Delaware Art Shows- Theo Platt and Steven Nederveen at Somerville Manning in Wilmington

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Delaware, Mixed Media, Painting / Painters, Photographers / Photography, Wilmington
Oct 082025
 

Theo Platt, “Chrome”, Oil on canvas

Theo Platt, “Sunstream”, Oil on canvas

Theo Platt, “Sunstream”, Oil on canvas (detail)

Theo Platt, “Deep Calm”, Oil on canvas

Somerville Manning Gallery is currently showing two painting exhibitions: Theo Platt‘s textured oil paintings from his Oceans series of works (pictured above) and Steven Nederveen‘s Stillness in the Shade of Green.

Below Nederveen describes his process for the work (pictured below)-

Using a mixed media approach to image making, I combine acrylic paint and C-print photographs. By layering these elements I can etch down into the emulsion of the photograph to reveal golden hues and also build up the surface with impasto and washes of colour. The result is an image with photo sharp detail in focal areas and painterly brush marks that obscure and create space for the imagination.

Both of these exhibitions close 10/11/25.

Steven Nederveen, “Gold Hidden Within”, Mixed Media

Steven Nederveen, “Gold Hidden Within”, Mixed Media (detail)

Steven Nederveen, “Breathe In the Forest Air”, Mixed Media

 

Flashback- NYC Art Shows- Katie Bell at Spencer Brownstone Gallery

 Architecture, Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Conceptual Art, Mixed Media, New York Art Shows, Painting / Painters, Sculptors / Sculpture
Sep 052025
 

“In Search of Form”, 2024, Acrylic, wood, aluminum, glass, rubber baseboard, rope, plastic tubing, drywall, solid surface, and cue balls

“Through Line (Grass) 1”, 2024, Acrylic and wood

“Line of Sight (Sunset)” and “Line of Sight (Horizon)”, 2024, Wood, acrylic and rubber

The images above are from Katie Bell‘s 2024 exhibition Edges in Search of Form at Spencer Brownstone Gallery in NYC.

From the gallery press release-

The lawn’s flat nature leads your eye to the edges in search of form, and if the edges are not sharp it will not show.

Spencer Brownstone Gallery is pleased to present Edges in Search of Form, Katie Bell’s second solo exhibition with the gallery. The show is composed of a collective of individual paintings, sculptures, and installation elements that share a common visual language with influences from architecture, the landscape, and Surrealism. The title of the exhibition references the quote above, advice from a gardener on crafting the perfect lawn.

Trained as a painter, Katie Bell’s sculptural practice stems from a rethinking of the painting process in the third dimension. Basic forms and simple found objects act as individual marks within the canvas of space, most evident in Through Line (Grass). The monochrome, matte grass green prisms are assembled together and around, activating space and generating an environment of its own. Pared down to its base attributes, shape, color, scale, and quantity foreground their objectness while their modularity alludes to a whole, greater than the sum of its individual parts. The rigidity and simplicity of the form is contrasted by its color and organic arrangement.

Operating similarly are the Line of Sight paintings, compact forms reduced to its base elements. Their shape, undulating line, softer hues, and subtle change in tones recall landscapes, shifting light, and the passage of time. The opposite wall features an amalgam of fabricated and found objects. In Search of Form is various in material and texture, with components overlapping, weaving, and puncturing the other. The eyes follow the intricacies of their interaction like a visual Rube-Goldberg machine. Or like the futile attempt of some to maintain the length and shape of grass, an exercise in controlling those things in our world that resist.

Reconciliation comes in the form of bird baths. Often found on lawns or backyards where the natural order is kept at bay to the best of one’s ability, they are beacons that welcome natural behavior. Composed of a patchwork of stone-like Corian, Water Table (Bird Bath) melds with the tones of our landscape while standing out in its formality.

Bell’s overall installation illustrates the light and often hard touches of human intervention. Her constructed worlds explore the absurdity of our extreme pursuit in controlling our environment, and ultimately its analogue in art making.

