Art Star

Category: Exhibitions

  • Upcoming Exhibition: “Too Close For Comfort” by Marcus Benavides

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    June 27th – August 23rd, 2015
    Opening Reception with the Artists:
    Saturday, June 27th from 6-8pm
    free + open to the public, light refreshments provided

    Art Star is pleased to present an exhibition with Philadelphia based printmaker, Marcus Benavides. The show, titled “Too Close For Comfort”, will include a series of new woodblock prints by Benavides.  The exhibition will be on view from June 27th – August 23rd, 2015.  There will be an opening reception with the artist on Saturday, June 27th from 6-8pm.   The reception is free and open to the public and will include light refreshments.

    The artist states, “Looking at a tree so closely, you fail to see the forest.” In “Too Close For Comfort” Marcus Benavides will line the gallery walls with new woodblock prints that each depict macro views of a small part of a larger piece, which will be revealed to the viewer when they come to the final image within the exhibition. Marcus writes, “Macro views of objects tend to abstract textures and patterns located within. Thus, distracting the viewer from what they are actually looking at. The extreme close-up can then distort your perception of reality. This perhaps can stand as a metaphor for many things; but, for the purposes of this art show, it represents an inability to accurately view the world. It is a hyperbolic, satirical statement about a problem that I, if not society in general, may have.”

    Woodblock printing lends itself to this concept. Marcus writes, “I find that by carving wood, I am physically changing the material. While paint can display imagery or a message on top of a material, woodcarving exposes parts of the naked grain. So, in manner of speaking, this allows the wood itself to speak. The grain of the wood even influences my mark-making as I gouge out sections. This coupled with the parameters of woodcarving tools, provides a distinct pallet of marks to utilize. As I use hundreds of thousands of marks to make up one image, the medium also provides ample room for discovery and unique expression.”

    Marcus Benavides is an artist, printmaker, and small business owner based out of Philadelphia. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Printmaking from Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Printmaking, from the University of Wisconsin. He has displayed his work in multiple national and international art shows, including exhibits in New York, Houston, Chicago, Beijing, and Athens, Greece. He has previously received grants from the Vilas Travel Program, the Arts Access Grant – Overture Center for the Arts, and holds a Purchase Award from the Porter Butts Gallery in Madison, WI. He currently owns and operates the Fishtown based fine art printing press, Red Light Press. It is here that he specializes in pulling limited edition, individual and collaborative, lithographic and woodcut prints.

  • Upcoming Exhibition: Same Same by Keith + Rita Greiman

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    We are pleased to present an exhibition with Philadelphia based husband + wife artists, Keith and Rita Greiman.  The duo will be exhibiting their own individual works as well as collaborative pieces.  The exhibition will be on view from April 18th – June 21st, 2015.  There will be an opening reception with the artists on Saturday, April 18th from 6-8pm.   The reception is free and open to the public and will include light refreshments.

    Keith and Rita Greiman will present an all new body of playful and vibrant works, drawing inspiration from the humor and absurdity of life’s everyday objects and events.  The show will include Keith’s acrylic on wood paintings and 3D wood figures, which feature a cast of quirky and animated characters that are brightly colored and evoke a childlike quality.  Set against flatly painted patterned backgrounds, the floating figures and objects populating the pieces appear anything but innocent though.  Rita’s mixed media dioramas mirror the childlike, yet twisted quality of Keith’s work, containing glitter coated army men, food, and animals.  In addition to their individual pieces, they will be exhibiting new works together which combine their shared vision and include patterns, floating objects and characters, real and supernatural.  The couple will also be painting a large mural together on one of the exhibition walls. This will be their first time showing at Art Star.

    Keith Warren Greiman lives and works in Philadelphia, PA. His bright and animated images of real and supernatural beings depict life, captured in experience, being ascendant, melancholic and at all times wild. Keith’s work has been shown in various galleries and publications from all over and everywhere. Some clients include LA Times, Village Voice, Newsweek, the Fader, Ace Hotels, Fantagraphics, the Utne Reader, and Willamete Week. His work has been recognized by American Illustration, The Society of Illustrators and Graphis.

