Revelatory Tension Artist Derick Adams Inspires Family Day Program

Works on wall are by Adams. Left: Everything Real and Imaginary Occupying the Same Space. Right: The Bigger the Lie, the More They Believe. Photo Jenna Salvagin, 2009

Last Saturday, BRIC artist educator extraordinaire Angela Earley led a kid-friendly art-making workshop inspired by Derick Adams’ mixed media pieces currently on view in the Revelatory Tension exhibition.

Photo Arlene Kriv, 2009

It seems especially apt that Adams’ collages served as the kids’ inspiration because much of Adams’ work references childhood experience and “edutainment” for young people.

Seminar with Jackie Battenfield, Founder of Rotunda Gallery

Jackie Battenfield, founder of Rotunda Gallery and author of The Artist's Guide: How to Make a Living Doing What You Love

Jackie Battenfield, founder and first director of the Rotunda Gallery from 1981-89 (now the contemporary art space of BRIC Arts | Media | Bklyn), led a seminar here last Wednesday inspired by her new book, The Artist’s Guide: How to Make a Living Doing What You Love. In her guidebook, Jackie shares her decades of experience as an artist and gallery director. “I learned how to run a gallery by the seat of my pants,” she said. “I made every mistake mentioned in the book, and more!” The insights and case studies in her book are relevant to emerging and established artists everywhere looking to build and sustain careers as full-time artists.

Revelatory Tension Opening Night

This Wednesday was our opening night reception for Revelatory Tension: New Assertions on Divine Form curated by Kalia Brooks. We had excellent turnout–nearly 250 people came, including Brooks and the six artists in the show, Derrick Adams, Lindsay Benedict, Russell Frederick, Jason Irwin, Shane Aslan Selzer, and Jeff Sims.

Check out these pictures from the party! There are more after the jump.

Group Pic! L-R: Russell Frederick, Shane Aslan Selzer, Jeff Sims, Kalia Brooks, Derrick Adams, Jason Irwin, Lindsay Benedict, Elizabeth Ferrer

Revelatory Tension: New Assertions on Divine Form

Everyone at BRIC Rotunda Gallery has been busy installing our next show Revelatory Tension curated by Kalia Brooks. The show will include work from Derrick Adams, Lindsay Benedict, Russell Frederick, Jason Irwin, Shane Selzer, and Jeff Sims in a variety of mediums. We are very excited about the opening of this show on Wednesday, November 4, from 7-9pm. The show is our second annual exhibition of artists included in our Artist Registry. Check out the installation progress in the photos below, and remember to come to the opening! For more information on  Revelatory Tension click here.

Brooklyn Art:Work 2009 Gala an Enormous Success

Our 2009 gala was a huge success and brought in upwards of $160,000 for BRIC Contemporary Art’s exhibition and education programs! This figure, which exceeds our goal, is especially inspiring given the economic recession.

The evening began with a cocktail hour on the rooftop terrace of our venue, Stage 6 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard’s Steiner Studios. The Latin indie-rock band Cordero set the mood as guests mingled and enjoyed hors d’oeuvres and drinks, the mild weather, and the stunning New York City skyline—and checked out the art that was up for auction later in the evening.

We were privileged to have both Mayor Mike Bloomberg and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz with us. We are grateful to both of them for their continued support of the arts in Brooklyn.

After remarks from our Executive Director, Leslie Schultz, we moved to the banquet hall for the next part of our evening: a live video art performance by Anita and Ernesto Pantin and Mariana Martín-Capriles, a tasty supper, and a presentation to our fabulous artist honorees, whose attendance made the event truly memorable. The evening concluded with the Art:Work 2009 auction. Our delightful auctioneer, Brooklyn Museum Director Arnold Lehman, encouraged participants to bid generously, and they did. All in all, it was a lovely and lively evening.

Thank you to everyone who contributed to Art:Work 2009. Your support makes our work at BRIC Contemporary Art possible.