Delaware Art Shows- “Bricolage: Artists & Accumulation” at The Delaware Contemporary in Wilmington

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Conceptual Art, Delaware, Drawing, Fiber Arts, Glasswork, Installation Art, Mixed Media, Painting / Painters, Sculptors / Sculpture, Wilmington
Aug 212025
 

Painting by Kelly Irvine

Installation of sculptures by Allison Hudson

Work by Anna Guarneri

Each of the five artists in Bricolage: Artists and Accumulation, currently on view at The Delaware Contemporary, use their materials to express meaning through a layering process.

From the curators, Kasia J. Bunofsky and Leah Triplett-

“I have a very simple theory. I have always pretended that objects themselves formed a self-composition. My composition consisted of allowing them to compose themselves.” – Armand Pierre Fernandez (Arman) (November 17, 1928 – October 22, 2005)

When ‘assemblage’ first circulated as an art-historical term in the early twentieth century, it referred to the primarily formalist practice of joining tangible, often discarded or found, materials. Like a three-dimensional collage, assemblages made novel juxtapositions of individual components to create a whole artwork with its own impact. As the topography of the art world shifted mid-century, assemblage was often used to critique the post-war era’s burgeoning consumerism. Similarly, “accumulation” refers to a kind of assemblage that emphasizes materiality through the mass repetition of similar objects or forms. Accumulations lent themselves particularly well to expressing discontent with consumerism. They underscored the commodity’s necessity as a medium while maintaining the artist’s agency to reclaim meaning through the processes of recontextualization and repetition. As time persisted, assemblage continued to inspire and lend credibility to avant-garde contemporary movements. Even the new wave of ‘conceptual art’–a blatant rejection of materiality–was seen as an assemblage that forwent concrete objects to assemble ideas, language, or concepts. From installation art, to performance, to ‘relational aesthetics’, assemblage and accumulation helped pave the way for today’s contemporary art world and its many innovations.

Assemblage and accumulation emphasize the importance of each material element to the message of the completed work of art. This idea evokes a sense of collectivism; a metaphorical microcosm of material cooperation that might inspire a yearning to change our individualistic society, as art reminds us the whole cannot exist without the contributions of every one of its parts.

The artists and works featured in Bricolage: Artists and Accumulation reference the tradition of assemblage, accumulation, and their many corollaries; either through the performance held within their artistic process, their compilation of abstract concepts, or their passion to speak through material. They build, assemble, accumulate, gather, and collect. Using assemblage as both a method and technique, these artists engage assemblage as an action that is always in perpetual evolution of form. Be their medium drawing or sculpting, painting or installation-their material glass or found objects, acrylic or graphite- Anna Guarneri, Allison Hudson, Brynn Hurlstone, Kelly Irvine, and Emilio Maldonado, apply an iterative, intuitive approach to making, resulting in a bricolage.

This aesthetic- in which the whole is a sum of parts-demonstrates a depth of material knowledge. The works presented here require long looks to unfold and reveal their discrete components. Layering, stacking, blending, and amalgamating are processes and aesthetic devices that enable the viewer to experience the work in an instinctual way. Throughout these artists’ individual practices, an emphasis on transformation through collecting and comingling materials, media, and forms is paramount, with bricolage being a means for metamorphosis.

Below are additional works by the artists and information from the museum-

Allison Hudson

“My work explores the nature of cycles and the emergence of growth from decay. It’s tactile and fragile- a combination of unfired clay, wool, fabric, resin, and wax. Driven to manipulate raw materials into something new and unrecognizable, I enjoy the physicality of building, tearing apart, and mending together – striving to create work that is at once ethereal and visceral.”

Kelly Irvine

“My abstract color field paintings invite the viewer to step into a lush, translucent world of color. Drawn to the beauty of layered transparent hues from an early age, I use sheer color, overlapping forms, gestural brush work, organic forms, and repeating motifs that flow and intersect, resulting in delicious new hues and increased tonal depth. Contrast is important in my work as well; hard edges are in conversation with areas of soft gradation, while vibrant, neon hues pop against muted tints and natural, raw canvas.

I’m especially inspired by the canvas staining techniques and paintings of Helen Frankenthaler and Washington Color School artists Morris Louis and Kenneth Victor Young. I pair that inspiration with constant experimentation and manipulation of materials, developing new processes as a natural outcome.”

