Whitespace Gallery

the DECEMBER SHOW: now open!

2009-12-12T12:41:00.004-05:00

Selected Gallery Artists:
Robin Bernat - Jonathan Bouknight - Teresa Cole - Sarah Emerson - Jody Fausett - Matt Haffner - Sally Heller - Julia Hill - Ann-Marie Manker - Beth Marcum - David Yoakley Mitchell - John Otte - Mark Sandlin - Red Weldon-Sandlin - Michele Schuff - Scott Silvey - Caroline Smith - Micah Stansell - Whitney Stansell - Ann Stephenson - Richard Sudden - Tommy Taylor - Yukari Umekawa - Tracy Wagner

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W H I T E H A U S
mini boutique
continues until the end of December!

Gallery Hours:
Wed - Sat | 11 AM - 5 PM
or by appointment

Whitespace
814 Edgewood Ave
Atlanta, GA 30307
404-688-1892

"Floodwaters wash away artist’s works and dreams" by Rosalind Bentley, AJC

2009-11-14T16:13:00.003-05:00

This is a heartfelt article on AJC on the effects of the recent flood on local artists, particularly Katherine McClure.

Sometimes the best way to make it through a hard patch is to grit your teeth and fake a smile. That’s what Katherine McClure tries to do and, most days, she succeeds. Like many who live along Peachtree Creek in Buckhead, McClure, 39, watched as a flood gorged her home last month...

"By Hand: From the pages of Vogue to an art gallery in Inman Park..."

2009-11-07T15:12:00.007-05:00

October issue of Atlanta Homes & Lifestyles has a feature article on Natalie Chanin, a designer from Florence, Alabama, and her relationship to Whitespace gallery. Read the full article here.

*Photos from Atlanta Homes & Lifestyle and article written by Angie Bennett Mosier

In The Thicket of It

2009-10-24T16:26:00.008-04:00

PHOTOGRAPHS + SITE SPECIFIC INSTALLATION
BY Sally Heller

OCTOBER 16- NOVEMBER 21

New Orleans-based artist, Sally Heller, creates unique structures that are at once familiar and strange by presenting mass-produced, disposable objects in unusual contexts. Through a process of subtle twists and turns she strips everyday detritus and disposable, low-end consumer goods of their original use-value, recycling them into organic forms that are repositioned in room-size installations, creating bizarre landscapes from the generic and proliferous discards of our disposable lifestyles. Fascinated by the poetics of contradictions, oxymorons and double entendres, Heller is less interested in her work's inherent commentary on consumerism, waste and ecology than she is in seeing humor in our world's plasticized realities.

The photographs provide documentation of the installations and are expressive as abstract paintings; their immediacy clearly reveals the dynamic energy that goes into building these colorful and animated installations. In the photographs, one can make out the havoc caused by nature's powers, yet the intensity of the color and wry plastic objects evoke anything but disaster. They are highly finished and elegant objects.

Conversion: new installations by Kelcy Chase Folsom

2009-10-24T12:03:00.005-04:00

conversion

NEW INSTALLATIONS BY Kelcy Chase Folsom
OCTOBER 22- NOVEMBER 21 | whitespec

Conversion, an exhibition by Kelcy Chase Folsom opened on Thursday evening, October 22 at whitespec. Folsom's intention is to tackle the process of deconstruction, rebirth and destruction. For over two years, Chase collected cast off shards and other discarded ceramic objects that covered his studio floor. Folsom had a choice, either dump the pieces or work with them. He chose the later and began sculpting the mass of stacked and strategically placed objects and by doing so, reconstructed a new aesthetic. He recorded this process with drawings and photographs. After the completion of each sculpture, he then smashed it to bits with a hammer. Next, he carefully and meticulously sieved and separated the materials into various gradients ranging from pebble-size to that of a fine powder therefore returning the ceramic to its original state. Five wall installations document Kelcy Chase Folsom's very unique approach to working with clay.

Wishes: a collaborative film by Blake Williams and Robin Bernat

2009-10-17T15:18:00.005-04:00

Wishes: Lovely, magical night of film, music, and dance. Wow. Thank you all.

Sarah Emerson's Artist Talk

2009-10-17T15:05:00.005-04:00

Thank you for joining us in Sarah's discussion of her latest exhibition, Soft Trap.
Thank you for your time and jubilant energy Sarah! Congratulations on the lovely exhibit!