Gearing up for the 2009 Brooklyn Art: Work Gala

We are gearing up for our 2009 Brooklyn Art: Work Gala! The Gala will be held on Tuesday, October 20th at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and will include a cocktail reception, dinner and live auction of works by our sixteen artist-honorees, each of whom exemplifies Brooklyn’s status as a global art capital. Proceeds from the night will enable exhibitions and education programs at BRIC Rotunda Gallery and throughout the borough.

We at BRIC Contemporary Art are really excited about this year’s artist honorees and the gorgeous works they have generously donated for auction. One of the 2009 artist-honorees is Jaishri Abichandani, who was represented in last year’s exhibition A Wrinkle in Time: Artists From the Registry at BRIC Rotunda Gallery. This Brooklyn-based artist, who was born in India and raised in Queens, creates stunning and seamless digital composites of disparate cities. The piece that Abichandani has donated for this year’s gala, New York Tokyo, blends two sparkling skyscapes; one is intimately familiar, the other perhaps less so.

Another of this year’s honorees is Bushwick-based artist Leslie Alfin, who was featured in the In/Formation exhibition at BRIC Rotunda Gallery last year. Alfin creates three-dimensional, mixed-media diagrams of “cultural ecologies.” Study for Of Intelligence and Irony, which Alfin has donated for auction, is gorgeous and very cool. Also up for auction is Laura Karetzky’s Savage Beast, a small but gorgeously composed painting whose handling of color and light are impressive.

Another gorgeous work, which just arrived today, is a painting by Park Slope-based artist Julie Heffernan. Heffernan’s beautiful painting of a nude child supporting a globe of giant roses on its head reads as a romantic spin on the Greek myth of Atlas.

Click here to learn more about this year’s Brooklyn Art: Work Gala, artist-honorees and auction pieces, and to link to the artists’ websites.

Status Report Opening Night

Please check out images of the opening of our current show  Status Report featuring works from artists Margarita Cabrera, Vicky Funari and Sergio de la Torre, Christina Fernandes, Coco Fusco, Erika Harrsch, Pedro Lasch, Delilah Montoya, and Dulce Pinzon. We were happy to have DJ Papichulo at the opening as well. The show will remain up until October 10, 2009. Click here to read a review of the show by Alison Levy of ArtSlant.

Opening Party – This Wednesday

We at BRIC Rotunda Gallery are gearing up for the opening of our new exhibition season tomorrow night. To celebrate the new season we have a DJ and Dos Equis, it will be a fun event!

Status Report, curated by Elizabeth Ferrer, is an exhibition about the border, immigration, and work.

Pedro Lasch, Vicencio Marquez (Mexico) crossed 7 times.

Margarita Cabrera, Backpack (green), 2006. Vinyl and thread.

Status Report – opens Sept 2!

Status Report opens the 2009-10 exhibition season at BRIC Rotunda Gallery. The opening party will be on Wednesday, September 2 from 7 to 9 pm. We’re excited because DJ Papichulo will be helping to set the party vibe!

Status Report, curated by Director of Contemporary Art Elizabeth Ferrer, is about the border, immigration, and work.

Into the Archives

Slowly but surely, BRIC  Contemporary Art’s vast collection of slide image archives is making its way into the digital world. It’s about time these pictures were dusted off and brought out into the light. They provide the opportunity to see nearly 28 years of the Rotunda Gallery’s history.

The first show, “Figurative Works on Paper,” which opened in November 1981, featured works which were not only not confined to paper, but which also refused to be trapped within the gallery space. One light installation spilled out of  the door of what was then Rotunda’s Borough Hall location down the surrounding street.

Collecting slides has been an interesting  process. It has been a chance to delve into Rotunda’s sordid history. Or atleast, sordid fashion history. While slide after slide was making its way through our newly purchased scanner, the opportunity to admire the manifold of 80’s wardrobe choices presented itself. One stunning ensemble, worn to the opening of the May 1982 “Bell Show,” is comprised of a blindingly-white, padded shouldered, nylon one piece:

But even with these interesting sights at the openings, what was still best at Rotunda Gallery, even back then was on the walls (or floors, or ceilings, or streets…). The care taken by the innumerable amount of photographers to document the gallery’s many manifestations shows that across the decades, the art and it’s connection to real people always came first.

-Ilana (Intern cum Archivist)