Anna Guarneri‘s work explores the possibilities of suggestive imagery and the devotional connotations of stained glass. She uses crude marks and associations to tap into early human experience, pulling from a range of sources – ancient art, architecture, dance history, and her own body. Colors in her work conjure poignant memories, turning drawn forms and glass structures into celebrations, memorials, or premonitions.

Guarneri’s latest body of work pulls from the visual world of postpartum life, incorporating imagery of bodily landscapes and interiors, and the various devices, accessories, and toys encountered during pregnancy, birth, and early motherhood.

Brynn Hurlstone

“In Time explores the process of healing from trauma, and the permanent transformation left behind once that process begins. Layers of broken safety glass are frozen within ice and slowly melt over a steel platform. The thaw allows for the release of contained breakage onto the foundation, where it rests in a slowly evaporating pool of water. Over time the water evaporates and the shattered glass may be swept away, but the foundational steel upon which the process took place will forever carry its traces.”

Emilio Maldonado

“I create art to explore personal narratives and navigate life through the material culture of capitalist America.
My work raises questions about social constructs, structural inequalities, and the dynamics of race and class. Through a multidisciplinary approach, I repurpose discarded objects as a means to reflect on memory, identity, and social conventions.”

This exhibition is on view until 8/24/25.

Delaware Art Shows- “Artist-In-Residence Cohort (ARC) 2025” at The Delaware Contemporary in Wilmington

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Collage, Conceptual Art, Delaware, Design, Drawing, Fiber Arts, Installation Art, Mixed Media, Painting / Painters, Sculptors / Sculpture, Wilmington
Aug 212025
 

Work by Tracey Tse

The Delaware Contemporary currently has several shows on view for their summer series Radius. Several of these exhibitions include emerging artists including ARC 2025. The exhibition will close 8/24/25.

More from the museum-

The Artist-in-Residence Cohort (ARC) identifies and supports local emerging artists poised for careers as dedicated artists. This year, jurors Dr. Casey Smith and former ARC resident Shefon Taylor chose four regional artists: Geraldo Gonzalez, Oscar De Paz, Tracy Tse, and Lucy H. West. These artists have spent several months in intensive professional development seminars, formal and informal critiques, and one-on-one meetings with mentors to prepare for their culminating exhibition. This year, the ARC residents “came full circle” through mini-residencies at Art-O-Mat by the Wilmington Alliance. This extended their perspective on the creative needs and opportunities of Wilmington, Delaware. You are seeing the results of ten months of their experimentation, planning, and growth.

This year’s cohort pushed the envelope to develop their skills beyond what they came to the museum doing. Lucy H. West has incorporated sophisticated video editing, performance, and sculpture into a tracing of sensory experience. Oscar De Paz has refined his political commentary in his painting practice, deeply rooted in social revolution iconography. Geraldo Gonzalez increased his scale and output, documenting the legacy and daily role DART plays in his life. And Tracy Tse, with the help of a new loom, weaves plastic nets and tapestries. These artists grew through a new partnership with Wilmington Alliance, where they each spent one month in the Art-O-Mat studio space. Their time working with a view to mid-center city grounded their work in an even deeper Wilmington context.

Below are additional selections and the artists’ bios from the museum-

Tracy Tse– “I like this little life of mine. It’s not something amazing, and it’s not a tragedy. However, every day doing art is enough in my world.

I’m a first generation Chinese American who grew up in a family tailoring business. Like many family-run businesses, I started helping out at a young age where I picked up skills in mending and tailoring. Over the years I’m grown into the career as a contemporary artist, where I used my skills interconnectively to express myself.

In my current work, I have been incorporating plarn (yarn made from plastic) to construct large-scale sculptures that protrude from the wall. Each piece is completed through labor-intensive repetition of sewing, knitting, crocheting, weaving, braiding, and knotting techniques to sculpt. The use of a variety of techniques is then adopted and shaped to form a specific look that is derived from family, tradition, heritage, history, and childhood.

Manufactured goods go through many hands and iterations before becoming the final product. Every hand played a role by putting blood, sweat, and tears into the production. Honoring and paying homage to the human touch and the sentiments that are overlooked during the production process is important. My collection of depicts efforts laborers and craftsmen. Convey the message of what human touch means.”