Soft Trap: Opening Night!

2009-09-12T14:13:00.015-04:00

I was very sorry to miss the opening reception of Sarah Emerson and Jeff Grant's Soft Trap + Withershins. But many of you were smart enough to stay in town (do away with the traffic, please!) and grace us with your presence at the gallery. It seems to have been great fun and games! Thank you all for coming!
We are open until 5 this afternoon if you wish to stop by, and would love to see you here!
GALLERY HOURS & INFO
{yh}

Artist Jeff Grant himself, getting jiggy wid it

Jeff and his boyfriend, Lucas

The lovely Sarah Emerson and her husband Jesse Cregar

Precious!

2 Events. 1 Weekend.

2009-10-10T11:40:00.002-04:00

Artist's Talk by Sarah Emerson
TODAY | Saturday, October 10 | 2 PM
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Wishes, a collaborative film by Blake Williams and Robin Bernat
Saturday, October 10 | 8 PM
Sunday, October 11 | 8 PM

Saturday, October 10 is the last day to view Soft Trap new paintings by Sarah Emerson
& Withershins sculptural works by Jeff Grant

Gallery Hours
Wed - Sat | 11 AM - 5 PM

Soft Trap + Withershins

2009-08-29T14:01:00.014-04:00

exhibition

SEPTEMBER 4 to OCTOBER 10, 2009

opening reception
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 4. 7 PM - 10 PM

Atlanta painter, Sarah Emerson, is inspired by the tragic romanticism of a decaying environment and civilization. Her paintings express a precarious balance between the innate splendor of nature, and the mysterious fear and violence that lurks beneath the surface as natural landscapes are encroached upon and exploited. Emerson’s newest body of work is a nostalgic projection of a “future Eden” filled with fear and awe. These paintings are uniquely haunting in their whimsy and playfulness, effectively blurring the line between fairy tale and horror story.

In addition to the paintings, a collection of drawings titled “The Final Girl” is on display. The collection emerges from a concept explored by author Carol Clover on the last surviving girl in horror films. The drawings are intimately connected to the paintings as Emerson’s paintings place the viewer in the position of “the final girl”, or last survivor. She paints strange, yet familiar scenes, using common images (such as deer, beehives, fruit, locusts, bubbles, and bullet holes) to evoke a landscape of intuitive impressions. Ultimately, Emerson presents a new environment that we are left to contemplate in our own human solitude.

Work by artist, Jeff Grant will also be integrated into the exhibition. Similar to Emerson, Grant explores themes of urban encroachment into our natural environment. He works in a variety of media (drawings in ink, wood and yarn sculptures, lighting installations), to create classic forms that resonate with the viewer. Together, Emerson and Grant’s exhibition, titled Soft Trap, encourage imaginative exploration into their work by creating a landscape of memory and ambiguous symbolism.

Sarah Emerson holds a BFA from Atlanta College of Art, while Jeff Grant holds a BFA from The Rhode Island School of Design. Both artists received their MFA from Goldsmiths College in London, England. Their exhibition will be displayed in the main Whitespace gallery.

NOW OPEN

2009-08-22T13:46:00.009-04:00

Summer FALLS

'beautiful things grow out of shit... '
'things evolve out of nothing,'
and 'everything disappears.'

Thank you all for coming!

Memorable evening at the summer's end

SUMMER FALLS

2009-08-08T14:00:00.007-04:00

AUGUST 19 - 29, 2009
opening WEDNESDAY AUGUST 19 | 7 - 10 PM

Whitespace is pleased to present, SUMMER FALLS, a two week only intermission in between regularly scheduled exhibitions featuring new work as well as collaborative multi-media works by John Otte, including artists: Fereydoon Family, Richard Sudden, Karen Tauches, and Mark Wentzel.

John Otte, is well known in Atlanta as an artist, DJ, and curator. His multi-disciplinary work is primarily abstract, containing numerous references to the body, music, architecture, and landscape.

SUMMER FALLS is set to take place in just a couple of weeks when Summer slowly begins the process of giving way to Fall. In this temporary "hit & run" installation, John Otte seeks to meditate on the ongoing collapse and erosion of many previously considered "stable" systems, both locally and globally, thus making way for other arrangements and different forms. In an ongoing exploration of creative destruction, Otte employs photography, text, collage, sculpture, and film sources creating porous abstractions where systems collide, contaminate, and overlap one another, forming strange new hybrids and mutations - an uncertain world where fact and fiction are inextricably bound, "beautiful things grow out of shit . . . things evolve out of nothing," and "everything disappears."

