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Past Gallery Exhibitions:
IPSO FACTO
Paintings and Drawings by Jerome Spinner
March 28 - April 27
Opening Reception: March 28, 7-9pm
curated by Jefferson Pinder, Karen Joan Topping and B Stanley
Painting over the anonymous with the obvious is the dialogue Jerome Spinner is entering into with anyone that looks at his work. To answer your question before you ask it; to exert a kind of meaningful control over what you should consider is important. Stenciling the title, media, size and year in block letters onto art works he gets at flea markets, yard sales and thrift shops the label becomes the work. It seems a blatant and simple critique of the relationship most viewers have with a work of art or artifact –the six seconds it takes to read the label. Except it’s not that simple.
Matthew Langley
Paintings + Paperworks
curated by J.W. Mahoney
January 18 - February 17, 2008
Opening Reception: Friday, January 18, 7-9pm

image: Come From Heaven, oil on canvas, 2007, 54 " X 54 "
In his first solo show at District of Columbia Arts Center, Matthew Langley is showing paintings and paperworks that explore multiple mediums but ultimately investigate an approach to painting from divergent strategies - one of building - the other of reducing. This process-based approach, combined with traditional easel painting, allows Mr. Langley to develop works that are multifaceted, while continuing to advance a reductive approach.
The New Future
December 14 - January 14
Opening Reception December 14, 7-9pm
Performance by Urban Scout, 8:00pm
for more info:www.new-future-show.blogspot.com/
curated by Kristina Bilonick
featured artists: Urban Scout, Jade Doskow, Jo Wonder, Benjamin Edwards
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In the 50's and 60s projections of the future ran rampant. TV shows like the Jetsons showed a civilization with conveyor-belt sidewalks, automated houses and robotic maids, Sci-Fi authors like Arthur C. Clarke and Ray Bradbury wove tales of space travel and new colonies on Mars. Fashion and architecture shone with metallics and repeated boomerang shapes.
Fast forward 50 years, and things are a little different than expected. There are no moving sidewalks, and we're using the same space rockets that launched 50 years ago.
The artists in this show bring you a 'new future'- not as shiny and new as the 'old future' but not dull either. Together, they present a mash-up of the past, present and future- leaving the viewer with ideas of what the next 50 years may have in store.
Read the dcist.com review..... |
Sloganeers
November 9 - December 9
Opening Reception November 9 7-9pm
curated by Liz Flyntz
curatorial project mentor: Suzan Shown Harjo
featuring: Larry Krone, Ginger Brooks Takahashi, Wendy Osher,
Julia Dzwonkoski and Kye Potter, Evan Greenfield, Liz Rywelski and Lou Laurita

slo·gan·eer (slg-nîr)
n. A person who invents or uses slogans.
An exhibition of artists exploring the visual engineering of language: text that acts like image, image that encompasses text: containing the trigger for a broad host of engineered associations.
Herb's Choice:
Manon Cleary
Skyscapes
October 12 - November 4
Opening Reception: October 12, 7 - 9pm
curated by Lea-Ann Bigelow

Manon Catherine Cleary – by any earthly measure – is a luminary among Washington DC artists. Globally exhibited and collected, Cleary has enjoyed a forty-year career as an artist and teacher, and is principally acclaimed for her virtuosic and conceptually provocative enlistment of oil paint and graphite to photo-realist ends. It is with great honor, then, that DC Arts Center will showcase the artist’s very newest “skyscapes” in its gallery during the month of October – works rendered and mounted in remembrance of Cleary’s dear friend and DCAC founder and patron Herb White, in whose company she spent countless contented hours “chasing clouds.”
Sept. 14 – Oct. 7
Dos Pestañeos - Every Last Day
opening reception Friday, Sept. 14 7-9pm
Dos Pestañeos is an artist collective formed in Atlanta , GA that curates and collaborates with local, national, and international artists.


