First Friday Focus

Carolyn Huckabay's First Friday Hit List

by Carolyn Huckabay

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Published: Jun 1, 2010

Rodger LaPelle Galleries En Garde, Sarah Hunter, oil on board

Sarah Hunter's En Garde, in a pale palette befitting a nursery, depicts a pair of narwhals engaging in playful skirmish, inexplicably surrounded by birds. Hunter's painted critters in the exhibit "On Birds of Passage" are meant to look like 3-D figures plopped on a canvas — hot-pink Peeps, a series of reptile skulls, metamorphic rocks and even what appear to be feminine hygiene products — to form mythical, futuristic dioramas. "I see it as an alternate or post-human place where the animals have adapted using the structures left behind," says Hunter. "But I want it to be open to the viewer's interpretation." So if En Garde looks like two tampons in a fight to the death, then that's exactly what it is. Opening receptions Fri., June 4, 6-10 p.m.; and Sun., June 6, 1-5 p.m.; free, through July 3, 122 N. Third St., 215-592-0232, rodgerlapellegalleries.com.

Confronting the issue of insider art head-on, Projects presents "It's Who You Know," in which five artists who've previously shown at the gallery — Distort, Conor Fields, Ashley Flynn, Brooke Holloway and Mia Rosenthal — each pay it forward by hand-selecting another artist (a colleague, an idol, a friend, a complete stranger) to show his or her work. The work of the "final five" isn't meant to be cohesive; it's meant to stir up debate. "It's putting the gallery in a strange place, taking a risk by trusting their artists and not knowing at all what they'll end up with until they get it," says local sculptor Darla Jackson, who was chosen by Flynn, a longtime acquaintance. "I know some people will probably balk at the insider aspect, but I really feel like wanting to promote your friends is a positive and inclusive thing." Opening reception Fri., June 4, 6-9 p.m., free; through June 26, 629 N. Second St., 267-303-9652, projectsgallery.com.

In anticipation of its production of Sunday in the Park with George, Arden Theatre Co.'s taking it to the street: The musical is based on the iconic Georges Seurat painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, so to tie it all together, 12 Arden volunteers will spend First Friday staging a modern version of the pointillist masterpiece — actors frozen in various seaside tableaux — outside the theater's doors. Fri., June 4, 6-7 p.m., 20 N. Second St., 215-922-1122, ardentheatre.org. 

Local photographers Mark Havens and Seth Shimkonis share the spotlight for Artspace Liberti's inaugural exhibit, "Inside Outside." Their images collectively depict "issues of space and the effects of humans on that space, be it subtle or harsh, beautiful or destructive." In other words, the city and the people who muck it up. Opening reception Fri., June 4, 7-10 p.m., free; through June 26, 2424 E. York St., artspaceliberti.blogspot.com.

(carolyn.huckabay@citypaper.net

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