    Originally from Irvine, California, Rita Greiman currently resides in Philadelphia where she has been for thirteen years.  Through the years, Rita has done various works as a seamstress, illustrator, upholsterer, and designer.  She studied in the School of Visual Arts at Pennsylvania State University as well as the College of Communications. She has worked in several media and currently combines painting, sculpture, and found objects to create playful dioramas that are often centered around animals, glitter army men, and food.

  • Genevieve Geer’s Le Puppet Regime Opens Friday!


    Enjoy this fun trailer for Genevieve Geer of Le Puppet Regime’s solo exhibition at Art Star. The opening reception will be this Friday the 13th from 6-8pm and will include snacks, light refreshments, Cut and Paste Photobooth and first dibs on this incredible work! And find out who is really pulling the strings 😉

    Learn more about Genevieve and her work here.

  • Upcoming Exhibition with Genevieve Geer of Le Puppet Regime


    Le Puppet Regime by Genevieve Geer
    Stained Glass Marionettes + Sculptures
    “You Never Know Who’s Pulling The Strings”
    February 13th – April 12th
    Opening Reception: Friday, February 13th from     6-8pm

    We are thrilled to announce a solo exhibition with Philadelphia artist, Genevieve Geer of Le Puppet Regime.  Genevieve makes brilliant stained glass marionettes of tattooed showgirls, circus freaks, Siamese twins, mermaids, strong men, minotaurs and more.  Each piece has movable limbs so you can contort and pose your puppet in any way you choose.

    We first stumbled across Genevieve’s unique work after she applied for our 2014 May Art Star Craft Bazaar.   We had never seen anything like it before and it isn’t often that we come across cool stained glass work!  Her application definitely gave us goose bumps.  We were even more smitten after checking out the work in person.  Not only does she make marionettes, but she also makes larger sculptural wall pieces and a line of jewelry.

    Her exhibition at Art Star will include her popular marionettes but also some more of her larger sculptural pieces.  The show will differ a bit from our typical exhibition.  Though the larger pieces will remain up throughout the duration of the show, the marionettes will be available to take home the day of purchase.  We will have a back stock to replace pieces as they sell.  The show will open the day before Valentine’s Day, so bring your date to check out the show, mix and mingle with the artist, enjoy a beer + snack and pick up a one-of-a-kind art piece for your special someone!

    Artist Statement: Genevieve Geer’s stained glass characters are articulated, modern day people, captured in an ancient art. They are holy in their medium, hearkening back to saints and sinners in churches everywhere, but they are living contemporary tales. Instead of stained glass as static object, well placed, well lit, and coveted as an architectural asset, these pieces move themselves to center stage. By pulling the characters out of the allotted window frame, Geer begins to force a reassessment of this medium. Further, by articulating each creature and character, the audience can no longer dismiss the work as sparkly background noise. They must look at each piece and divine it’s story, what it is and where it comes from.

    The Artist’s process is painstaking and involved. The first steps are drafting a basic line drawing on paper and transferring the cartoon to glass, using hand mixed powdered glass paint that is then kiln fired. Cutting the glass, coppering, soldering, drilling and piecing together the final figure allows for variations and deviations at every turn, often resulting in creatures that stray from the initial drawing by happy accident. “Powdered glass paint is a medium unlike any other–one can have a general idea of what it will do, but sometimes it’s better than me, it knows what will look best, and when that happens, if I am smart,  I lift the brush quickly off the glass, let it dry and get it in the kiln.”

    Geer is constantly feeding her work, researching embroidered textiles and antique dishware patterns, ukiyo-e woodblock prints, contemporary couture fashion, Russian movie propaganda posters, illuminated manuscripts, and contemporary illustrators like Yuko Shimizu.

    ABOUT THE ARTIST Genevieve Geer is a Philadelphia based artist working in glass, metal, wood and textiles. Originally from Massachusetts, she attended Parsons School of Design for Illustration and The Museum School in Boston for Animation. She moved to NYC soon after graduating and worked as a freelance prop fabricator over the next few years. When she relocated to Philadelphia in 2007, she began to experiment with a new medium, hot glass. She started out as a manager of a local public access glass studio for a year before taking an apprenticeship at Wheaton Village in New Jersey. There she developed her blown glass skills, but was also introduced to casting, kiln forming and flat glass techniques. After two years she returned to Philly and she and her husband built a studio in their Kensington home. In 2012, after seeing a stained glass show by the artist Judith Schaecter in Philadelphia’s Eastern State Penitentiary, a spark was lit and Genevieve began to research and experiment with stained glass. In this one medium she found a meeting place for her training in illustration, animation and hot glass. Her company, Le Puppet Regime, came into being soon after, and features articulated, movable stained glass characters and scenes.