Every Last Day is a contemplation of the fertile terrain of the in-between, and exploration of transitions. Perceiving the threshold as an intermediate space charged with possibility and quite possibly haunted, the collective and invited artists have shaped an exhibition of magic, ignorance, illusion, uncertainty and pleasure. For more info on Dos Pestañeos visit their site: www.dospestaneos.co
1460 WALL MOUNTABLES!!
July 20 - Sept 7th
opening reception Friday, July 20 7-9pm
Read the DCist review: http://dcist.com/2007/07/27/1460_wall_mount.php#more
Kate Hardy
AMERICAN IDOLATRY
A site specific installation
June 8 - July 8, 2007
Opening Reception: Friday, June 8, 7 - 9pm
Artist & Curator Talk, 8pm
A curatorial project organized by: Anne Surak
Assisted by Margaret Boozer and Claire Huschle
a site-specific installation by Kate Hardy that examines the ever-increasing existence of art as a commodity and explores the abstract value attributed to consumer goods in a capitalist society.
‘American Idolatry’ is a conceptual artwork that aims to be
accessible in its content, visual appeal, pricing, and the collaborative action
of exchange. I am presenting the audience with objects that appeal to me.
Familiar objects: toys, knick-knacks, souvenirs, etc. They are objects that I have
collected from thrift stores, found on the streets of DC or have been given
to me by friends. They are a set of unique collectibles. They are not things
that I necessarily need but they are things that I want to have. The artist,
the consumer and the collector in me would like to have them. Their value
system is based on my own personal relationships with and associations to
them. They have been ranked and priced according to my preference, and I
am presenting them in a gallery setting where by purchasing an object, you
will be participating in the completion of the piece.
— Kate Hardy
...Hardy’s installation is a conceptual piece that discusses the commodification
of artworks as well as subverting the typical protocol of the
art market. Projects like this do not attempt to bypass the valorization and
commodification of the work, but instead embrace it. It is this embrace
that completes the work of art. The artistic act is the interactive process of
shopping.
— Anne Surak
This exhibit was made possible by a generous grant from the Warhol Foundation to support the DCAC Curatorial Initiative which helps develop and mentor emerging curators in Washington DC
IAN AND JAN: The Undiscovered Duo
A Secret History of the Washington Body School
Jeffry Cudlin and Meg Mitchell
Exhibition Advisors: Rex Weil & Central Intelligence Art
May 11 - June 3, 2007
Opening reception, Friday 5/11 7-9pm

This spring, many local museums and galleries will celebrate the Washington Color School , a group of abstract painters who, in the early 1960s, briefly made D.C. the center of the visual arts universe.
Local artists Jeffry Cudlin and Meg Mitchell won’t be playing along. At DCAC, the two will stage an art historical intervention, weaving an alternative history for Washington art.
Cudlin and Mitchell will mount a retrospective for their alter egos, Ian and Jan—a fictitious husband-and-wife performance art duo. According to the exhibition’s premise, Ian and Jan led the Washington Body School , a group that, in the late ‘60s and ‘70s, exhibited their body art alongside the work of prominent Washington abstract painters.
Ian and Jan: The Washington Body School will provide humorous commentary on Washington ’s cultural legacy, on revisionist art historical agendas, and on gender bias and power politics in the arts. The show will include photographs, drawings, props, and videos of the couple in action.
The centerpiece of the show will be a video featuring interviews with D.C. gallerists, collectors, and historians, all recalling the rich, heretofore unexplored history of these two obscure performance artists. Participants in the video include: Jonathan Binstock, Curator for Contemporary Art at the Corcoran Gallery of Art; Sam Gilliam, celebrated artist; J. W. Mahoney, contributing writer and editor for Art in America; Joshua Shannon, Professor of Contemporary Art History at The University of Maryland, College Park; Andrea Pollan, Director of Curator’s Office; Janis Goodman, critic for WETA’s Around Town and instructor of art at the Corcoran College of Art and Design; and Tyler Green, blogger for Arts Journal and contributing writer for Fortune magazine and The Wall Street Journal.
Though the show exists as a parody, it also investigates the seductive power of master narratives, even discredited or demonstrably false ones. Ian and Jan may make you laugh, but they will also change the way you think about the business of cultural production—and Washington , D.C. —forever.
# # #
Friday, April 27th - Monday, April 30th
Washington Convention Center , Hall E
801 Mount Vernon Place, NW , Washington DC
Friday (Free Day) April 27, 11 AM - 7 PM
Saturday April 28, 11 AM - 7 PM Sunday April 29, 11 AM - 7 PM
Monday April 30, 11 AM - 5 PM
General Admission: $12; Seniors/Students: $5; Children under 12: Free
April 13 – May 6
“ American Icons through Indigenous Eyes”
curated bySuzan Shown Harjo*
opening reception Friday 4/13 7-9pm
gallery talk, closing day 5/6 3:00pm

