Westbeth Gallery is an establishment located in New York City that is dedicated to showcasing artwork in a number of styles and mediums.
From May 25 to June 18, the gallery will host a show titled "In This House of Sky" which features eleven contemporary artists and explores the concept of space, time and the sky. The exhibition is free to the public, and the gallery is open from 1 pm-6 pm Wednesday through Sunday. A reception is scheduled on May 25 between the hours of 6 pm to 8 pm, and a panel will be held on June third between 6 pm and 8:30 pm to discuss the role that imagination plays in contemporary art.
Curation
"This House of Sky" was curated by Artist Karen Fitzgerald and it features art by her as well as Reet Das, Julie Gross, Yan Cynthia Chen, Ellen Grossman, Susan Spencer Crowe, Paula Overbay, Susan Knight, Mary Vengrofski, Alice Zinnes and Jim Pignetti.
This contemporary collection is stylistically wide-ranging: some works feature unique textures such as fabrics or three-dimensional elements such as wax on cardboard, clay on paper, and water with string. The art seeks to create an imaginative presence by focusing on the complex possibilities of the celestial sphere.
Curator Karen Fitzgerald was inspired to create the show due to the rich perceptions that the infinite sky offers creators.
The sky has been the source of artistic inspiration for generations, and everything from literature to songs to paintings have featured the sky--and so do all eleven artists in the exhibition at Westbeth Gallery.
“I wanted to include artists who have shown their work as well as those who are under-exposed,” Fitzgerald explained.
“Each has done work that I am familiar with that also fit with my idea of bringing a broad range of work together that might spark interesting aesthetic dialogue among the pieces and styles.”
Artwork
The artists in the group range from emerging to mid-career and they have all developed a compelling aesthetic within the contemporary art range.
Fitzgerald, who began curating exhibitions approximately eight years ago, is among these artists and she is going to display a few of her recent works that were inspired by clouds and the moon. Regarding the panel discussion on June 3, Fitzgerald is interested in delving into people’s opinions about imagination since she considers it to be an essential component to any artistic pursuit.
“I'm interested in uncovering ways artists think about how their imagination is present in their work, as well as how they see it in contemporary work,” she stated. “This is a topic that is casually overlooked - I don't see a lot of press on it. Playfulness is certainly present in contemporary work. Sometimes it is there in coloration or form but identifying a playful thought can be fraught with misinterpretation.”
Fitzgerald has worked all her life as a professional artist, and she also finds her role as a curator to be very rewarding.
“The thoughtfulness that supports the creation of the artwork is another aspect of being in this industry that is compelling,” she said. “In many ways, it is what makes the world go round. Artists have the capacity and the motivation, to bring together different thoughts, ideas, traditions, and a myriad of another phenomenon, in ways that no other profession supports.”
Aside from the show at Westbeth Gallery, Fitzgerald is also planning a four-person exhibition at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical Center Lakefront Gallery located in New Jersey. The exhibit will be titled "In The Space of Spirit, " and it will be on view until January 10, 2018.