+ 2 FILM SCREENINGS
* Selected films for screening will be announced shortly. Check back with us soon!

Artist talk with printmaker Teresa Cole

2009-07-18T15:27:00.005-04:00

Thank you for coming out last Saturday to hear Teresa Cole's artist talk! The photos from her residency and her process of art making was inspirational to say the least. It opened up the floor for discussion regarding printmaker's printmaker, Louisiana, the studios at Tulane, Belgium, and India. Although she has gone back to New Orleans, come by and check out the show, Agents of Seduction.

Agents of Seduction, now open

2009-07-18T14:54:00.009-04:00

Agents of Seduction

SCULPTURE BY CAROLINE SMITH
+ UNIQUE PRINTS BY TERESA COLE

JULY 10 - AUGUST 15

Whitespace is pleased to announce a two-woman exhibition opening Friday, July 10 through August 22. The exhibition, Agents of Seduction, features New Orleans printmaker Teresa Cole and Atlanta sculptor Caroline Smith.

Printmaker Teresa Cole, teaches at Tulane University, New Orleans and holds a BFA from the Maryland Institute of Art, and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art. Her work represents a fine balance between science and craft manipulation from its construction to its presentation. Though many prints utilize digital aspects, she hand carves each mark on nontraditional materials, such as masonite and pegboard, to create her unique images.
The prints began as an exploration of patterns and illusion. Incorporating many qualities inherent to the science of optics, her work investigates notions of ornament, decoration, and beauty. Through elegant layering and magnification, she examines how the repetition of patterns is used to distort information to elicit a complex sense of security. The prints thus create a safe space where the viewer can be captivated, persuaded, and seduced to contemplate the complexity and layers of contemporary existence.
In the same space, Atlanta native and Tulane University graduate Caroline Smith examines human existence through large, organic sculptures. Smith’s work finds inspiration in primitive and animalistic motivations found deep within human nature. She portrays the fundamental struggle in expressing the deep desires of the heart through the prism of the conscious mind. Her curvaceous and leafy creatures flow in familiar human gestures to tempt viewers to reconnect with their primal instincts while reminding them of the humanity so easily dismissed in others. Smith aims to “pry at those uncomfortable, awkward edges of life, between animal, plant, and human.”
Her sculptures juxtapose course earthenware, silky porcelain, and shiny gilded ornament, as a representation of the hidden beauty in the everyday life. Hostile and tender, fierce yet vulnerable, fearsome and fragile, the creatures are entangled in their own internal and external struggles.

Team Caroline + Julia!

New Orleans printmaker Teresa Cole
We loved having you, Teresa!

Yukari Umekawa's Opening

2009-05-30T13:54:00.006-04:00

Thank you all for coming to Yukari's opening of itodenwa (2 cans + 1 string)! It was a beautiful crowd of locals, friends, and family. Congratulations to Yukari on her BFA show, and we are excited to show the work at Whitespec. Come check it out before the exhibition closes on July 11th!

Artist Yukari Umekawa and family

Last Saturday for Civic Remedies!

2009-06-27T11:27:00.004-04:00

Today is the last Saturday for the show, Civic Remedies by Scott Silvey at Whitespace. The exhibition will be open until Friday, July 3rd (closed July 4th), but for those who are busy throughout the weekday- today is your day! Don't miss out!

Also check out Yukari Umekawa's photography show itodenwa (2 cups + 1 string) concurrently showing at WhiteSpec :)

Julia and Jody at Abernathy/GA Juried Arts Show

2009-05-30T15:32:00.006-04:00

Congratulations to Julia Hill and Jody Fausett
for sweeping the top two awards at the
2009 Georgia Juried Arts Show at Abernathy!!!