Twelve Native American artists in an exhibit curated by Suzan Shown Harjo ( Cheyenne and Hodulgee Muscogee).
The views of most Native American people are never heard or seen by anyone near the shores of the Potomac. But that doesn’t stop a lot of folks in Washington , D.C. from believing they know who Native Peoples are, what we think and what’s best for us. ..I wanted to curate a show that would expose Washingtonians to unfiltered views of some Native people outside D.C. After settling on the broad exhibit theme, I contacted a dozen topnotch Native American artists, with an open-ended request for new or existing work on any subject they wanted to address in the nation’s Capitol.
-Suzan Shown Harjo, curator
check out the Washington Post review here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/12/AR2007041201748.html
*This exhibition was made possible by a generous grant from the Warhol Foundation to support the DCAC Curatorial Initiative which helps develop & mentor emerging curators in Washington , DC .
March 16 – April 8, 2007
“The Jolly Cowboy” curated by Cara Ober*
opening Reception: Friday, March 16 7-9pm
If the taming of the Wild West is our nation’s legend, the central character is the cowboy.
More myth than history, the cowboy’s identity varies wildly. From outlaw to hero, from
cattle rustler to gunslinger, from drunkard to sheriff, his mystery, his bravery, and his
autonomy remain constant. Visual artists from different nationalities, backgrounds, ages,
and sensibilities create a complex and contradictory image of this character and with it,
an exploration of American identity and individualism.
Featured Artists: Laurence Arcadias, Julie Benoit, Zoe Charlton, Billy Colbert, Rob Sparrow Jones, Charman Lewis, Lump Lipshitz, Jack Livingston, Gabriel (Baby) Martinez, Lauren Schott, Rene Trevino, and Elena Volkova
February 16- March 11:
“By Chance…”. curated by Lisa McCarty*
opening reception Friday 2/16 7-9pm
curators talk Sunday 3/11 4:00pm

LaRinda Meinburg, If Frank and Cynthia Had Kids.., mixed media & Michael Matason, Untitled, silver gelatin print
This is the fourth Curatorial Initiative show supported by the Warhol Foundation. This show is curated by emerging curator Lisa McCarty who also worked on “Hystoria” with JW Mahoney.
In this show Lisa explores chance within the context of curating and artmaking, inquiring into the processes involved in both these pursuits when the element of chance is involved.
Lisa includes six artists that use, invite, or embrace chance within their work. She selected the first three artists, Thomas M. Lowery, Michael Matason, LaRinda Meinburg and each of these three artists then picked one additional artist each to include in the show: Jym Davis, Wendy Downs, and Andy Holtin & Galo Moncayo.
The show is made up of artists that all utilize chance in their work, and is also brought together by chance in the DCAC exhibition space.
In a larger context it also facilitates an investigation into the process of curating, and provides a forum to rethink the relationships between artists, their works, and curation.
Jan. 19 - Feb. 11, 2007
"In a Land Far, Far, Away..."
Opening Reception: Friday January 19th, 7-9pm
The four artists in this show create characters and landscapes that tell stories both exotic and mundane. The show brings up questions about illustration as fine art and the psychological and emotional stories artworks can tell.
Preview the works of these four artists at:
December 15 - January 14, 2007
Obsession, recent works by Amy Lin
curated by Anne Collins Goodyear, assistant curator of prints+drawings
at the National Portrait Gallery
opening reception 12/15 7-9pm, curator's remarks 8pm