    Visit  http://www.genevievegeer.com/ for the artist’s full portfolio.
    Find a selection of her work at our shop + on our website.


  • Jen Corace Opening + Our 10 Year Anniversary Party THIS SATURDAY!

    We will be celebrating our 10 Year Anniversary and the opening of Jen Corace’s solo exhibition, Within, with a party at Art Star this Saturday from 6-9pm + you are all invited!

    There will be beer, booze and food aplenty – including snacks donated by Soy Cafe + Honeygrow!

    Nick + Danielle of All Boy / All Girl will be playing an acoustic set throughout the evening.

    Cut and Paste Photobooth will be here with her fun props and backdrops. Cram in with all your friends and take some fun pics!

    Jen Corace will be exhibiting new, original paintings all done in gouache, ink and pencil on Rives BFK.  Corace states, “Within explores the practice of bringing the outside indoors.  I’m interested in representation of nature through home decor, the restraint, patterning and control that occurs within a space, what it means to internalize the external and the private world of quiet reflection and imagination.”  This will be Jen’s 3rd solo exhibition at Art Star.

    Please contact us  if you are interested in being on our collector’s preview list for the show. We will be sending out a email preview of the work on Thursday before the opening.

    ABOUT JEN CORACE
    Jen Corace was born and raised in the not so wild wilds of suburban South Jersey.  She attended RISD from 1992-1996, graduating with a BFA in Illustration.  For the past few years Jen has been focused on children’s book illustration. She’s worked with Amy Krause Rosenthal on the Little series, with Cynthia Rylant for Hansel and Gretal and The Steadfast Tin Soldier and most recently Mac Barnett for Telephone.

    Jen currently resides in Providence, RI.  When she’s not children’s-booking-it-up she’s doing something else in her studio … like drawing for fun or working on projects with her brother.  Or she’s gardening … or wrangling a dog named Leonard … or eating too much toast … or laying on the floor and staring at the ceiling.

    Thank you to our Partners:

     

  • Announcing Jen Corace Exhibition + Our 10 Year Anniversary Party!

    Art Star Gallery + Boutique is turning 10 years old this Fall!  This has been such an incredible, crazy ride!  We are both living our dream and we can’t thank our customers and artists enough for making it all possible.  We have worked so hard to make Art Star a reality and though we’ve seen our share of success, we’ve also encountered our share of stumbling blocks.  But what doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger, right? We have learned alot along the way, but the #1 thing that we’ve learned is that our passion for what we do and a little bit of hustle can get us through anything. Now that we have 10 years under our belt, we feel stronger than ever and are looking forward to many more years of bringing you the very best in Art, Craft and Handmade!

    “Root” by Jen Corace / 2014 / gouache, ink and pencil on Rives BFK

    As a way to say thank you + to celebrate 10 years in business, we’ve decided to host an exhibition with one of our favorite Art Star artists – the incredibly talented, Jen Corace! The show will open on October 11th as part of the DesignPhiladelphia Festival.  We will also be hosting our 10 year anniversary party that evening.  Mark your calendars for a really fun party with the Art Star gang and our exhibiting artist, Jen Corace.  And as a very extra special treat, we will have our INSANELY talented friends, Danielle Lovier + Nicholas Rahn from one of our favorite bands, All Boy/All Girl  playing a live acoustic set during our party! We hope to see you there!  If you are interested in getting first dibs on a Jen Corace original, please email us at info(at)artstarphilly(dot)com and we will add you to our Preview List.