Julia Hill, Best in Show

Jody Fausett, 1st Place

itodenwa (2 cans + 1 string)

2009-05-27T13:15:00.005-04:00

itodenwa (2 cans + 1 string)
Yukari Umekawa
SCAD BFA photography show

May 29 - July 11, 2009
Opening Friday May 29, 7-10 PM

Photographer, Yukari Umekawa’s art emerges from her efforts to find peace in a state of longing and isolation. Born in Osaka, Yukari left her friends and family in Japan to pursue her BFA in photography at Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta. She juxtaposes images of telephone wires and the sky to express a nostalgic homesickness. The telephone wires represent her perpetual desire for contact with home, while images of the sky serve as a comforting reminder that she and her distant home are under the same sky. The exhibition is aptly titled itodenwa, which is the Japanese word for a telephone created from two cans and a string. By deconstructing her digital camera, she created a pinhole camera to capture her images. Through the use of long exposures, her constructed pinhole camera returns dreamlike images that are softened and out of focus. Yukari states, “The photographs then become unclear like my memories.” The show marks her debut, and will be displayed at whitespec alongside Scott Silvey’s exhibition “Civic Remedies”. In contrast to Yukari, the American-born sculptor and painter now resides in Tokyo and is presenting his newest paintings from Japan. Together, the exhibitions will be a unique opportunity to explore the influences of Japanese and American culture on artists living outside their respective homelands.

Jerry Cullum on Scott Silvey's Civic Remedies

2009-05-30T13:14:00.005-04:00

Jerry Cullum
Counterforces and Other Little Jokes

Scott Silvey at Whitespace

"Scott Silvey's ambitious sculptural installations will be remembered by those who attended various alternative-space shows prior to his decamping for parts ever further afield.

His new and quite different paintings of flowers and architecture, transported to Atlanta at immense expense from his current home base of Tokyo, reflect his sensitive effort to transmit the spiritual currents of a culture via visual metaphors. But first and foremost, they are uncommonly fine paintings..."

To continue reading, click me

Scott Silvey's Opening

2009-05-30T12:30:00.006-04:00

Thank you all for joining us at Whitespace last Friday evening! It was such a treat to have Scott and his family present throughout the night, especially for those who have known him during his Atlanta era. As usual, it was very interesting seeing the various viewer reaction and the immediate artist response. Although Scott and his wife Mio are back in Tokyo, the show Civic Remedies is up at Whitespace until July 3rd so come check it out!

Scott and his lovely wife, Mio!

2009-05-16T14:23:00.006-04:00

Civic Remedies
new paintings from Tokyo by Scott Silvey

OPENING RECEPTION
FRIDAY, MAY 22 | 7-10 PM

EXHIBITION DATES
MAY 22- JULY 3

Visual artist, Scott Silvey received his MFA from Georgia State University and was an important player in the art scene in Atlanta until his departure in 2001. After extensive travel throughout Asia, Silvey eventually landed in Tokyo where he currently lives with his wife, Mio. There he continues to teach English and make art.

Scott's exposure to Asian cultures has significantly influenced this new body of work, Civic Remedies. The richly textured paintings imagine Tokyo as a city devoid of its former human inhabitants. Inside a decaying landscape, vending machines, meters, and electrical lines stand like sentinels among the dwellings where people once lived. Because of unabated consumption, the skeletal remains of human production are all that linger in the faint, enfolding light. Within this spectral scene, soil and medicinal herbs gather in abundance. Their restorative potential has returned to heal an ailing urban landscape. This exhibition presents a continuation of themes that Silvey has explored throughout his career via paintings and installations, the relationship between human construction and natural systems.

Scott Silvey's work has been exhibited in both group and solo shows in the United States and Asia. His artwork has been reviewed in Sculpture, Art Papers and Antennae.

Artist talk by Julia Hill

2009-05-16T14:04:00.005-04:00

Thank you for joining us in the Artist talk and closing reception for Julia Hill's installation, Chaos and Currents! If you have not seen the show, I hope you will make it out to whiteSpec some time today. Both Chaos and Currents and Everything is Optional (in Whitespace) are closing its doors after today.
Don't miss out!

Artist talk by Deanna Sirlin

2009-05-16T13:09:00.000-04:00

Today is the final day to see the show, Everything is Optional. Don't miss your opportunity, and thank you all for coming to Deanna's talk last week!

Richard Fleming reviewed in Art Papers

2009-05-09T15:08:00.004-04:00

Richard Fleming's Walking to Guantanamo is reviewed in the March/April issue of Art Papers by Jeremy Abernathy.

Please click to enlarge

Richard Sudden reviewed in Sculpture Magazine

2009-05-04T10:09:00.011-04:00

Richard Sudden's exhibit "For The Water's of Lethe" is reviewed in the April 2009 issue of Sculpture Magazine by Dorothy Joiner.

Pardon us for this belated post! Please click on the image to enlarge!