Separate Worlds, Fluid, and Circle by Amy Lin
With a soaring blue mass anchored above a small pink enclosure, “Separate Worlds” reads almost like a question mark. The comparison is apt where Amy Lin’s work is concerned. Enveloped in the artist’s meticulously rendered drawings is an implicit question: what are they? It is precisely in their resistance to easy categorization that the works reach out to spectators.
Lin’s work, with an exquisite calligraphic quality of interweaving cables, is composed of tiny spheres, rendered painstakingly, at varying scales, by the artist. Yet the work does not read as pure abstraction, concerned only with formal properties of color and composition. Instead, a careful examination of these lively surfaces reveals fascinating intersections between the minute units themselves—microbes of a sort— some of which seem to cohere with magnetic pull while others seem to resist one another. Through her use of pattern and repetition Lin has put into play dynamics that seem almost human in nature.
If the artist’s intensity, or “obsession,” reveals itself graphically, the work also brings about a deep sense of contemplative satisfaction. For through an act of meditative creation, Lin has constructed pictorial environments that produce a sense of immense space. Here the viewer can become lost in the delicate task of untangling skeins of threaded dots that tease the mind. - Anne Colins Goodyear
for more information go to: www.amylinart.com
Exchange: Richmond @ DC - 'Twisted Roots'
curated by Tosha Grantham
Presented by DCAC & WPA\C
November 10 - December 10, 2006
Opening Reception: November 10, 7-9pm

Curator Tosha Grantham selects Richmond artists to exhibit at DCAC.
Featuring: Sanford Biggers, S. Ross Browne, Caryl Burtner, Sonya Clark,
Taliaferro Logan, Ayo Ngozi, and Heide Trepanier
check out the washington post review here
Herb’s Choice: Born Again Dada!
curated and juried by J.W. Mahoney
October 13- November 5, 2006**
Opening Reception: Friday, October 13, 7-9pm- curator's remarks 8pm
**Night of Live Performances + Poetry: Sunday 10/29 at 7:30pm (free) featuring: Blk w/ Bear, Eigenvalues, J.D. Smith, and Dee-Ranged!!! come see the dada-ness of it all...
DCAC put out an open call for Dada artists, poets and performers. This show will feature artists selected by curator, J.W. Mahoney and will also include a variety of performances and readings throughout the show’s duration. A gluttonous $250 prize will be awarded to the most ‘dada’ submission from the open call.
Featuring work by:
JS Adams, Ian Chase, David Hartwell, Linda Hesh, Brendan Howell, Mariah Josephy,
Carolina Mayorga, Aaron Oldenburg, Betsy Packard, Anne Stillwood, Paul Thomas and
Charles Westerman
September 8- October 8, 2006
Space Of Change
Curated by Claire Huschle and Margaret Boozer

Opening Reception: Friday, September 8, 7-9pm
artists' and curators' talk, 7pm
Featuring the work of:
Martin Brief
Amy Kaplan
Justin Rabideau
Wendy Weiss & Jay Kreimer
Space of Change is an exhibition about "liminal spaces"...that pocket of time during which things/people transform from what they were into what they are going to become.
The exhibition, curated by Claire Huschle and Margaret Boozer with help from Anne Surak, will introduce the work of five artists: Amy Kaplan, Martin Brief, Justin Rabideau, and the collaborative team of Wendy Weiss and Jay Kreimer.
Kaplan explores issues of trust, faith and illusion with her mummified stuffed animals, Brief takes a literal look at reading between the lines, Rabideau uses his native Georgia clay to explore the physical extensions of his thoughts and actions, while Weiss and Kreimer create a motion-triggered sound and fiber installation with social and political underpinnings.
In very distinct and disparate ways, each artist addresses the theme of liminality, creating an exhibition rich in the poetry of their connections and contrasts. A brief talk with artists and curators will accompany the opening reception.
for more info, artist bios and images click here
Sunday Art Forums at DCAC -
Sundays at 7:30 in the DCAC theater
Admission: FREE!
get your weekly art fix, and hear about issues that face today's artists, art historians,
curators and collectors.