Geraldo Gonzalez

“I am, first and foremost, a transit artist. I began working as an artist in the early 2000s. I first started taking photos for a homework assignment in middle school, which inspired me to start taking photographs of local transit systems. Public transit has always been an interest of mine. I regularly took the bus as a teenager going to and from school, then went out and got to know other transit routes within the greater Delaware valley, like SEPTA, PATCO, AMTRAK, MTA, NJT, and DTC. My passion for public transportation has led me to make thousands of artworks to encourage people to use and find the beauty in these local transportation systems. I am a self-taught multimedia artist, working in colored pencil, acrylic paint, oil paint, watercolor, photography, video and sculpture. My process is to project images that I take and find online and translate them into my artwork through tracing, then going back and adding color.

Issues surrounding transportation like road rage and gas inflation have inspired me to spread my message about public transportation. Outside of transit-related art, I also create self portraits that express my identity and feelings. My Puerto Rican culture influences my art, in my self portraits and expressive use of color.”

Oscar Eduardo De Paz

“My drawings, paintings, and books tie together the threads of my personal experiences and sociopolitical issues. I reflect on my personal experiences of poverty, discrimination, homelessness, immigration, and disruptions in my family and education to explore how these experiences engage with their historical and sociopolitical expressions and contexts, and shape who I am. My intent is to stimulate reflection, discussion, and examination of the impacts of sociopolitical institutions and systems on individuals, specifically vulnerable populations. My artistic process begins with writing personal narratives and poetry that become sources for me to interpret or amend into visual representations. Historical, sociological, and visual research provide further inspiration in the process of creating my work. Subjects and elements in my work often function as symbolic representations of the idea and emotions evoked by my written pieces. The writing is rarely literately translated into a visual representation, but instead through a process of association translated into figurative and metaphorical representations that contain subjects and elements laden with personal, cultural, spiritual, and mythological meanings.

Sometimes, the work stands alone visually. At other times, the work stands with the written text in a unity. It is the space between the text and image where the audience, both as viewer and reader, is invited to experience the themes of my work, and to contribute their insights.”

Lucy H. West investigates intimacy, mindfulness, incorporeal inner experiences, and understanding of the worlds we inhabit and cohabit. Using painting, installation, and most recently multi-sensory media, West seeks to push the boundaries between the artist and spectator by inviting the viewers to be involved in her work, transforming them into active collaborators.

Through participatory art projects, she is interested in eliciting social consciousness, playfulness, curiosity, experimentation, and introspection from her collaborators, creating avenues for her work to evolve and be defined by the community who engages.

West is a Philadelphia-based artist from Tokyo, Japan. She has exhibited and had works acquired in Philadelphia, New York, Tokyo, Rome, and Madrid. Her artwork has also been selected and acquired by the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Medicine.

Throwback- NYC Art Shows- Bo Bartlett at Miles McEnery Gallery in March 2025

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, New York Art Shows, Painting / Painters
Jul 032025
 

In March of 2025, two of Bo Bartlett‘s series, Summer and Home, were on view at Miles McEnery Gallery in New York. This work in particular, Saudade (with The Painter to the left and The Skippers on the right) has an unsettling quality- note the smoke in the distance.

From the gallery’s website-

This exhibition brings together works from two distinct but intimately connected series: his early “Home” paintings and the more recent “Summer” works. While deeply personal, these works invite viewers to reflect on universal themes—longing, nostalgia, and the sense of home—offering a moment of connection through shared human experience. Accompanying the exhibition is a fully illustrated digital publication featuring an essay by Patricia Junker.

As Patricia Junker writes, “Bartlett embraces what he calls his topophilia: More than a connection, it is love of place.” Take his work, Home, where “we feel the texture of a subject’s madras shorts, the elasticity of her red knit headband, the suppleness of her black leather ballet flats, cast aside, and the soothing feel of cool grass on her bare feet and its scratchiness on a boy’s knees and palms. We know that time of day when light can penetrate a white linen shirt just so, and we know the quiet that allows a tuckered-out child to lie listening, lost in thought, on the verge of dreamland, perhaps. We take stock and try to make sense of a strange scene—a house of dark windows, a searching youth who crawls to peer around a corner, a forthright young woman at the center, a still baby at the far right. It seems as real before us as life itself. It is at once familiar and curious, because, as Eudora Welty has aptly put it, ‘Life is strange. Art makes it more believably so.’”

