Also this issue: Paperback Riders Local commuters (re)discover the pleasures of reading in transit. -Toby Zinman Industry Standard -David Anthony Fox Tabloid Sensation Bat Boy invades suburban household! With terrifyingly good results! -David Anthony Fox Hanging in the Balance The negative and the positive find a happy medium in Isabel Bigelow’s work. -Susan Hagen Telling the Truth -Lori Hill Twists of Fate -Deni Kasrel Weathering the Storm -Janet Anderson Art of the Deal -Lori Hill

May 29-June 4, 2003

artpicks

Highway to Art

by A.D. Amorosi

Public art is our finest form of democracy -- allowing artist and viewer to interact daily. Photographer Zoe Strauss is interested in revealing the naturalism of her environment for what it is, better or worse. Strauss --executive director of the Philadelphia Public Art Project and recent Leeway Foundation grant recipient -- snaps pictures of neighbors and neighborhoods at both a far-off, colorful distance and in unblinking, tight close-ups. Strauss captures the irony, honesty and joy of corner stores and humble churches whose signs and mini-billboards often tell oddball truths in sad soliloquies. Strauss also captures the geometry of her geography -- whether it be tilescapes in subways or military-like formations of freshly baked muffins. "I usually just laminate photos and glue them onto wood, then nail them into telephone poles around my neighborhood, but they always disappear within a few days," says Strauss. "People are welcome to take them, but could you leave those motherfuckers up a little longer, folks?"

Strauss can keep an eye on things when she creates an installation under I-95, pasting nearly 60 photos onto concrete pillars (with the help of fellow artists DJ Cosmo, Savannah Roberts and Meredith Jones). "Under 95 is the perfect spot. People can happen onto it by accident, it can be viewed at any time and the sound of the highway is beautiful." Along with selling each of her works for $5 each, there will be, says Strauss, "delicious sn

acks including cheese curls, fine wines like Thunderbird and my people’s favorite, Manischewitz Concord Grape, as well as a variety of Acme sodas for teetotalers."

Zoe Strauss photography installation opening, Sun., June 1, 1-3 p.m., free, under I-95 at Front St. and Washington Ave., 267-250-4158.