapman University, Orange, Ca. as well as in private
collections in the U.S.A and Europe. She holds an MFA from Yale University and a BFA from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art.
Matt Magee, Breakdown I and Breakdown II
Diptych, photograph
8.5 x 11 inches
Edition 5
$300 per diptych
Diptych, photograph
8.5 x 11 inches
Edition 5
$300 per diptych
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Matt Magee (1961) was born in Paris, France, and has a Bachelor of Arts in Art History from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, and a Master of Fine Arts from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn. He currently lives in Phoenix, Arizona. Magee’s work is held in the collections of Museum Fine Arts Houston, Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, University of New Mexico Art Museum, Phoenix Art Museum, Albuquerque Art Museum, Columbus Museum of Art, JP Morgan Chase Art Collection, New York and Twitter Inc., San Francisco.
Melissa Marks, Volitia Makes Noise
Ink jet commemorative print
22 x 15.5 inches
Edition of 10
$200
ARTIST STATEMENT: The drawn mark has been given superhero status and attributes, and yet, remains a basic building block with the power to elaborate fantasy. Vigorously loyal to the forms of Nature, Volitia is blossom and ice, temporary, alive and melting. To make a mark is to connect ourselves to something essentially human, calling attention to the vulnerable, alert moment. At the same time, the drawn gesture attaches us to a long history of mark-marking, and therefore, to the history of what is seen and not seen, to the power of visibility and of erasure.
Volitia Makes Noise is a bellows driven, hand-pumped, mouth-blown, concord of sound. As with any pliable squeezebox, the quality of the sound depends on the movement of the player. The resulting noise arises out of a coordinated, although often improvised, sequence of gestures including compression, expansion, breathing, stomping, pausing, listening and playing.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Volitia is a twenty-year project that has included Drawing, Painting, Animation, Wall-Drawing and Installation, inspired by a diverse array of sources including American comics, Contemporary Japanese Anime, Chinese Scroll Painting, Pop, Nature and Abstraction. Marks received her Bachelor of Arts from Wesleyan University and her Masters of Fine Arts from Yale University. Solo exhibitions include: Planthouse Gallery, NY; Bloomberg Space, London; Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery, NY; Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, CT and Joya: arte + ecología, Almeria, Spain. Her work has been included in exhibitions at PS1/Moma, NY; Artspace, CT and The Drawing Center, NY.
Tanya Marquardt & David B. Smith, Seven Moves
Cotton photographic tapestry
50 x 60 inches
Edition of 5
$325
Detailed view
ARTIST STATEMENT: David B. Smith photographed Tanya Marquardt as she moved in the studio and the layered image was woven into a tapestry at a mill in North Carolina. Our shared intention was to create an image that represented a fantastical body from another reality. The image did this, and also surprised us by reflecting and illuminating our own reality. Tanya writes, “The process echoed our desire to mirror form and content, and surprised us by becoming a document of my ever-changing trans body, gender-in-motion, a fierce and vulnerable mucking about in an in-between space.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: David B. Smith works primarily within the intersection of photography, sculpture and textiles. His work was featured at the 2019 Textile Biennial at Museum, Rijswijk in the Netherlands, and he has had solo shows at Planthouse, Halsey McKay, LMAK, and Spring Break Art Show. He has attended residencies at Apex Art, NZ, Textile Arts Center, Socrates Sculpture Park, NY and Marble House Project in VT.
Tanya Marquardt (they/she) is a queer writer and performer, whose book Stray: Memoir of a Runaway was named a Best Queer History & Bio by The Advocate. Their theatre work has been presented in NY at the Brooklyn Museum, Dixon Place, The Tank and The Collapsible Hole. Tanya’s play Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep is the subject of an Invisibila podcast, and an online version will be presented at FoldA, a festival of digital performance, in June.
