FLOURISH group show
Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum, Arizona
May 12 – August 12, 2017
Opening Reception with the Artists:
Friday, May 12, 2017
6:00 pm – 9:00 pm
Opening at Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum on May 12, 2017, is Flourish, a group exhibition featuring works by artists belonging to the New Contemporary Art Movement. Curated by Los Angeles’ Thinkspace Gallery, one of the Movement’s most active proponents, the exhibition showcases new and relevant talent by some of its most compelling artists. Working in a variety of stylistic veins, New Contemporary Art includes everything from Pop Surrealism, Muralism, Installation and Street Art, to Graffiti, Hyperrealism, Illustration, and Portraiture. Though seemingly disparate, these genres are all linked by a vibrant community, multiple stylistic allegiances, and a return to the expressive possibilities of figurative and representational content, driven by a more populist sensibility. The Movement is loosely defined by its shared interest in the social rather than the abstract or conceptual.
Largely self-supported and community-driven since the 90s, the New Contemporary Art Movement has been steadily gaining in international recognition over the past decade and is now widely recognized as both the largest and longest running art movement in history. Inclusive and diverse, several styles, media, and exhibition platforms fall within the Movement’s now widely cast net. The potential of representation inspires these artists to draw from popular and counter-cultural sources like music, illustration, comics, design, tattoo culture, skate culture and the like, looking to the outside world rather than to the more self-referential gestures that typify that of fine art.
Flourish features a project room installation by Felipe Pantone, and site-specific murals by Esao Andrews and Nosego. The group exhibition includes works by 1010, Aaron Nagel, Alex Garant, Alexis, Diaz, Allison Sommers, Amy Sol, Bec Winnel, Benjamin Garcia, Cinta Vidal, Craig ‘Skibs’ Barker, Curiot, Daniel Bilodeau, David Cooley, David Rice, Derek Gores, Dulk, Erik Siador, Ernest Zacharevic, Fernando Chamarelli, Frank Gonzales, Ian Francis, Icy and Sot, James Bullough, Joel Daniel Phillips, Jolene Lai, Juan Travieso, Kelly Vivanco, Kevin Peterson, Lauren Brevner, Linnea Strid, Liz Brizzi, Marco Mazzoni, Martin Whatson, Mary Iverson, Meggs, Michael Reeder, Molly Gruninger, Rodrigo Luff, Sarah Joncas, Sepe, Sergio Garcia, Stephanie Buer, Telmo Miel, Tran Nguyen, Wiley Wallace, and Yosuke Ueno.
A continuation of Thinkspace’s recent guest forays into institutional spaces, Flourish brings New Contemporary Art to a museological context. By mobilizing alternative platforms like social media for the dissemination of work, the gallery, and its artists, have an exponential public following in the context of group shows, especially when placed within an institutional space. This mutually beneficial exposure helps to increase the visibility of a Movement that has thrived and grown largely outside of institutional aegises.
According to Andrew Hosner, Curator and Co-owner of Thinkspace Gallery, “That is our plan with these collaborative shows, to continue to knock on the door of the establishment until more listen, more take notice, more start to add these artists to their permanent collections and start to give this movement the attention it has earned and deserves.”
Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum
One East Main Street
Mesa, Arizona 85201
www.mesaartscenter.com
480.644.6560
About the Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum
Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum is the exciting visual art exhibition space at Mesa Arts Center. In five stunning galleries, MCA Museum showcases curated and juried exhibitions of contemporary art by emerging and internationally recognized artists. MCA Museum also offers lectures by significant artists and arts professionals, art workshops and a volunteer Docent program.
About Thinkspace Gallery
Founded in 2005, Thinkspace Gallery was established with a commitment to the promotion and dissemination of young and emerging art. The Culver City gallery is a catalyst for the emerging art scene in Los Angeles and beyond and is dedicated to the exposure of its artists and the support of their tenets. This young movement straddled between street art, graphic art, design and popular culture, is subject to steadily increasing international exposure and interest, and is in need of institutional advocates. Thinkspace is positioned to create opportunities and act as a visible platform for the New Contemporary movement, and its aim as a gallery is to establish both a curatorial forum and a collector base for its output. As an institution, Thinkspace is committed to the vision, risk and the exceptional talents that wield it. From the streets to the gallery, from the “margins” to the white cube, Thinkspace is re-envisioning what it means to be “institutional.” As a haven for talent, and a venue founded with passion, conviction, and community, the gallery’s mandate is rooted in belief and support.
http://thinkspacegallery.com