photograph by Gabriela Bulisova
June 11: Social Commentary in Art, moderated by Marc Cohen, PhD
Featured Panelists: Gabriela Bulisova, Laura Burns, Geoff Bell and Jack Rasmussen
June 25: The role of art historians, curators and critics in the contemporary art scene, moderated by Marc Cohen, PhD
Featured Panelists:
Joshua Shannon, Assistant Professor of Contemporary Art History & Theory at the University of Maryland
Rex Weil, independent curator, critic and artist
Judith Brodie, curator of modern prints and drawings at the National Gallery of Art
JW Mahoney, independent curator, critic and artist
July 16: The Intersection of Art and Architecture, moderated by Ira Tattleman and organized Ira Tattleman and Dan Emberly -
Featured Panelists:
Janet Bloomberg: http://www.kube-arch.com/index1.html
Michael Janis: http://washingtonglassschool.com/studio/profiles.html
G. Byron Peck: http://www.guild.com/CDCartist_com/4367.html
Kelly Towles: http://www.kellytowles.com/
July 23: Making, showing and collecting video art, moderated by Marc Cohen, PhD Featured Panelists: Kathryn Cornelius, Djakarta, Philip Barlow, Jefferson Pinder
*this series is funded by the Humanities Council of Washington, DC which is an affiliate of the National Endowment of Humanities
The Document- a presentation of The B-Boy Project
August 18 - September 3, 2006
Opening Reception Friday Aug. 18th 7-9pm
Artist Talk- Sunday, Sept. 3 at 5:00
Featured Artists: Bat, Brandon Hill, Alex Meiners, Peter Chang
The Document is an exhibit of the documentation of the artists' use of Breakdancing as a means to move paint over canvas. The idea was three-fold: first creating two-dimentional art pieces as a result of a performance; second documenting the entire process by video; and third, photographing every step and action taken during the breakdancing sessions. The Document is a collaborative visual, musical, and physical exploration of the B-boy/hip-hop culture.
for more info visit: thedocumentshow.com
blurb in the Washington Post here
2006 1460 Wall Mountables !!!