    Below is our press release with all the nitty gritty details:

    For Immediate Release
    Media Contact: Megan Brewster
    Email: info(at)artstarphilly(dot)com or Call: 215.238.1557

    Within
    a solo exhibition by Jen Corace
    October 11th – November 16th, 2014

    Opening Reception + Art Star 10 Year Anniversary Party
    as part of the DesignPhiladelphia Festival
    October 11th from 6-9PM at Art Star
    Live Music by Danielle Lovier + Nicholas Rahn (of All Boy/All Girl)
    Food, Drinks, Cut + Paste Photobooth, + more fun TBA
    Free To Attend / Open To The Public 

    Art Star is pleased to announce a solo exhibition, titled Within, by Rhode Island based illustrator, Jen Corace.  The show will be on view from October 11th through November 16th, 2014 at Art Star Gallery + Boutique.  There will be an opening reception held in conjunction with the 2014 DesignPhiladelphia Festival on Saturday, October 11th from 6-9pm.  Meet the artist, enjoy live music, snacks, drinks and celebrate Art Star’s 10 Year Anniversary!

    Jen Corace will be exhibiting new, original paintings all done in gouache, ink and pencil on Rives BFK.  Corace states, “Within explores the practice of bringing the outside indoors.  I’m interested in representation of nature through home decor, the restraint, patterning and control that occurs within a space, what it means to internalize the external and the private world of quiet reflection and imagination.”  This will be Jen’s 3rd solo exhibition at Art Star.

    ABOUT JEN CORACE
    Jen Corace was born and raised in the not so wild wilds of suburban South Jersey.  She attended RISD from 1992-1996, graduating with a BFA in Illustration.  For the past few years Jen has been focused on children’s book illustration. She’s worked with Amy Krause Rosenthal on the Little series, with Cynthia Rylant for Hansel and Gretal and The Steadfast Tin Soldier and most recently Mac Barnett for Telephone.

    Jen currently resides in Providence, RI.  When she’s not children’s-booking-it-up she’s doing something else in her studio … like drawing for fun or working on projects with her brother.  Or she’s gardening … or wrangling a dog named Leonard … or eating too much toast … or laying on the floor and staring at the ceiling.

    ABOUT ART STAR
    Art Star is a gallery & boutique located in Northern Liberties, Philadelphia. We carry handmade items & products by artists from across the country and many local too. We also work closely with select artists to design & develop limited edition products for our brand and wholesale line. Our goal is to offer quality handcrafted goods at a full range of prices to accommodate all budgets. We currently work w/ 50+ artists & stock everything from one-of-a-kind pieces to housewares, prints, jewelry, greeting cards, baby items, clothing & more. In addition to our brick-and-mortar shop, we also put on Philadelphia’s largest outdoor craft fair – the Art Star Craft Bazaar, which won Philadelphia Magazine’s Best of Philly Award for Best Shopping Event in 2010 + again in 2012. Additionally, our shop won the title for Best Homemade Gift Shop in 2011.

    ABOUT DESIGNPHILADELPHIA
    DesignPhiladelphia, a signature event of the Philadelphia Center for Architecture, is the oldest and largest design event of its kind in the country and annually showcases the work of over 400 practicing architects, designers, and creative professionals.  Experience design in unexpected ways through more than 120 exhibitions, workshops, demonstrations, tours, talks, and events held in venues across the city.  Learn about wide-ranging topics, including architecture, urban planning, landscape, graphic, multi-media, product, furniture design, fashion, and the like.  This year’s festival kicks off on the evening of October 8 and events run from October 9-17.

  • Kelly Kozma Solo Exhibition at Paradigm Gallery

    Detail of “Chattersphere” by Kelly Kozma, mixed media on canvas

    As many of you already know, Kelly Kozma is our first Artist in Residence.  If you’ve been at the shop, you might have seen her diligently working in her studio space in our side room that is off of our back gallery space.  For the last couple of months she has been busy finishing up her latest body of work for her solo exhibition at Paradigm Gallery.  Her exhibition, titled “Chattersphere”, will be the first at Paradigm’s brand new and much larger space at the NW corner of 4th and Fitzwater.

    Detail of “Four Words, Sounds Like” by Kelly Kozma

    Kelly’s process driven, mixed media work typically begins as a flat piece of paper or canvas and is meticulously worked with brightly colored shapes and patterns that are created with layers of drawing, painting, hand embroidery, + jewels. The end result is a rich tapestry of abstracted patterns and textures that looks more like a textile piece, rather than the flat canvas or paper that it began as.

    detail of the back of “Four Words, Sounds Like” by Kelly Kozma

    I learned a fun fact about Kelly’s work since she moved into our space –  the backs of each of her pieces are almost as interesting as the front, which led her to create prints of the backs of each finished piece.  These prints are then transfered onto a blank canvas, becoming the first layer of her subsequent piece. This creates a lovely continuity in her body of work.  I’ve seen each piece for Chattersphere and they are all amazing on their own.  I cannot wait to see them hanging all together.  The show is now up at Paradigm Gallery.  Please join us at the opening this Friday from 5:30 – 10. And if you can’t make it to the opening, the show is up through June 21st.

