Preview: JUXTAPOZED Group Exhibit @ Fort Wayne Museum Of Art

The team over at Thinkspace Gallery have consistently made it a point to extend their reach well beyond their space in Culver City, CA, curating or co-curating exhibits not only outside of the city and state, but internationally, in places such as Hong Kong. In 2015, these efforts to broaden the visibility of both the artists and the new contemporary art movement that they represent to a wider audience involved the LAX/DTW show, which saw them teaming up with the Inner State Gallery in Detroit, Michigan for a group exhibit; in part, helping to highlight works of local Motor City area landscape artists, and personal favorites, like Stephanie Buer (now in Portland) and Liz Brizzi. A week later, came Invisible College, another group showcase which saw Thinkspace co-owners, Andrew and Shawn Hosner, heading all the way out to Indiana‘s Fort Wayne Museum of Art, home of their co-curator on the project, Josef Zimmerman. As we stated then, “by reaching across the country to areas that aren’t as widely acknowledged, as they are doing […] they are not strictly benefiting from the cross promotion, networking, and getting their own artists names out there, or even just shining additional spotlight on the artists native to those areas that they are visitors in [as in Detroit], but they are also effectively operating as ambassadors for the entire movement itself.” In Andrew‘s own words, “Our plan is 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 the movement the attention it has earned and deserved.””

As for the movement, no single publication deserves more credit for it’s growth in both visibility and popularity than JUXTAPOZ, just like no other artist has been more vital to its success than the magazine’s co-founder, Robert “Robt.” Williams. Of course, we’ve written all about Robt. in detail and gone over all of this before, so I’m just going to rehash/repost a bit right here, but the simple truth is that JUXTAPOZ was born out of frustration and necessity, as Williams, who was carving out his own path, consistently found himself rejected by the mainstream/”high brow” art world, throughout his entire career. In speaking about the roots of the magazine, he’s referenced one particular incident where he was communicating with a girl that was holding a tattoo magazine, in which he expressed the need to find a similar outlet for the outsider artists that he shared a particular kinship with, who also had no platform of their own. From there, he had a brainstorming session with art collector and owner of the highly influential Copro Gallery in Santa Monica, Greg Escalante, wherein the two got the idea to approach Thrasher Magazine and Independent Truck Co. founder, Fausto Vitello who, along with Eric Swenson (Vitello’s partner in both ventures) used their experience to help launch the publication. Also joining the team was writer/artist/photojournalist Craig “C.R.” Stecyk known for being a co-founder of the iconic Zephyr surfboards and an important figure in propelling Dogtown and its infamous Z Boys into the public eye through his compelling coverage in Skateboarder Magazine — years later, Stecyk would go on to write and produce the award winning documentary, Dogtown & Z-Boys. This was not a crew comprised of individuals who were new to the idea of forging their own way, promoting ideals and lifestyles that were a bit off the grid, but it’s hard to believe that, when they aimed their collective focus toward publishing something for those who had been marginalized in the visual art field, that even these men could have ever foreseen to what magnitude their venture would flourish. This both pertains to the scope of the content that they would go on to embrace, genre-wise, as well as in regards to what degree their little magazine would expand. JUXTAPOZ is now the most widely circulated art publication in the world.

Also in 2015, Hosner teamed up with, Gary Pressman from Copro Callery, another impressive and incredibly consistent name at the forefront of their field, to throw a pair of concurrent exhibits at Barnsdall Park, in Los Angeles. While Slang! Aesthectic! paid tribute to Robert Williams with an expansive solo exhibit of his work, 20 YEARS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF JUXTAPOZ celebrated the first 2 decades of the magazine that he founded. This week, a version of each of these two exhibits will be resurrected, running side-by-side, just as they did 2 years ago. This time around, however, the Hosners are taking the shows on the road back to Fort Wayne Museum Of Art and bringing in old friends Josef Zimmerman and Pressman as a co-curators.

Along with murals and installation work by Cinta Vidal, Icy and Sot, Laurence Vallieres, and Meggs JUXTAPOZED brings together 50 contributors including Buer and Brizzi, as well as high profile name/pioneers like Mark Ryden, Shepard Fairey, SHAG, and Ron English. and takes its name from the magazine that provided a platform for all of these artists which simply wasn’t available to that extent two decades ago. If you’re gonna be in the Fort Wayne area, you should probably make sure to attend this thing.

Here’s a list of the folks providing pieces for this event…

LIST OF CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS
1010, Aaron Nagel, Alex Garant, Allison Sommers, Amy Sol, Bec Winnel, Benjamin Garcia, Brian Viveros, Chris Mars, Cinta Vidal, Craig ‘Skibs’ Barker, Daniel Bilodeau, David Rice, Derek Gores, Dulk, Erik Siador, Erika Sanada, Fernando Chamarelli, Frank Gonzales, Fuco Ueda, Ian Francis, Jason Seife, Jeff Gillette, Joe Sorren, Joel Daniel Phillips, Jolene Lai, Jon Swihart, Josh Keyes, Juan Travieso, Kazu, Kelly VIvanco, Kikyz1313, Lauren Brevner, Liz Brizzi, Mark Ryden, Martin Whatson, Martin Wittfooth, Mary Iverson, Meggs, Mike Davis, Ron English, Scott Listfield, Sepe, Sergio Garcia, Shag, Shepard Fairey, Stephanie Buer, Telmo Miel, Travis Louie, Wiley Wallace, Yosuke Ueno

Check out a selection of preview images below, after the following event details.