July 28 - August 13, opening reception July28 7-9pm
Installation July 26, 27, 28
Each year we section the gallery into 2'x2' squares and have an open call to artists.
for complete rules/regulations click here: 2006 1460 Wall Mountables
Vox Populi- "Home Free"
June 30- July 23, 2006
Opening Reception Friday June 30 7-9pm
photograph by Stefan Abrams
Homefree, a group exhibition of the artist members of Vox Populi, is a nod to our recent agoraphobia (we haven’t traveled in a while) and also, an attempt to put a positive spin on our impending homelessness (our building is being torn down sometime this year). Expect the unexpected as Vox members pack up their paintings, videos, sculpture, photos, prints, and concepts, and in our rented minivan careen down 95 to show DC how we do it in Philly and make some new friends.
Red Mountain, Corey Antis / Lens Flare, Matt Suib
Founded in 1988, Vox Populi is a nonprofit artist collective that supports the work of emerging artists with monthly exhibitions, gallery talks, performances and lectures. For nearly 20 years, Vox has occupied a unique role in the artistic and cultural community in Philadelphia by bringing our audience cutting-edge contemporary art and a diverse range of programming, while at the same time providing a supportive environment where young artists can feel free to experiment, take risks and gain valuable experience to help them lauch their professional careers.
Come visit! www.voxpopuligallery.org
Participating Artists: Kate Abercrombie, Stefan Abrams, Doina Adam, Amy Adams, Anita Allyn,
Corey Antis, Leah Bailis, Gabriel Boyce, Robert Chaney, Micah Danges, Sarah Daub,
Nadia Hironaka, M. Ho, Charles Hobbs, Joseph Hu, Maximillian Lawrence, John Lorenzini,
Roxana Perez-Mendez, Matthew Suib and Eva Wylie.
"Subdivisions"- curated by Matthew Best
"unit 8" by Andrew Prayzner
May 26 - June 25, 2006 . Opening Reception May 26 7-9pm
Featuring work by:
Sandra Jeknavorian, Andrew Prayzner, Matthew Clay-Robison and Joseph Segal
Images of suburbia are prevalent in contemporary visual culture. At their best, the suburbs are portrayed as a safe and peaceful utopia, full of happy and healthy families, and free of crime; at worst, conformist and lacking in diversity and individual expression. The suburbs have come to represent an ideal, the fulfillment of the American dream of land ownership, a house, two cars, and 2.5 children. This American ideal has been the subject of constant scrutiny. This exhibition seeks to explore suburbia as both the birthplace of, and an inspiration to, artists, portraying the love/hate relationship that those who grew up in the suburbs often share. - Matthew Best
"Don't Bring No Bad News"- curated by Barbara Blanco
April 28 - May 21, opening reception Friday April 28th 7-9pm
Featuring the work of: Michael Platt, Harlee Little, Kasha Stewart + Kim Johnson
The exhibit entitled, “Don’t Bring No Bad News”, will focus on positive imagery that reflects the African American experience. It captures our spirit, our hopes, our joy, our laughter, our faith and the inspiration we encounter everyday in our lives.
It is essential that we show the African American experience is the human experience, as our stories share a common history with our families, friends, and neighbors. These images will include everyday messages of love, hope and appreciation. The overall aim of this exhibit is to share visual stories whose good news should be told. - Barbara Blanco
photograph by Jeff Jaffe
“From Sea to Shining Sea” March 31 – April 23
Curated by Ori Z. Soltes and Cara Ober,
part of the curatorial initiative, funded by the Andy Warhol Foundation
Opening Reception Friday, March 31 7-9 pm , Artist Talk, April 23 4pm
The exhibit title and underlying concept play with the rich visual possibilities that the sea as a subject has to offer to so many artists. It alludes specifically to the doctrine of Manifest Destiny, which asserted that it was God’s will that the republic expand from ocean to ocean, and its relevance today.
The artists represented in this group show come from coast to coast and their subject matter relates to the sea

Babel Revisited, Julee Holcombe- courtesy of Conner Contemporary Art
H Y S T O R I A
curated by J.W Mahoney and Lisa McCarty
March 3-March 26 , Opening Reception March 3rd 7-9pm
part of the curatorial initiative, funded by the Andy Warhol Foundation
Featuring the work of:
Geoff Bell
Julee Holcombe
Betsy Packard
Jeffrey Smith
Champneys Taylor
Artist Talk: March 12 4:00pm
The anxieties that the present course of history induces in artists are often most creatively bourn indirectly.
The social chaos, and the pressure of information, the “wreckage,” is monumental. Turning aside offers periphera
l vision a full scope. And turning around to the Past offers a very different range of worlds than the one that our
present ceaselessly opens. All this data can feel useful, and strangely beautiful. These five artists in Hystoria present
unfamiliar beauties emerging from our image and form-rich visual history –created in the context of the strong
geopolitical uncertainties we’re witnessing right now.