John Mitchell, Lady in Blue and Twinkle
Oil on linen
90 x 37 inches
Unique
Please inquire
Oil on linen
90 x 37 inches
Unique
Please inquire
Oil in linen
37 x 80 inches
Unique
Please inquire
Oil in linen
37 x 80 inches
Unique
Please inquire
ABOUT THE ARTIST: John Mitchell, born 1971 in Southern Illinois, is an American artist. As a draftsman, printmaker, and painter, Mitchell works from direct observation of people, places, and things. He was educated at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Yale University. Mitchell lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
Rachel Ostrow, Everything is Here (09) and Everything is Here (10)
Alcohol ink on yupo paper
9 x 12 inches
Unique
$300
Alcohol ink on yupo paper
12 x 9 inches
Unique
$300
ARTIST STATEMENT: My paintings urge the eye and the mind to wander within space, form, light and movement. They skirt between abstraction and representation, reveling in the fluidity of visual perception. Indulging in the mystery, uncertainty and openness of our visual experience, they use abstraction to be suggestive and to engage the viewer’s imagination. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I am exploring new mediums in order to work from home. Everything Is Here, 2020, is a series of alcohol ink on yupo paper drawings that were all made in my living room. This is the first time I have worked with alcohol ink and I am enjoying the struggle and the discovery.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Rachel Ostrow (b. 1977) is a Brooklyn-based painter and printmaker. She earned a B.A. in fine arts from Wesleyan University, a post-baccalaureate degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art, and an M.F.A in painting from Hunter College. She has had solo exhibitions at 42 Social Club (Lyme, CT), Sunday Takeout (Brooklyn, NY), The Kenan Center (Lockport, NY), John Davis Gallery, (Hudson, NY), Saffron (Brooklyn, NY), Todojunto Gallery (Barcelona, Spain), and The Plant (Buffalo, NY). She has participated in group exhibitions in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Montreal, Dublin, Joshua Tree, CA and Great Barrington, MA.
Janis Stemmermann, What It Takes: Nerve, Guts, Backbone and Heart
Wheel-thrown with high fire clay (food safe)
8.5 x 1.5 inches
Edition of 3 (1 edition left)
$400 (set of 4 bowls)
Nerve, detailed view
Guts, detailed view
Backbone, detailed view
Heart, detailed view
ARTIST STATEMENT: In contemplating the theme of Miss Democracy, with the upcoming election and living in COVID-19 reality, thoughts of different kinds of courage needed kept coming to mind. The words nerve, guts, backbone, and heart written on individual plates that can be displayed, stacked, or used to eat everyday meals, reminding us daily of the qualities What It Takes.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Janis Stemmermann is a multidisciplinary artist and designer whose work continuously explores the relationship between form and pattern in sculpture, ceramics, printmaking and textiles.
Victory Garden, Miss Democracy
Miss Democracy, 2020
Miss Democracy bandana, 2020
Screen printed 20 x 20 inches Included with Miss Democracy print 
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ARTIST STATEMENT: In January of 2017, Victory Garden, a newly formed activist art collective began preparing for the Women’s March on Washington. Inspired by Suffragette Parades of the early 1900’s, they appropriated traditional satin beauty pageant sashes and subverted them with sayings such as “Miss Governed”, “Miss Led” and “Miss Take.” As the demand for these protest sashes increased, the collective began hand printing sashes and distributed over 1000 to protestors just in time for the Women’s March on Washington.
Now as we approach what might be the most important election in history, Victory Garden has decided to revisit the “Miss” pageant theme with a series of prints titled Miss Democracy, aimed at reminding us all what Democracy means. Now more than ever, as a country we must defend democracy and vote for our lives.
This limited edition print edition includes a Miss Democracy bandana, printed to protect your health and the spirit of democracy. The 3-color screen printed bandana measures 20×20 inches.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Victory Garden Collective — Louise Eastman, Jess Frost, Tara Geer, Katie Michel, Wendy Small, and Janis Stemmermann.
