Sep 092025
 

In honor of artist Sol LeWitt‘s birthday today (9/9), here is his work Wall Drawing #1240, Planes with broken bands of color (Akron), located at Akron Art Museum. It was created in 2005 and installed at the museum in 2007.

The piece was drawn by Megan Dyer, Tomas Ramberg, Joe Ayala, Jennifer Bair-Shipman, Ashlie Dyer, Kathy Ilg, Sarah Sutton and Kelly Urquhart.

From the museum about the work-

Presiding over the McDowell Grand Lobby is a wall drawing by Sol LeWitt, one of the leading artists of his time. LeWitt’s approach to art stressed rigorous design and geometric abstraction, rejecting narrative, emotion and representation for the reality of art’s elemental components—line, shape, space, color and the most important, concept.

LeWitt began creating wall drawings in 1968 in response to his concern-and that of other artists at the time-that art was becoming too much of a commodity. These drawings are not so much physical objects as ideas. The artist conceived and planned them; his “drafters” (artists themselves) draw them directly on the walls of museums and public spaces around the world. Drawings may share forms and motifs, but each is unique and many, like Akron’s, are site specific.

Wall Drawing #1240 was created by the artist for the 18 by 34 foot wall where the museum’s historic 1899 building and its 2007 expansion interconnect. The triangular shapes refer to the angled supports and folded forms of the newer glass and steel lobby, while the blocks of color echo the brick wall removed from the south façade of the older building. Two drafters, assisted by area artists, worked for five weeks to fabricate the wall drawing.

 

Jul 242025
 

Filtered Yellow, 1968, by Ohio artist Julian Stanczak, is part of Cleveland Museum of Art‘s permanent collection.

From the museum about the artist and the work-

For more than a half century, Julian Stanczak maintained a distinguished career as an abstract painter interested in how vision works. Filtered Yellow features hundreds of alternating reddish and greenish razor-sharp vertical bands that create the illusion of a yellow shape, despite the absence of pure yellow paint. As typical of his work, it emphasizes a high level of technical mastery rivaled by few.

And from the artist’s website about his work-

“My primary interest is color – the energy of the different wavelengths of light and their juxtapositions. The primary drive of colors is to give birth to light. But light always changes; it is evasive. I use the energy of this flux because it offers me great plasticity of action on the canvas. To capture the metamorphoses – the continuous changing of form and circumstance – is the eternal challenge and, when achieved, it offers a sense of totality, order, and repose. Color is abstract, universal – yet personal and private in experience.”

“If I take time to really look at what I’m seeing, there is no limit to the secrets unveiled. I look to nature for clarification and crystallization, for things that I can use in my paintings. I live in the moment of recognition. In search for power through abstract clarity, I select shapes that have the maximum possibility for metamorphic action. We can only see what we understand!”

 

Jan 312025
 

This mural in Akron by Axel Void was organized by Curated Storefront and is based on a photograph taken with a ring camera and posted on the Neighbors app.

From Curated Storefront about the work-

This piece is a note on human inter-relational experience. The work presents a highly specific, anonymous interaction between neighbors in the digital realm.

The image is sourced from a post on the Neighbors app, a location based message board designed to connect Ring doorbell cameras into a network of private surveillance, with the intention of “always knowing what is happening in your neighborhood with real time, hyper local safety.”

The posting was created on June 18th, 2022 by an anonymous neighbor 3.4 miles away from the site of the mural. The post is titled: “Unknown visitors, Strange kids at my door 10:30 pm do you recognize them?” The Ring doorbell footage shows a young man at the door for about one minute; the footage is grainy and black and white, he is hard to make out and shuffles from side to side; a friend waits in the background on a bicycle. Twelve commenters on the post argue on whether or not the boy appears suspicious, or if he is merely looking for his lost dog; casing the house or calling for help.

This piece proposes a discussion point on irrational fear, the changing nature of surveillance, and an overarching sense of paranoia in modern society.

Nov 152024
 

78th Street Studios, located in Cleveland, is the largest art and design complex in Northeast Ohio. The building is home to several art galleries, artist studios, performance spaces, and businesses, and is a great place to see local art.

Tonight, 11/15, the complex and several of its creative spaces will be open from 5-9pm for its monthly Third Friday event.

Below are some selections from April of this year.

Work by Mark Yasenchack and paintings by Jenniffer Omaitz

“Love Triangle” by Jenniffer Omaitz

Gallery 202 has a variety of work from local artists for sale and also hosts exhibitions. Above is work from Jennifer Omaitz’s exhibition Where Love Lives and mixed media work by Mark Yasenchack.

Sculptures and installations can be found throughout the building like the light sculpture pictured above by Dana L. Depew.

Rebecca Cross’ installation Rock Cloud, was part of her exhibition Mapping the Sensorial at HEDGE Gallery. The gallery focuses on promoting contemporary artists from Northeast Ohio.

Susan Snipes’ work, pictured above was part of a group exhibition at Understory.

You can also see artists at work in their studios. Above is work by Jessica Mia Vito.

Dawn Tekler encaustic wax paintings like the one pictured above, are on view in her studio.

The painting above is by Laurel Herbold, located outside her studio.

Walking through the halls you can also find artwork hanging outside several of the spaces- like the two paintings below.

David King, “Snow Day”, Oil on aluminum

Scott McIntire, “The Birds”, Enamel on canvas

Jul 122024
 

The painting above is 3 Oracles, 2022, by Sayre Gomez, on view at Columbus Museum of Art. It is part of the exhibition New Encounters: Reframing the Contemporary Collection of the Columbus Museum of Art .

From the museum about the work-

Based in Los Angeles, Sayre Gomez often employs techniques borrowed from Hollywood set painting and commercial advertising to heighten the sense of lifelikeness in his paintings. In 3 Oracles, Gomez’s depiction of a vacant big-box store renders the shifting forces of the consumer economy in exacting, photo-realistic detail. The three appliance brands represented on the store’s façade, DieHard, Craftsman, and Kenmore, were all formerly owned by Sears Corporation, a retail giant that filed for bankruptcy in 2018.

Gomez recently co-curated the Feed the Streets Benefit Show at Sebastian Gladstone in Los Angeles. The opening is tomorrow evening (7/13) from 6-9pm and the exhibition will be on view until 8/3/24.

The group exhibition includes work by- Alfonso Gonzalez Jr. , Andrew Park, Bennet Schlesinger, Bryan Ruiz, Calvin Marcus, Chad Murray, Eddie Martinez, Emma McMillan, Evan Holloway, Greg Ito, G.V. Rodriguez, Jaime Muñoz, Jake Longstreth, Jonas Wood, Josh Smith, JPW3, Julia Yerger, Juliana Halpert, Justin Caguiat, Kalan Strauss, Mario Ayala, Max Hooper Schneider, Mungo Thomson, Nick Angelo, Nick Clark, Nihura Montiel, Richard Tinkler, Ryan Preciado, Sam Moyer, Sayre Gomez, Sterling Ruby, timo fahler, and Tristan Unrau.

All proceeds benefit Feed the Streets and their ongoing mission of colecting donated food, hygiene products, clothing, and educational items for hand to hand distribution in Los Angeles and New York. Feed the Streets also provides athletic and creative resources for underserved youth.