Today and Tomorrow: Worcester Public Schools Visual Art Teachers

Gallery 1

Opening Reception: Saturday March 7, 5-8 pm
Closing Reception: Sunday March 8, 1-4 pm

Participating Artists:

Benjamin Adwetewa-Badu
Keri Anderson
Hagop Aprahamian
Laurie Atchue
Jay Benotti
Victoria Caezza
Deanna Degon
Joe DiGregorio
Margaret Donahue
Kate Egnaczak
Margaret Fitzgerald
Tina Glodis
Jason Harthan
Kallie Hunter
Tobias Irving
Ryan Jarvis
Courtney Johnson
Susan Kellogg
Darya Kuruna
Timmary Leary
Juli Leighton
Sharon Mansfield
Kerry McCormack
Callie Mulcahy
Erica Murphy
Christine Murphy-Cross
Amie Nemes
Tithya Puch
Ann Rokosky
Megan Shea
Brynnalee Blackmar
Jamie Sullivan
Fran Warner

Please join us for the opening of “Today and Tomorrow” on View for one weekend only. Enjoy an eclectic selection of works in various media from 33 artists-educators of the Worcester Public Schools.

Jumping the Shark – New work by Peter S Wise
Adventures in entropy and other dark matters

Gallery 3

Opening Reception: Saturday March 7, 5-8 pm
Gallery Hours: Saturdays and Sundays, 1-4 pm
Closing Reception: Sunday March 29, 1-4 pm

JUMPING THE SHARK:
PHOTOMONTAGES AND PAINTINGS
BY PETER S. WISE

Some but not all of the works presented here are connected to the theme of “Jumping the Shark.” Hopefully, the viewer will make his or her own determination as to which are and which aren’t. The phrase itself has jumped the shark and become a parody of itself, originally coined to depict the later seasons of the sitcom,”Happy Days” as over the hill, tired, lacking surprise and so on. However, the phrase has stuck with me and many of the images reflect an expanded and readily understandable view of the inevitable deterioration of matter, cultures, relationships, beliefs, logic and really everything else in the known universe. The physical basis for jumping the shark is the second law of thermodynamics, or simply that in the absence of absorbing energy, all things tend to entropy. It’s pretty easy for us to understand but rather more difficult to accept, especially when personally applied to our bodies (aging and eventual death)and mental state (dementia and Alzheimer’s disease being common examples.) But we are not alone and this work seeks to universalize the drift towards entropy of all things and ideas, and not without humor.

Scientists discuss whether our known universe has reached a point when its expansion will end and start contracting to the point it was at 14 billion years ago. Historians debate whether civilizations conform to an inescapable pattern of the proverbial rise and fall paradigm. Marxism declares capitalism is doomed to failure as it careens from one financial crisis to the next and economic inequalities increase. These are all examples of jumping the shark and we can look to less cosmic examples as well – the breakdown of logic in human dreams, the stresses endured by the Donner party in the 1840s that led to cannibalism, or oppositely the chaotic humor of Benny Hill. So, these images may be a celebration of universal law or a lamentation but they do attempt to encourage acceptance of immutable phenomena in which we as human beings have no choice but to comply.

The title piece, “Jumping the Shark,” is based on a Bill Brandt photograph from the early 60s taken in London on the Embankment where one finds the Tate Gallery. Obviously the added shark fin and Dalek from, the British sci-fi series “Dr. Who,” is of my own doing and can be read as a comment on pop culture and its exhaustion or any other way a viewer wants to read it. The practice of enhancing original work like Brandt’s is a hallmark of postmodernism, which in itself declares originality is dead and yes, has jumped the shark. The image itself is self-referential and a closed circuit so to speak wherein movement, the decisive characteristic of life at at least a molecular level, is an endless loop – in other words, dead. I find this humorous to the extent that Karl Marx called history the first time around, “tragic” but the second time around “farce.” I hope people seeing these can maintain some sense of levity as they really are, at one level, just representations of the human condition.

