Joseph Podlesnik:
"The Pain, Boredom and Euphoria of Looking"
April 6 - June 23, 2024
Opening Reception: April 13, 2024, 1:00 - 3:00 PM
For the “The Pain, Boredom and Euphoria of Looking” exhibition, my intent is to select color and black and white photographs which involve some personal physical discomfort (while capturing photographs - namely the photograph titled “Cliff Face”), degrees of boredom (tolerating, organizing and capturing a world full of redundant, irrelevant visual information) and the euphoria I experience while capturing photographs and exploring their effects in post- processing. The intent is to arrive at formal order, unity, mood, complexity, ambiguity, and in many cases engage the viewer in frame edge-to-frame edge visual activity.
In addition: For me, the camera lens depicts perspective too easily, which is why I capture and develop photographs which often frustrate readable perspectival space, through glass and light reflections and refractions and spatial ambiguity, bringing the viewer’s eye stubbornly back to the surface of the image, so the mind is not allowed to linger in readable/navigable space too long. For me, the photographic image is not only a window through which to see the visible world, but also a maker of flat surfaces which stunt or block logical space. I see photography and pictures not only as documentation, but as commenting on or reenacting visual perception itself.
-- Joseph Podlesnik
Kambel Smith
April 6 - June 23, 2024
Opening Reception: April 13, 1:00 - 3:00 PM
Kambel Smith is a self-taught artist and published author based in Philadelphia, PA, who builds large-scale sculptures of historical buildings out of primarily found materials such as cardboard and foam. With no formal training in art or architecture, Smith uses a natural ability to gauge perspective and scale without measuring tools. This ability to see and recreate scale quickly propelled him into the world of fine art where he has done various solo and group exhibitions. Smith was diagnosed with autism as a teenager and began making art to express his worldview.
Maryn Olson: My Story with a Traumatic Brain Injury
Pop-Up Art Exhibition
April 10 - May 17, 2024
Opening Reception: April 13, 1:00 - 3:00 PM
Stockton University student Maryn Olson shares the artwork she created as part of her healing journey after a traumatic brain injury. This exhibition is produced in partnership with the Disability Studies program at Stockton University. Disability Studies is an interdisciplinary field of study that examines the meaning, nature, and consequences of disability, as a social, cultural and political construct. In contract to educational, clinical, medical, or therapeutic perspectives on disability, DS focuses on how disability is defined and represented in society.
African American Heritage Museum of Southern New Jersey
The Art of the Quilt: Fiber & Clay
Gloria Gammage Davis, Artist
AAHMSNJ Atlantic City | Stockton University's Noyes Arts Garage
Exhibit Dates: February 1 to March 30, 2024
Meet the Artist Reception: Saturday, February 3 from 2 to 5 PM
Davis puts the focus on African American history and culture in her fine art quilt creations. Ms. Davis’ thought provoking compositions employ the techniques of classic needle artistry but deconstruct the form of the familiar rectangular quilt with the use of organic inclusions, abstract shapes, sculptural forms, embroidered text, and African symbology. She uses written and embroidered text, block prints, and colorful African textiles to refine the messages of race and heritage in her artwork.
Davis has exhibited nationally and throughout the region. Her quilts are included in the publications "We Are the Story" (2021), and "Black Pioneer Legacy in the American West" (2022). The multi-talented assemblage artist is a graduate of Cheyney State University of Pennsylvania.
