The Art Scene: 09.14.17
Networking Night
The East Hampton Arts Council and Golden Eagle’s Studio 144 have teamed up to hold a series of networking nights for artists, professionals, and other community members, the first of which will take place this evening from 6 to 8 at the barn at the Golden Eagle at 144 Main Street in East Hampton.
Five artists from different disciplines will present their work during the first hour of each program, after which a reception will allow presenters and audience members to intermingle. Tonight’s participants are Nancy Atlas, a singer and musician, John Haubrich, a visual artist, David Kozatch, a writer, Anne Raymond, a painter and printmaker, and Kara Westerman, whose fields are podcasting and oral history.
Painting, Sculpture at Ille
An exhibition of sculpture by Eva Cocco and paintings by Edwina Lucas will open at Ille Arts in Amagansett with a reception tomorrow from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. and remain on view through Oct. 3.
Born and raised in Italy, Ms. Cocco has lived on and off in Sag Harbor and works closely with the Clay Art Guild of the Hamptons in Water Mill. Her doll-like and otherworldly ceramic heads and figures reflect her interest in Wabi-sabi and its concept of “accepting beauty within imperfection.”
A Sag Harbor native, Ms. Lucas strives in her paintings to capture the beauty of the natural world, including landscapes, animals, flowers, and water. She works from life when possible, preferring to engage her subjects directly rather than through photographs.
Five Painters at Ashawagh
The five painters in “Free Falling,” which will be on view at Ashawagh Hall in Springs from tomorrow through Sunday, with a reception set for Saturday from 5 to 8 p.m., are loosely linked by an attraction to nature, but each follows a different path.
The landscape-inspired paintings of Kirsten Benfield have recently taken a turn toward the abstract and reflect her interest in Eastern and Western calligraphy. A surfer and sailor, Christopher Butler captures the atmospheric qualities of air, space, light, and water in his paintings.
Anahi DeCanio’s abstract mixed-media works, built up with many strokes of paint and occasional collage elements, are abstract but inspired by both nature and urban settings. The paintings of Jerry Schwabe are also abstract reflections of his response to the light and color of the East End. Richard Udice’s landscapes, which focus on the unique lighting of the region, are the most realistic in the show.
A.A.E.H. Open Studio Tour
The 2017 open studio event of the Artists Alliance of East Hampton will feature the work of 20 artists from East Hampton, Sag Harbor, and Bridgehampton who will open their studios on Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Addresses, a map, and more information about each artist can be found at aaeh.org.
All About Eating
Crush Curatorial in Amagansett will open “Eat/ing Your Heart Out,” an exhibition of work by about a dozen artists who take diverse approaches to “how, why, how much, and what drives our impulse to eat,” with a reception on Saturday from 6 to 9 p.m. The show will remain on view by appointment through Oct. 2.
Among the works on view will be R. Crumb’s original drawings from the cookbook “Eat It,” made up of his wife’s recipes, sculptures by Cheryl Donegan made with her tongue, and “Recipe for Potable Water,” Allie Wist’s method for desalinating ocean water for drinking in the event of sea level rise.
Other participants are Molly Surno, who organized the exhibition, Ilana Harris-Babou, Christopher Chiappa, Christina Crawford, Suzan Pitt, Joshua Schwartz, Elaine Tin Nyo, Scott Bluedorn, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and Almond Zigmund.
Books as Objects
An exhibition featuring four artists who use books in their work is on view at the John Jermain Memorial Library in Sag Harbor through Oct. 14, with a reception set for Saturday afternoon from 2:30 to 4:30.
Mary Ellen Bartley’s photographs are inspired by the physical and formal properties of books. The poet Star Black creates collages using pages and imagery from books. Pages from her mother’s encyclopedia are among the found objects used by Kass McGowan in her mixed-media works. Amanda Tobier’s work includes book sculptures and altered artwork incorporating maps, dictionaries, stamps, and other ephemera.
Group Show at White Room
“Look Deeper,” a show of photographs, paintings, and ceramic sculpture, is on view through Oct. 1 at the White Room Gallery in Bridgehampton. A reception with live music will take place on Sept. 23 from 5 to 7 p.m.
Drip painting, Lissajous curves, and painterly strokes figure in Kevin Bishop’s work. Laurie Fishman’s photographs are inspired by her encounters with naturally occurring beauty. Zoe Breen is exhibiting photographs of sunrises taken over a seven-month period. Alyssa Peek transforms her own photographs by manipulating them either in the camera or in postproduction. Adrienne Fierman has been working with clay for 25 years, focusing on the traditional hand-building methods of coiling and pinching.
Darius Yektai in Manhattan
An exhibition of recent paintings and sculpture by Darius Yektai of Sag Harbor, organized by Keyes Art, will open this evening at Mark Borghi Fine Art on Manhattan’s Upper East Side with a reception from 6 to 8. The show will run through Oct. 14.
Paint, canvas, wood, and resin intermingle in Mr. Yektai’s work, which includes images of landscapes, figures, and flowers, some relatively simple, others more complicated and abstract, all marked by a vibrant and colorful handling of paint that flattens the images while energizing the surfaces.
Art Talk at Canio’s
Marc Fasanella, a professor of art, architecture, and design, will talk about “Ralph Fasanella: Images of Optimism,” a monograph that includes 70 full-color reproductions of his father’s paintings, on Saturday at 5 p.m. at Canio’s Books in Sag Harbor. The painter chronicled life in early to mid-20th-century New York, including the American labor movement and political and social injustices, while asserting his own hopeful vision for a prosperous working class.