On June 8, celebrate contemporary art in the Central West End with three gallery openings.
Spend an evening exploring all that McPherson Avenue has to offer — all galleries are within walking distance of some great CWE dining establishments, too! The Alberto Patiño Jazz Trio will perform.
Duane Reed Gallery
Featuring “Portals and Dimensions,” with works by Greg Pettit, Benjamin Lowder and Francesco Lo Castro.
From curator Ethan Meyer: “Present-day reality offers the artist new inspirations, fears, and existential conflicts. Faced with a rapidly expanding and all encompassing technological evolution and a level of interconnectivity never before experienced in human history, the aesthetic of this show represents what I view as a Contemporary Futurist movement; informed also by the history of Maximalism and Abstract Expressionism.
The artist is in a particularly interesting position to react and resist the nihilism that comes from abandoning our biology for a purely technocentric model of viewing reality, or to integrate and transcend the dichotomy of nature verses artificial intelligence.
Francesco Lo Castro, David Fratu, Benjamin Lowder and Greg Pettit are all on the cutting edge of this philosophical and aesthetic unfolding and discovery. Exploring and reacting to this new reality with their own visual repertoires; they are the visionaries and pioneers of our collective future.”
Houska Gallery
Featuring new artwork from Mark Hillard.
From the gallery: “Mark’s primary interests are color and geometry of the human form. He most frequently works in acrylic, oil and ink. Primarily a painter, over the last two years he has been exploring the juxtaposition of spontaneity versus his natural inclination to obsess on the legitimacy of a ‘finished’ product. Transferring the almost subconscious quality of a ‘napkin sketch’ to a finished, large painting is always a psychological challenge for Mark. Most recently, Mark has, experimented with enlarging sketched compositions digitally, printing on canvas and then finishing in oil or acrylic. This investigation almost always manifests itself in the figure and the inherent geometry of the form and its context.”
projects+gallery
Featuring “Almost Now, Just Then,” with works by St. Louis artists Lyndon Barrois Jr., Addoley Dzegede, Jen Everett, Kahlil Robert Irving, Katherine Simóne Reynolds and WORK/PLAY (Kevin and Danielle McCoy).
From the gallery: “(The show) builds on constellations and their stars as models to explore a modular approach to art making. Shifting away from prioritizing individual subjects, the strength of the show hinges on a relationship between many. The artists in the exhibition consider the nuanced potential of multiple reads, using a variety of historical, material and cultural references in near proximity. This relationship between macro and micro is fundamental to our understanding of the depths and complexities of individual situations; we don’t accept the cumulative entity despite our knowledge of its supplements, but rather, the value of its assembled form could not emerge without them.”
Ongoing Shows
Don’t forget to check out the ongoing exhibitions at Atrium Gallery (“I Know It When I See It,” through June 24) and Philip Slein Gallery (Valerie Jaudon and Chuck Webster, through June 17).
Openings are free and open to the public. For more information about specific artists, please contact the galleries directly.