Synthspiration III

Synthspiration III
(pt. 1) Saturday Feb. 12, 7 - 11pm at sota Art Studio & Residency
(pt. 2) Saturday Feb. 19, 7 - 11pm at The Light Gallery


Born out of a series of events hosted in the apartments of various Light members, Synthspiration has now made its way into the gallery space. The Synthspiration series started with Synthspiration I, held to celebrate the launch of Joseph Vargas' website, as well as the inspiration for the name: Synthspiration.

What exactly is Synthspiration, you ask? In the words of Joseph Vargas himself, 

"It's the feeling you get when you hear that nasty melody in your favorite hook or when your favorite beat drops. It's that photograph or painting you think about when you're at a stoplight. It's trying your favorite food for the first time...Joseph inspired by synthesizer? Boom! Synthspiration...Synthspiration is also collaboration. I've had the pleasure of working on creative projects with some very talented friends and I wanted a website where I could share these collaborations with others." 

The Synthspiration events might best be described as some combination of art opening / dance party / film-screening / live music event / slam poetry reading / ... They are really whatever we want them to be, as well as a time and place for friends to get together and share their own "synthspiration." Synthspiration II followed Synthspiration I, and now we're excited to invite you to be a part of Synthspiration III.

In the spirit of collaboration, The Light Gallery is pairing with Studio of the Arts (sota) Art Studio & Residency in Annapolis, MD to host two events, one at The Light Gallery and one at sota. Synthspiration III (pt. 1) will be on Saturday Feb. 12 from 7 - 11pm at sota and Synthspiration III (pt. 2) will be the following Saturday Feb. 19 from 7 - 11pm at The Light Gallery. We would love for you to join us at one (or both!) of these events! 

Check out these photos from Synthspiration I and II!:

Happy Fun Work Space this Tuesday Feb. 1, 6-10pm!

This Tuesday February 1st, we invite you to join us for Happy Fun Work Space @ The Light! Stop by the gallery anytime between 6 - 10pm. Bring your latest project to work on and join us in creating art as a community! It will be happy. And fun.


          

Review of Up From Here Opening

Up From Here, the current exhibition on display at The Light Gallery, opened Friday January 21^st, as a collection of works by the artist Emily Hines, a recent MICA graduate.  The show contains her large most recent drawings and collages on fabric as well as her installations of small pieces and writings.  The title Up From Here and the artwork presented “emerges from an ongoing spiritual dialogue rooted in a series of personal losses…they ratify…the validity of a person’s spiritual and emotional experience”(Hines).  The subtexts in the title are that both act of the creation of the artwork and the act of the viewer interacting with the artwork at the show are ways of moving up from a personally low place.  Each piece has its own variation on the subtexts, but all pieces both large and small are communicated in with the subtlety of a limited pallet of pigments, graphite, and small pieces of textiles attached with sewing pins.

The opening reception drew a very large crowd that comfortably congregated in the bright high ceilinged front room where Hines larger works were installed.  Those periodically fleeing the great crowd were drawn in the lowly lit back half of the gallery where they were given the time, space, and quiet to investigate Hines’ smaller more intimate works.

One piece in particular If Your Presence Does Not Go With Us drew a tentative gathering of viewers who one by one moved close enough to the work to smell the cotton fibers.   If Your Presence contains 28 small portrait drawings, negative test strips, old Polaroid’s of family members, photo transfers on delicate fabric, and pages torn from torn from old books.  The pieces were arranged in an organic fashion on the wall hung to creating flowing spaces in-between the works filled with handwritten text from William Faulkner and Roald Dahl on the wall.   It is both in this piece and in the larger piece In the Sleep that the use of pins reveals the complexity of the stories being presented.  Though both If Your Presence, and In the Sleep contain details and lines committed to with great care and respect, textiles that make up some of the hues inside the portraits and cradling the heads of the figures, are attached to the surface using small discrete metal pins. These pins pierce the flesh tones of the portraits, emphasizing both the delicacy of the materials being used and the delicacy of the emotions that went into the cultivation of these images.

The time spent with these works is much akin to spending time with a person.  The works slowly reveal intimate details of a broader narrative of personal loss.  But it is the sharing of these slowly released, intimate details to the viewer that brings about the exchange between the viewer and the artwork and a greater empathy for the stories and the people involved in their creation.

Up From Here gives viewers a space to contemplate and empathize with the emotions not easily shared through conversation and other social encounters.   My own viewing experience allowed me to meditate both on the emotions and the skillful execution of Emily Hines’ work.  The show will stay up through the 15^th of February and viewing is by appointment. 

-by Kathleen Durkin 

To view more of Emily Hines' work, visit www.emilyhines.com.

Photos from the opening!

the artist herself

quite a turnout!

Artist Emily Hines (R) and author of review Kathleen Durkin (L)

Up From Here: Opening this Friday the 21st, 7-9pm

You are invited to attend the opening reception of Up From Here: work by Emily Hines this Friday January 21st from 7-9pm at The Light Gallery, 1015 N. Charles St.  The show features the painting, installation and delicate collage work of artist Emily Hines along with live music and light refreshments.  If you are unable to join us for the opening please feel free to make an appointment: johnatthelight@gmail.com  The work will be available for viewing from January 15 through February 15.  Hope to see you there!

Up From Here
Emily Hines Solo Show
Opening Friday January 21 7:00-9:00

“Scorning the pomp of must and shall
My father moved through dooms of feel;…” e.e. Cummings

I’m sitting in my studio now, and as long as I think of you and what you will think, I belong to you and so does my voice. I have allowed others, circumstances, and fears tremendous power over me. It has given me leave to not assert or proclaim anything that is not combed through, edited or analyzed. ...

"HomeCooked Stories"

As we entered into the Fall 2010 season, we took the opportunity to reevaluate our goals and mission as a gallery. After deciding we wanted one of our main focuses to be community engagement, the following months centered around a series of events called "HomeCooked Stories" that featured the work of artist Ashley Minner, a member of the Lumbee tribe, and brought together people of the Light and Lumbee communities to share their own stories over a homecooked meal. 

Stories lay over our collective history, tucking us into the past and unfolding us into the future. They bring us onto front porches long after nightfall and keep us around the table once the last plate has been scraped. These are our family histories. Baltimore artist, Ashley Minner, celebrates her own family history through her work entitled, “Lumbee Legends.” Minner grew up as part of the Lumbee community in Southeast Baltimore City. Her work consists of 5 artist books, each containing a unique oral history given by a Lumbee elder. Accompanied by photographs and sound recordings, Minner strives to depict the unique fabric of her culture as honestly as possible. By preserving these ephemeral treasures, Minner makes tangible the intangible. Inspired by this work, we joined together to celebrate our own oral tradition by sharing our stories with one another over dinner. 

The first part of the exhibition featured an installation of Ashley's work. The gallery space was converted into a 'home environment' to recreate the feel of being present in someone's home.  

Inspired by these ideas of 'family' and 'stories' central to Ashley's work, we then hosted two dinner events where we invited members of both the Lumbee and Light communities to come together and share their own stories. Everyone was invited to bring a 'story-starter' - an object of importance to them that either signified family or reminded them of a particular story about their own family - and were given the opportunity to share their stories either verbally during dinner, by recording them in our 'audio booth,' or by writing them down. 

After hosting two dinner events, a closing reception was held that brought together the stories gathered over these dinners along with the images and objects used to tell them.