The Art Scene: 09.17.15
Cohen and Vega at Ashawagh
Ashawagh Hall in Springs will exhibit photographs by Zachary Cohen and paintings by Matt Vega tomorrow through Sunday, with an opening reception set for tomorrow from 5 to 8 p.m.
Mr. Cohen will show 54 black-and-white photographs he produced in Paris in 1988 of the gentrification of La Bastille neighborhood as well as work from an ongoing series, “In Transit,” that focuses on places people pass through en route to other destinations.
Mr. Vega, who lives in Amagansett, will be showing a selection of small unstretched canvases chosen from 145 painted in August as well as larger stretched canvases, also from 2015. A photographer for two decades, his return to painting was marked by the use of letters as line and shape and as symbol. The newer paintings are concerned with the symbolic nature of marks.
The gallery will be open tomorrow from 5 to 8, Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sunday from 1 to 6 p.m.
Danish Design
The Sara Nightingale Gallery in Water Mill will show “Danish Design Meets American Art” tomorrow through Sunday from noon to 7 p.m. each day. A reception will take place Saturday from 5 to 7. The exhibition will include home accessories and accent furniture imported in limited quantities from Denmark by Kontrast, a company founded by Louise Fisher, a Montauk resident, as well as contemporary art selected by Ms. Nightingale. Kontrast’s offerings can be seen at shopkontrast. com.
Portraits Come Home
“Remnant Animism,” a show of paintings by Aubrey Roemer, is now on view at the Atlantic Terrace Gallery in Montauk and will remain up through September. The work originated last summer as part of “Leviathan: The Montauk Portrait Project,” Ms. Roemer’s effort to paint the portraits of 10 percent of Montauk’s population. The paintings were executed on old household linens and hung in clothesline fashion at Edward V. Ecker Sr. County Park in Montauk.
Since then, the work has traveled to the Vermont Studio Center and to Somerset, England, before returning to Montauk for waxing and final touches. As a consequence of the travels and exhibitions, the exposure to the elements has become part of the work. Ms. Roemer cites process art and cave paintings as among her inspirations.
Christensen Retrospective
The Berry Campbell Gallery in Chelsea will open its fall season today with a retrospective exhibition of work by Dan Christensen, the renowned Color Field painter who lived in Springs until his death in 2007. A reception will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. today, and the show will continue through Oct. 17.
The exhibition involves more than 20 paintings from various periods of his career, including rare early spray paintings from the late 1960s, saturated stained canvases from the 1970s, spray ovals from the 1980s, pulsating orbs from the 1990s, and rhythmic calligraphic swirls from his last decade.
His work is in more than 30 museum collections, and a traveling exhibition, “Dan Christensen: Forty Years of Painting,” was organized by Kansas City’s Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in 2009.
Strassfield Juries at S.C.C.
The Southampton Culture Center, on Pond Lane in Southampton Village, has a show on view of many regional artists whose work was selected by Christina Strassfield, the director and senior curator at Guild Hall’s museum. The show will feature work by Stephanie Reit, Ruth Nasca, Setha Low, Lance Corey, Linda Capello, Sara Douglas, Sarah Jaffe Turnbull, and Dan Sullivan, among many others.
The show is on view through Oct. 3. A reception will be held on Saturday from 4 to 6 p.m.