 

Throwback- NYC Murals- Tomokazu Matsuyama

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Drawing, New York Art Shows, Nyack, Painting / Painters, Public Art
Jun 122025
 

This mural was created in 2019 by Tomokazu “Matzu” Matsuyama as a commission for The Houston Bowery Wall in NYC.

Matsuyama recently completed the painting Morning Sun Dance, inspired by Edward Hopper’s 1952 painting, Morning Sun. An exhibition of his paintings and works on paper centered around this new work opens at Edward Hopper House Museum in Nyack, New York, on Friday, 6/20/25.

From the museum about the exhibition-

The exhibition centers around Matsu’s new large-scale painting Morning Sun Dance. Of the work that inspired his painting, Matsu says, “While Hopper’s Morning Sun captures a moment of introspective stillness within the psychological landscape of mid-century urban life, his treatment of solitude, light, and constructed space continues to influence my own approach to thinking about isolation as well as my approach to painting.”

In Morning Sun, Hopper depicts a woman sitting on her bed in the sun, alone in an empty room, wearing a plain orange dress and a simple, contemplative expression. In Morning Sun Dance, Matsu paints a solitary woman with a similarly meditative demeanor. However, her environment is far more richly layered: the room is filled with personal artifacts—dogs, magazines, and a luxurious couch—reflecting contemporary material life. Notably, the presence of dogs, while suggesting companionship, also references historical depictions such as Toutou, le bien aimé by Rosa Bonheur (1885) and A Nurse and a Child in an Elegant Foyer by Jacob Ochtervelt (1663), in which dogs symbolized wealth and ownership. In Matsu’s work, these animals subtly underscore solitude rather than alleviate it—suggesting not connection, but the heightened self-awareness of being alone.

Her clothing fuses Western and Japanese motifs—a William Morris textile layered with traditional patterns—while a Sports Illustrated poster of Muhammad Ali nods to her alignment with diversity, strength, and modern identity. In contrast to Hopper’s figure, who gazes outward toward the cityscape, Matsu’s subject turns inward, facing her domestic space. This shift in gaze implies a broader narrative: solitude, once externalized and meditative, is now negotiated through personal space and cultural consumption.

The exhibition will also feature Matsu’s process drawings, which reveal how the artist engaged with Hopper’s use of light, figuration, and abstraction. Two additional smaller paintings by Matsu also reinterpret Hopper’s iconic figure in the orange dress—one from Hopper’s original perspective, and the other from an external vantage point, as if observing the figure from the outside.

“This exhibition offers a fascinating dialogue between two artists from different eras, both grappling with the complexities of modern life and the experience of solitude,” says Kathleen Motes Bennewitz, Executive Director of the Edward Hopper House Museum. “Matsu’s vibrant and layered response to Hopper’s work invites us to reconsider themes of isolation and introspection through a contemporary lens, highlighting the enduring relevance of Hopper’s vision while embracing new perspectives.”

Delaware Art Shows- Maurice Evans at Bridge Art Gallery

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Collage, Delaware, Mixed Media, Painting / Painters, Wilmington
May 282025
 

“Khola”, Mixed media, acrylic paint, fabric and collage on canvas

“Kanga Amricani”, Mixed media, acrylic paint, fabric and collage on canvas

The images above are from Fabric Secrets, Maurice Evans‘ solo exhibition of mixed media paintings, on view at Bridge Art Gallery in Wilmington until 5/31/25.

From the gallery-

Born in Smyrna, Tennessee, Maurice Evans discovered his artistic passion through music before transitioning to visual arts. After studying Fashion Illustration at the Art Institute of Atlanta, he pursued a career that blended bold colors, cultural narratives, and mixed media. In 1994, his independent career took off with a successful exhibition at the Black Arts Festival in Atlanta, leading to national and international recognition.

