VISUAL ARTS: Philagrafika

The Fresh Prints

by Holly Otterbein

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Published: Oct 20, 2010

Neal Santos Fine Print: Philagrafika staff — including curator José Roca, via Skype — are photographed Oct. 14 in their office at 16th and Walnut streets.

Let's parse Philagrafika 2010, the city's triennial printmaking festival, by the numbers: It was 10 weeks long, involved 80 local venues and 300 artists, and was the culmination of nearly five years of planning. It attracted 150,000 visitors; if you count outdoor projects, like Paul Morrison's 40-foot-long landscape mural at Moore College of Art & Design, it lured in nearly 8 million.

For an inaugural event, that's ginormous.

But stats don't reveal, for instance, the newlyweds who used Morrison's piece as a backdrop for their wedding photos. Nor how provocateur Duke Riley trespassed onto a New Jersey island to paint a portrait atop a CITGO oil tank; how The New York Times wrote a glowing, front-page review of the fest; or how Philagrafika made the local arts community believe it could support its very own Whitney Biennial — or perhaps already had.

"It wasn't like any other print festivals," says Julien Robson, one of Philagrafika's six curators. "They're usually based in tradition- and craft-based practices, whereas this one really expanded the idea of what constitutes as print."

Indeed, it's hard to imagine that just a few years ago, people were battling over whether photography should be deemed "print." Post-Philagrafika, print is not only that, but it's also video, breaking the law and Pepón Osorio's heaping pile of black-and-gold confetti.

So what's in store for the next fest?

Though chief curator José Roca won't disclose much about its tenor, he says, "I have been thinking about the idea of the print as performance — specifically themes that deal with the relationship between the print and the body, or the body and the environment."

That brings us to another statistic: three, the number of years we'll have to hold out till the next fest — the only thing about Philagrafika we wish were smaller.

Visual Arts Honorable Mentions

Sarah Stolfa
The goal of the photog's Fishtown nonprofit Philadelphia Photo Arts Center, complete with digital lab, is to keep talented Philly photographers in Philly.

Love Letter
The Mural Arts Program/Steve Powers/SEPTA/Pew joint project is the epitome of innovative — and gorgeous — urban collaboration.

Zoe Strauss
Her "On the Beach" work after the Deepwater Horizon disaster is as enlightening as it is harrowing.

Midwives Collective Their June/July showcase to benefit Midwives of Haiti epitomized art's universal responsibility.

City Paper Choice 2010
GOVERNMENT & POLITICS: Seth Williams
LITERATURE & JOURNALISM: Barbara Laker & Wendy Ruderman
MUSIC: Girls Rock Philly
PERFORMING ARTS: Beth Nixon & Pig Iron Theater Co.
SPORTS & RECREATION: Charlie Manuel
SUSTAINABILITY & DESIGN: Rina Cutler
ACTIVISM/WATCHDOGS: South Philadelphia High Asian Student Advocates
FILM & SCREEN: Don Argott
FOOD & DRINK: The Food Trust