WHERE: DEEP SPACE GALLERY, 77 Cornelison Ave., Jersey City
Please join us this THURSDAY NIGHT, February 13th, from 6-11pm, for the Opening Reception of CIRCLE THE SQUARE, featuring an incredible collection of works by contemporary abstract artists pushing the genre in new directions, each from their own angle.
CIRCLE THE SQUARE includes new works by George Goodridge, Debra Lynn Manville, Orlando Reyes, and Kati Vilim. All four artists will be on the premises—come meet them and ask them about their process!
GEORGE GOODRIDGE:
“Throughout my career, I have always tried to produce works that are surprising, original and playful which rely on invention rather than appropriation. Exploring varied concepts through the creation of new forms, these works may question themes regarding diversity, visual kinetics, identity, object pairings or more narrative ideas pertaining to the concrete world. To ensure invention I rely on the unconscious mind and a form of Cage’s Chance Operations, which has much to offer. This practice is not reliant on our learned awareness nor what we believe to be correct through history. To begin production, after a concept has been decided, I perform a type of meditation that clears my mind of my preconceived notions of geometry. I then create viscerally from a first notion in search for unrealized forms or uncommon pairings that could possibly imitate life in its irregularity. I refer to this process as Unconscious Geometry.”
George is a graduate of the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan where he taught Visual Techniques. He also attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and was awarded the position of Senior Technical Adviser to the Student Body.
Best known for his three-dimensional stretched canvas works, he has relocated several times between New York, Los Angeles and Miami. George has been awarded both the Art Center South Florida’s Studio Program and Print Lab Residencies as well as the Eileen S. Kaminski Family Foundation Residency at Mana Contemporary in Jersey City, NJ. His work has been represented in the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, the NSU Art Museum, the Boca Raton Museum of Art, the South Korean Embassy in Washington DC, as well as numerous commercial galleries, Scope, Pulse and other satellite Art Fairs. Multiple purchases and commissions have been produced for United Airlines, The Related Group, Banyan Capital and Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines. Notable press includes Land Escape Art Review, White Hot Magazine of Contemporary Art, the Examiner, the Miami Herald and Art South Florida with artist talks on PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) and the Syndicated News Network. He currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.
DEBRA LYNN MANVILLE:
“I am a self-taught painter, although I have taken many art classes and received training in interior design. Bright colors and abstracted forms are the mainstay of my work. I have followed graffiti as an art genre since I was young since the letters were always so difficult to read that they become forms in and of themselves that take on new symbolic and communicative meaning. My own artistic language has evolved over the years to become increasingly nonobjective. Color and shapes communicate a language that becomes more complex as they interact with one another in a single piece. I use the term “silent” to express art that really catches my eye -- work where the juxtaposition of forms and angles “quiet” the periphery in a distinctly commanding way. “Silent” works are the type of art that I love to see, share, and produce.”
Debra is the sole founder and manager of the extraordinarily popular instagram profile @1MillionDiamonds, which features abstract and nonobjective artwork from artists around the world. She was the Red Bull Arts Resident in Detroit in 2018. She currently lives and works in Central NJ.
ORLANDO REYES:
“My paintings are experimental compositions of chemical reactions, in which paint fractals manifest as studies of life, line and nature. An early exposure to large scale, public painting via graffiti had a major influence on my aesthetic and my outlook on art. My love for and mastery of color and pigment eventually led me into an abstract and non-linear approach, culminating in the complete abandonment of brushes. My present day painting approach incorporates the use of eyedroppers as a way of pursuing an organic, pigment-centered style. My cultural, urban, and nomadic roots resonate throughout all of my works.”
Orlando completed two fine art apprenticeships in 1983, co-launched a street art campaign in 1991 that addressed controversial issues of the day, completed a fine art residency in Jamaica, and then continued his self-directed study of art in Europe from 2000-2003. Orlando founded and managed his critically acclaimed and legendary contemporary art gallery, 58 in Jersey City for 10 years (2002-2012), collaborating with artists, and curating shows. He founded the 58 Gallery as a space where artists could gather to exchange ideas to usher in a cultural revival of the art scene in Jersey City. Since its inception, the primary focus of the gallery was to fill the gap created by the elitism of the New York art market, prioritizing creativity and innovation. 58 Gallery hosted over 250 artists in more than 200 shows, and continues to be a significant part of Jersey City’s recent art history. He currently lives and works in Jersey City, NJ.
KATI VILIM:
“In my work I create abstract images. This type of abstraction doesn’t happen through the reduction of something visible. It is created through visual ideas - originated in the invisible part of the world – much like music, or mathematics. These ideas are becoming visible through the compositions built from more or less complex geometric forms, transparency, color, structure, ratio or rules as repetition, symmetry, etc. If we want to use a label to describe this type of work, we could call it geometric abstraction.
The way our mind is creating a translation of an image is a complicated process – many things can get lost or added through the interpretation. Basically, through the understanding of a new image, the art piece can help us to open up new ways to understand the world or ourselves from a new or another aspect. With a new combination of visual elements, an image can help us to be more aware of the process of the interpretation itself. Providing the freedom of forgetting about preconceptions or contexts, the compositions are inviting the viewer through enjoying the immediacy of this abstraction to develop an independent, individual interpretation.
My compositions are about abstraction itself, instead of referring to anything from the visible world. Abstraction is the basic subject of my work because whether we are aware of it or not, our brain is built to work with abstract systems and we live and function through abstract thinking. Also abstraction makes possible the transmission between the reality of the world outside and our inner entity. It is also the mental field where culture exists, where we can communicate and find social symbiosis. The expression of inner thoughts is transposed and the flow of information presumes transmitters, by various mediating agents, composed of abstract language systems, such as a spoken or written language, music or mathematics. These language systems possess numerous common features, e.g. structure, rhythm and ratio are found in all that then become the elements, with the addition of color that my compositions are based on. With a traditional way of painting combined with a world of simple forms I am expressing new visual contents in the current era – one that is characterized by a way of seeing strongly influenced by technology and industrial development.”
Kati recently completed an art residency with the prestigious Eileen S. Kaminsky Family Foundation (ESKFF) at Mana Contemporary in Jersey City. She currently lives in Jersey City and works at her art studio in Chelsea.