Evans’ work, often incorporating photography, painting, and sculpture, explores themes of music, culture, gender, and politics. His distinctive style has been showcased in numerous galleries, museums, and collections, including Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and the Hammonds House Museum.

Residing in Atlanta, Evans continues to push artistic boundaries, living by the mantra, “Create art for art’s sake,” inspiring artists and audiences alike.

It’s also worth checking out his Instagram account where he posts videos of his process, as well as his most recent work.

Delaware Art Shows- Mia Fabrizio at The Delaware Contemporary

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Collage, Conceptual Art, Delaware, Furniture, Installation Art, Mixed Media, Photographers / Photography, Sculptors / Sculpture, Wilmington
May 222025
 

For Mia Fabrizio’s installation in the lobby of The Delaware Contemporary, Pull Up A Chair, she has created several sculptures that use domestic objects to explore a variety of social issues. It is part of the museum’s Winter/Spring three-part exhibition, Dinner Table.

From the museum-

Mia Fabrizio is an interdisciplinary artist creating mixed media portraits, freestanding sculptures and installations composed of building materials and domestic items. She carves away, mends, and cobbles together assemblages from a domestic landscape that is both nostalgic and full of pathos.

In these works, Fabrizio explores the power structures and cultural paradigms associated with, “having a seat at the table.” Fabrizio reveals how furniture conventions can grant power to the user. It is the “power to be seen, power to be heard, and power to contribute to the framing of a society” that Fabrizio aims to scrutinize. The chair sculptures become vessels for memories with details that reference labor, gender, and cultural constructs. Her multilayered constructions toggle between tearing apart and memorializing her personal experience. The assembly and material choices subvert the basic understood function of a “seat” and reveal illusions of functional space. She asserts that, “these seats are invitations in name only, token representations.”

Mama Liked the Roses links past to present by combining images and materials from Fabrizio family home with images collected from regions in Italy where her great grandparents had originated. The details within the piece reference labor, food, gender and religion.

And from the artist-

I am an interdisciplinary artist. Mixed media portraits, freestanding sculptures and installations are composed of building materials and domestic items. Multilayered concepts relating to identity and social constructs are presented through a variety of artistic mediums and processes. Consumed with hidden and exposed structure, my investigation of physical construction, cultural paradigms and their relationship, originates from the framework most familiar to me, the house in which I grew up. Contradictions within this space spark my desire to highlight the fluidity of perceived binaries, particularly those relating to feminine and masculine, public and private and modern and traditional.

Ascribing to the visual context of home as well as the ethos of homemade I paint, adhere, carve and chip away at plywood, drywall and paper. I vacillate between tearing apart and tenderly memorializing my personal experience, concurrently the work points outward to larger societal conversations around immigrant status, feminism, and queerness.

This exhibition closes 5/25/29.

Delaware Art Shows- “Take A Seat” at The Delaware Contemporary

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Ceramic Art, Conceptual Art, Delaware, Installation Art, Mixed Media, Painting / Painters, Sculptors / Sculpture, Wilmington
May 222025
 

Work by Adam Ledford

Painting by Sierra Montoya Barela

Painting by Sierra Montoya Barela

Installation by Debra Broz

Take A Seat, at The Delaware Contemporary, presents three artists whose work focuses on aspects of domestic life. The sculptures in Adam Ledford‘s installation, and Debra Broz’s porcelain creations both explore items found around the house and encourage viewers to take a longer look beyond the initial familiarity. Sierra Montoya Barela‘s still life paintings, with their bright colors and unique compositions, balance out the exhibition.

From the museum-

The dinner table recalls memories of cuisine, traditions, faces. Many of these memories are not clearly outlined but are rather assembled together through the periphery of our experiences. At the edge are small details such as decor or furniture, all of which complement the feeling and evoke emotion that registers our memories of the moments. The settings themselves often define the sensibility of the dinner table. Working within and beyond these domestic settings, Sierra Montoya Barela, Debra Broz, and Adam Ledford each contribute their distinct techniques to a larger place setting, inviting visitors to reminisce on tables past and present.