The oil paintings here are not intentionally connected to the themes of the photomontages. Truthfully, I include them because they are a departure from non-traditional means of visual expression and I hope, that conventional painting has a much longer cultural shelf life than the disposable photomontages they accompany. While the montages tend to irony, my paintings of people I like are not ironic in any way to my way of thinking and hopefully balance the former.

Personal Vision:

Gallery 1 & 2

Opening Reception: Saturday April 4, 5-8 pm
Gallery Hours: Saturdays and Sundays, 1-4 pm
Closing Reception: Sunday April 26, 1-4 pm

Participating Artists:

Judy Billman
Jack Casey
Stephen Cioffari
Norm Eggert
Phil Grzyb
Sherry Horeanopoulos
Stewart Simberg
Robert Steffen
Corinne Walker
Roma Wilk
James Hunt
Paul Goodwin
Anne Greene
Anne Hendrickson
Karen Clickner
Rich Lapping
Dorothy Magadieu
Doris O’Keefe
Sue Sedgwick
Joanne Shapiro

Ron Rosenstock – Ireland: Vintage Silver Prints, 1971-2001

Gallery 3

Opening Reception: Saturday April 4, 5-8 pm
Gallery Hours: Saturdays and Sundays, 1-4 pm
Closing Reception: Sunday April 26, 1-4 pm

Light Shots 2020 – A Survey exhibition by Raphaele Shirley

Gallery 1, 2 & 3

Opening Reception: Saturday June 6, 7-10 pm

Spanning over 10 years of production this exhibition features prominent artworks by this versatile and prolific artist. Versed in a variety of mediums ranging from sculpture, installations and painting to performance and video, Shirley will fill the Sprinkler Factory’s 3 galleries with the full breath of her production. Light sculptures large and small will animate Gallery 1 forming a meditative and awe inspiring entrance. In the rear galleries we will be able to explore further her site-specific installations. Special performances and presentations of her collaborative projects with Shirish Korde, Karen Gottschang and Algis Kizys will be presented during the length of the exhibition.

About the artist:

Raphaele Shirley (born 1969) is a french/american visual artist working in NYC. Shirley’ employs in her work diverse mediums such as LED, laser, neon, watermist, sound, and occasional pyrotechnics, as well as more traditional materials such as wood, metal and paint. She creates sculptures and site-specific environments which play on the tension between ephemerality and permanence. Shirley explores in her work the power of direct communication of materials as the carriers of meaning, in keeping with a minimalist language developed from the 60’ onwards. Shirley specializes in outdoor installations working with raw industrial spaces, natural environments and public parks. She collaborates regularly with composers/musicians such as Shirish Korde, Algis Kizys, David Watson, Laura Ortman and Rhys Chatham to further her installations with sound compositions and live performances.

Shirley’s solo exhibitions include: 12.6 Lyrae, The Chimney, New York (2016) 0910 Light Shots, Chelsea Art Museum, New York (2010); Arctic Lights, Dorfman Projects, New York (2010); Jewels of Kvinesdal, Kvinesdal, Norway (2009); Sunken City, Marc de Puechredon Gallery, Basel, Switzerland (2008); Sunken City Episode II, Emily Harvey Foundation, New York, NY (2008); Video Art in the Age of the Internet, Chelsea Art Museum (2007).

Shirley’s work has been featured in group exhibitions including: KAI art center opening performance, Tallinn, Estonia (2019), Chance Ecologies, Queens Museum (2016); Free City, Flint Public Art Project, Flint, Michigan (2017/2013); The Luminous Surface, Salisbury University, Maryland, USA (2015); Magnetic North: Artists of the Arctic Circle, UBS Art Gallery, New York, NY (2014); Sandnes 2160, Museum of Moving Image, Queens, NY (2013); [PAM] Cyland Festival, Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia (2009); Drift , National Center for Contemporary Art, Moscow, Russia (2008); New York; Video As Urban Condition, Museum of Modern Art Linz, Linz, Austria (2007).

Selected fairs and biennials include: Context New York (2018/2017); Featured Project /Scope, New York and Miami (2005-2009); Docks Art fair/ Lyon (2009); The Dark Fair/Swiss Institute (2008); Mykonos Biennale