Rita Valley, WTF: Dark Camo
Hand sewn fabric with French ribbon adornments
30 x 32 inches
Unique
$700
ARTIST STATEMENT: For the past three years, I wake up to the news and face-palm. My “WTF” series is a direct reflection of the unhappy state of national affairs. The current administration and their many unfortunate pratfalls- verbal and otherwise- have both kept me awake at night and inspired me to produce more art. I suppose I could be thankful for the endless bounty of subject matter pouring forth on our twitter feeds, but mostly I’m just scared and angry. “WTF” indeed.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Rita Valley is an artist living and maintaining a studio in Connecticut; close enough to New York to dive frequently off the deep end into the vagaries of the art world, but distant enough to enable a life of bucolic scenery, complete with a Dog and Pony Show. She grew up as a self-professed “political firebrand” (despite politically indifferent parents who eked out working class livings) and early on explored issues of inequality, the waging of war and financial disparity. These motifs continue in her work to this day, with the near collapse of our economy providing further fodder for her studio investigations. She trusts- perhaps in vain- that her art practice will help to correct the wrongs so manifestly present in the world today, but she is not holding her breath.
Rita Valley studied at Bard College, and graduated from Bennington College with a degree in Studio Art and a minor in Literature. She has shown extensively throughout New England and sporadically in New York City. She has received three State of Connecticut Individual Artist Grants and recently was commissioned by a collaboration between Yale University Art Gallery and Artspace (New Haven) to create an original artist’s book, Better Guns and Gardens. Funding was provided by the National Endowment for the Arts. Her work has been shown at Odetta Gallery in Brooklyn and Real Art Ways in Hartford CT. Rita Valley had her first New York one-person show at Capsule Gallery in February 2018. Her work was recently included in the Spring/Break Art Fair in NYC.
Chuck Webster, Missed Democracy
Wax crayon on paper
15 1/4 x 14 1/4 inches
Unique
$900
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Born in Binghamton, NY, Chuck Webster received a B.A. from Oberlin College in 1992 and a MFA from American University in 1996. The artist’s work can be seen in numerous public collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY; Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX; and The Archives of the Rothko Chapel in Houston. He has been the recipient of numerous awards and grants, including the 2018 National Academy Affiliated Fellow at the American Academy in Rome, The Milton Avery Fellowship at Yaddo, 2010 and 2000; the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 2016; the MacDowell Fellowship, Peterborough, NH, 2004 and 2017; and the Winter Fellowship at the Fine Art Works Center in Provincetown MA, 2004. Webster lives and works in New York City.
Diana Weymar, Tiny Pricks Project – Nancy, As I Call Her and I’m Done Being Quiet
Vintage textile, cotton embroidery floss, hand stitched
12 x 12 inches
Unique
$900
This piece is from the Tiny Pricks Project, quote by Trump
vintage textile, cotton embroidery floss, hand stitched
8 x 8 inches
Unique
$300
This piece is from the Tiny Pricks Project, quote by Lisa Page
ARTIST STATEMENT: Tiny Pricks is a public art project created and curated by Diana Weymar. Contributors from around the world are stitching Donald Trump’s words into textiles, creating the material record of his presidency and of the movement against it.
Tiny Pricks Project holds a creative space in a tumultuous political climate. The collection counterbalances the impermanence of Twitter and other social media, and Trump’s statements as president through the use of textiles that embody warmth, craft, permanence, civility, and a shared history. The daintiness and integrity of each piece stand in stark contrast to his presidency.
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Diana Weymar is an artist and activist. She grew up in the wilderness of Northern British Columbia, studied creative writing at Princeton University, and worked in film in New York City.
She has worked on projects with Build Peace (in Nicosia, Bogota, Zurich, and Belfast), the Arts Council of Princeton, the Nantucket Atheneum, the W.E.B. Du Bois Center at UMass Amherst, the University of Puget Sound, The Zen Hospice Project (San Francisco), the Peddie School, Open Arts Space (Damascus, Syria), Trans Tipping Point Project (Victoria, BC), New York Textile Month, Textile Arts Center (Brooklyn, NY), The Wing (NYC and SF), and Alison Cornyn’s Incorrigibles project, as well as Syrian journalist and activist Mansour Omari. She is a judge / presenter for All Stitched Up at the University of Puget Sound. She has also curated exhibitions at the Princeton, NJ headquarters of Fortune 500 company, NRG Energy, and exhibits for the Arts Council of Princeton.
Diana is the creator and curator of Interwoven Stories and The Tiny Pricks Project, both of which are open for public participation. Her work has been exhibited and collected in the United States and Canada.