Sierra Montoya Barela is a painter of modern-day still life, capturing the spaces we exist in, but specifically the life that exists alongside us. Barela’s use of perspective composes a portal of access, one that feels like a peephole into the domestic items that capture our impression of a space. Each painting offers a scene that imbues surrealistic comfort. Plants that grow as we move around them, food that waits to be consumed, isolated hands or feet that are suggestively attached to a body. Barela’s spatial acuity combined with her use of color and pattern is multidimensional and lively, highlighting the surroundings that outline our lives.

Also questioning elements of space, Adam Ledford melds multiple mediums together to create installations that are dimensionally varied. The mixture of sparse line work directly applied on the wall with hand-crafted, two-dimensional ceramic vessels create a composite scene of domestic familiarity. Evocative of furniture found in our homes, the drawings support the elegant pots that rest on their implied surfaces. The nature of the entirely non-functional dioramas are deceivingly simple; their whimsical nature feeding into our sensibilities of space and depth, while subverting those perceptions into new spaces of disbelief.

Debra Broz also works within the composite. Broz alters found porcelain sculptures, seamlessly combining various pieces together to craft new creatures altogether. These small figurines are reminiscent of lovingly coveted trinkets that decorate our shelves and tables. Broz leans into our memories, appropriating the figurines’ normal representation and twisting them into something fantastical. As an actual conservator of porcelain goods, Broz’s technical skill leaves little room for error; enabling her audiences to jump into the sublime and become collectors of her newly constructed tchotchke.

This show is on view until 5/25/25.

 

Delaware Art Shows- Nicole Nikolich at The Delaware Contemporary

 Art, Art Shows by Location, Artists, Delaware, Fiber Arts, Installation Art, Mixed Media, Sculptors / Sculpture, Wilmington
May 212025
 

The Delaware Contemporary is currently showing several exhibitions that reflect on the theme of the dinner table. In one room Nicole Nikolich has created the installation Can I Please Eat In The Computer Room Tonight? which includes an old Macintosh desktop computer surrounded by her colorful textile pieces. The work evokes the nostalgia of a childhood spent eager to be on the computer, even in its then limited capabilities.

From the museum about the installation-

The dinner table is a place of routine and tradition, the daily ritual of which can consist of eating, sharing, and storytelling. However, the dining room is not always the location for eating a meal. Food can be served on the sofa in front of the TV or outside under the stars, and in Nicole Nikolich’s experience, these special occasions were spent in her computer room. Seeking solace as a young teen, there was an excitement in experiencing space and time alone. Nikolich reclaims this memory, reflecting on nostalgic moments through her textile practice.

Nikolich’s artistic interests varied until she taught herself how to crochet; a medium that combined her intrinsic interest in color and texture. Based in Philadelphia, she was jointly inspired by street art and the ever-increasing yarn bombing movement and so took her developing techniques to her surroundings. These early experimentations eventually led to larger projects and commissions; enabling opportunities to further explore the medium on an increased scale. Her bright colors, varied textures, and whimsical designs explode on different surfaces and in all types of environments.

Can I Please Eat In The Computer Room Tonight? is a site-specific installation in response to Nikolich’s sensorial memories, her retelling of these early moments of youth. Combining both two and three-dimensional textiles, Nikolich inserts her audience into a youthful memory that is both individually personal and collectively reflective. The space is transformed by Nikolich’s signature experimental style and bold color, constructing a portal into a textile explosion. In doing so, the installation offers audiences an opportunity to reimagine their adolescent abandon; those remembrances in which routine breaks and adventure begins.

And from Nikolich-

Can I Please Eat In The Computer Room Tonight? explores the positive and transformative view of tech from a preteens perspective growing up in the early aughts. This installation is a memorial to this fever dream of a time period where you could only access the internet in a specifically designated computer room, often decorated in brown hues and overstuffed with knickknacks and office supplies. This space, an escape to another part of your life, often felt like an oasis to explore who you were becoming for the first time without the microscope and confinements of adults and societal expectations. Swapping sandboxes for CD-ROM games and mixed tapes. Inside jokes with friends in chat rooms and staying up until way too late messaging your crush in your own secret language. Taking selfies on the front facing camera and looking at yourself in a slightly different way for the first time. Learning about yourself and the world all from the glow of a little square box in the middle of a little square room.

This exhibition will close on 5/25/25.

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