First Friday Focus

Lori Hill's First Friday Hit List

by Lori Hill

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Published: Oct 30, 2007

Space 1026

Knoxville Girl: Approval by Rob Matthews graphite on paper, 8.25 by 8.5 inches (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

When a few art-school friends started a collective called Space 1026 on Arch Street in 1997, it was a gathering place for art-making, community, and of course, skateboarding. The massive, Jim Houser-painted ramp is long gone, but the impish spirit is not. Now, with a 10-year retrospective called "Never Forget Doing It Yourself With Other People," the 1026 crew looks back at its history of collective work and individual triumphs. For those who have never been there (and, really, what are you waiting for?), the front space serves as the gallery, with the back divvied up into studio spaces for individual artists, a micro-press and an ever-growing "wheatpaste wall." The gallery has hosted group shows, solo shows, traveling exhibits, musical performances, even a prom. Names like Houser, Andrew Jeffrey Wright, Adam Wallacavage and others are now known citywide and beyond for their innovative, often irreverent, work that defies art-world expectations. With art that has ranged from seriously beautiful to delightfully crass to downright bizarre, a show bearing the 1026 association is nothing if not unpredictable. Indeed, the collective has gained an international reputation by distinguishing itself with what member Jesse Goldstein has called a "unique, slightly dysfunctional and certainly haphazard, energy." Which is exactly what should have happened in a city that tended to suffocate in its own stodginess. What places like 1026 and Spector (RIP) did was loosen everybody up, throw open the doors to young talent and set the precedent for the new independent gallery. Now Philly's scene is thriving on that philosophy. (Just don't tell 1026 they're any kind of institution.) This show gives us all a chance to catch up, surveying the work of the more than 40 members they've had over the years as well as their spontaneous collaborations and inspirations. Given this group's past, it would be foolish to predict what this show will be like beyond that.

Opening Fri., Nov. 2, 7-11 p.m., through Dec. 20, art auction Dec. 7, 8 p.m., 1026 Arch St., 215-574-7630.

Gallery Joe

There's nothing creepier than an old murder ballad. See "Tom Dooley," "Frankie and Johnny," and the many variations on the village girl murdered by her lover, like "Knoxville Girl." Which brings us to Philadelphia artist and onetime Knoxville resident Rob Matthews. Borrowing the title of that last song for his show, Matthews takes off on the theme with a tragedy told in graphite on paper. The four major players, murderers and victim, are first depicted in single portraits, looking casually, grimly, at the viewer. What follows are a series of scenes playing out the murder and its aftermath. It's not cheap, it's not gory and it's certainly not sensational. What it is is an emotionless presentation of events, like the storyboard for a short film: the lure into the woods, the sinister laughter, the deed, the disposal and finally, perhaps, the realization. The old ballad goes, "We went to take an evening walk/ About a mile from town ... I picked a stick up off the ground/ And knocked that fair girl down." Matthews' tale involves a group of friends, Jack Daniels, a knife and no small amount of evil. Still, there's something wry about it all and the contemporary details lend a strange levity to the circumstances. Decide for yourself. The vault at Gallery Joe this month becomes a royal boudoir at the hands of Marilyn Holsing. Holsing's "La Vraie Histoire de Jeune Marie," or "The True History of Young Marie," is a collection of drawings concerning Marie Antoinette as a child (towering curls and all) in a number of fantastical situations. In additional to the intricate, rococo-like drawings (Marie on a lamb-drawn "carriage," Marie juggling golden eggs), the artist has created embroidered benches, toile drapery and other fixtures to place us in the realm of the future queen.

Opening Fri., Nov. 2, 6:30-8:30 p.m. through Dec. 15, 302 Arch St., 215-592-7752.

And Then There's ...

Projects Gallery hosts the impressively divergent work of Peter Gourfain, including a moving series of linoleum block prints inspired by anti-Nazi German peace activist Sophie Scholl. Another exhibit pairs Huston Ripley's ornate, symbolic ink drawings with Kit Brown's kind of goofy, not-quite-fetishistic photographs. Opening Fri., Nov. 2, 5-8 p.m., through Dec. 29, 629 N. Second St., 267-303-9652. ... Continuing at Seraphin Gallery is "Latin American Contemporary: Masters and Mavericks," with rarely seen works by Marcial Conza, Fabricio Lara and others. Through Nov. 25, 1108 Pine St., 215-923-7000.

(l_hill@citypaper.net)

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