    Important Links
    Facebook Invite
    Kelly Kozma’s Website
    Paradigm Gallery Website 

     

  • Spotlight on Rachel Fuld

    Rachel Fuld in her studio. Photo by Laura Jamieson.

    Local artist Rachel Fuld contributed beautiful handmade Mahogany Wall Hooks to our current exhibition, Farmhaus & Friends.  She was kind enough to tell us more about them and share her inspiration and photos of her process.  Enjoy!

    Rachel Fuld’s Wall Hooks in Farmhaus & Friends

    Rachel says: Ossements were designed for a show, “Your Personal Hang Ups”, at the Center for Art in Wood on 3rd Street. The artists were asked by curator Gail Brown to “explore inventive forms inspired by their individual interpretation of “personal hang ups”- both as functional and conceptual ideas”. I took the functional route and created this series of hand shaped wall hung hooks that resembled antlers, though the actual form was inspired by another artist’s metal sculpture. For months the sculpture hung in a window of a gallery near my house. I walked by every day. It was a metal armature of differently sized Y shaped hooks attached to a grid maybe 3feet by 5 feet, very dense, like a forest. On each arm was a piece of cut wood. Somehow, I simplified the idea, into the single y shaped ossement. 

    Here are some photos to show how they are made:


    Check out the pieces in person in Farmhaus & Friends, which closes this Sunday or online here.

  • Spotlight on Audrey Cooper

    I will be posting a spotlight on each of the participating Farmhaus & Friends artists now through October 20th.  This first spotlight features potter Audrey Cooper.  We weren’t familiar with Audrey’s work until Ben introduced it to us and we are so happy he did!

    AUDREY O. COOPER (b. 1971) has been working with clay since 2005. Born and raised in Philadelphia, Audrey graduated with a degree in literature from the University of Pennsylvania and studied sculpture at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. She has studied with potters in Maine and Pennyslvania, and worked for two years at The Clay Studio in Philadelphia. She lives and works in Northern Liberties.

     

    Audrey is interested in using local materials, creating as little waste as possible, and in the life cycle of materials. She embraces the unpredictability, combined with the control of craftsmanship, inherent in the ceramic process. For this project, Audrey made functional tableware, hand-thrown on her electric wheel. She fired one group of porcelain pieces in a wood-fired kiln, fueled by scraps from Ben McBrien’s woodshop. These pieces are unglazed, fired in the salt-chamber of the kiln, colored by the intense atmosphere created by wood fire. The other group was fired in her electric kiln. They are stoneware glazed entirely or partially with ash glazes she made by burning woodshop scraps, applied in combination with commercial glazes.

    Check out all of Audrey’s pieces from Farmhaus & Friends online here but if you can, please come and see them in person.  The photos do not truly capture the richness and beauty of the glazes PLUS they all feel great in your hands.

  • DIY Silkscreen Kit Debut / Make + Take with Julie Lange

    The lovely Julie Lange of On3Designs has been hard at work creating a new line of DIY Silkscreen Kits, which she will be debuting at our DesignPhiladelphia Celebration / Closing party for Farmhaus + Friends on Friday, October 11th from 6-9pm.  Guests will be able to sample one of the kits on a piece of muslin to create their own one of a kind scarf to take home with them.  The make & take is completely free but we encourage visitors to purchase a kit to take home with them!


    Each kit will  include a screen, 3 stencils of 1 design, small package of textile ink (which can also be used on paper), a squeegee and directions.  There will also be refill packs for purchase that will include 3 stencils of 3 designs.  These kits are great for kids 10+ up or beginners who would like to learn how to silkscreen.  By using the kit, you will learn what you will need to do to create your own one of a kind designs!

    Here are some samples of what your finished scarf may look like but there are endless possibilities of what you can create!

    We did a wonderful blog feature on Julie & her line of hand printed purses and bags.  Click here to learn all about her and her work!

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