Executive Director, pinhole photograph, 90 min. exposure, silver gelatin print
Bruce McKaig- TIME MARKERS
JANUARY 27- FEBRUARY 26, 2006 curated by art critic Andy Grunberg
Opening Reception Friday January 27, 7-9pm
In-gallery events February 11,18 and 25 at 2:30pm
A project that simultaneously makes a single cumulative pinhole photograph and a digital time-lapse
animation of scenes from the arts, science, business, family and social rituals
Since January 2005, Bruce McKaig has been photographing people in their places of work, simultaneously
using a pinhole cameramade froma paint can and a digital camera to capture time-lapse stills at regular intervals.
The project is called Time Markers anduses both crude pinholephotography and digital technologies to record and
display events from science, the arts, nature, business,social and family rituals. The materialresults from Time Markers
include the single cumulative pinhole exposure, large digital contactsheets of the still images, and a DVD where allimages
have been clipped together to produce a flipbook-like animation. This projectexamines activities that surround us but that
are rarely observed: a bookkeeper, a construction site, a business meeting, a family reunion, a cake decorator, a Rock
and Roll band rehearsal, waiters at a sidewalk cafe, an archivist, people watching the news, a photography class,
a paper mache artist, an exotic dancer, a frame shop, tourists in DC, a pianist rehearsing, me hand coloring photographs.
The DCAC exhibition will display monitors for the DVD animations, large prints of the time-lapse images, and light boxes
with transparentpinhole images. In addition, events will be scheduled and photographed in the gallery during the exhibition to allow the public to see the paint can and digital cameras in action.
Time marker events: Events will take place in the DCAC gallery and will demonstrate the pinhole camera techinique.
- Saturday Feb 11th at 2:30- Paul Begley, caterer will make hors d'ouevres
- Saturday Feb 18th at 2:30- Caron Anton, CPA, will do bookkeeping
- Saturday Feb 25th at 2:30- Kerry Keeler, artist, will do bookbinding

Dec 16, 2005- Jan 22, 2006:
In Memory D Thompson, curated by Buck Downs
Opening Reception December 16 th 7-9pm
A series of visual poems created by rubbing words from the names and related inscriptions found on headstones in historic Congressional Cemetery, Washington DC. Equal parts ghost story and concrete poem, each sequence teases out a mysterious syntax buried in the names of the dead.
Buck Downs is a poet and book artist, publisher of Buck Downs Books.
Nov 11 - Dec 11, 2005: Points of Departure:
works by Nathan Manual and D. Billy,
curated by Trish Tillman
Opening Reception November 11 th 7-9pm
Enter into a conversation between the two newly acquainted DC area artists Nathan Manuel and D. Billy,
and you might think you are entering a choreographed sitcom. Mix the silly nature of throwing around
language and shapes paired with a whimsical yet careful attitude towards the outcome of their collaborative
artworks, and you'll find that it's not only about the art, but that it's also a game. In fact, the more the two
artists learn each other's artmaking aesthetics, the more strategic the game gets. The resulting gems of
painted and collaged panels speak miles with an array of caricatures cut out from books, scraps of food packaging,
cardboard boxes and discarded educational materials. Lines section off compartments to define thoughts and put
stereotypical lifestyles on a pedestal. Circular clouds waft ideas across the composition, projecting questions into
the garish jabber jaw of fleeting discussion. In the end, the games Manuel and Billy present extend through to how
life's idioms can be taken out of context and put into someone else's set of rules. One large-scale drawing in the
exhibition will be made using 'viewer input' from ballots (available at DCAC) that are submitted in the month
leading up to the show.

Nov 7, 2005 : An Art Exhibit & Reception
Featuring Stella Mercy Atal Artist/Painter of Uganda
on Monday, November 7th, 2005, 6:30pm – 9:30pm
hosted by Angelique Shofar, Executive Producer & Host of “Africa Meets Africa” on WPFW 89.3 FM
To RSVP Call 202-588-0999 ext 319
Or email info@africameetsafrica.com
A drawing will take place for a fabulous
gifts and prizes bring your business cards
A donation of $5.00 is appreciated
www.africameetsafrica.com

October 14-Nov 6, 2005 : "Herb's Choice:
The Duke Ellington School of the Arts"
Opening: Friday, October 14th from 7-9 PM
DC Arts Center resides in a facility that is donated rent-free by arts supporter and avid collector,
Herb White. Now retired and living in Miami , FL , each year Mr. White chooses a DC artist and
offers an exhibition of their work. This year he has chosen to feature the work of visual arts
students from the Duke Ellington School of the Arts. The exhibited work will be a selection from
their annual Spring Exhibition from 2004 – 05 which initially featured 296 pieces of art. The work
will represent three levels of the department’s curriculum, 9 th, 10 th, and 11 th grades. It will
showcase the enrichment and experiences of various techniques, processes and mediums while
exploring a variety of subject matter. The work also represents a focus in developing excellence
in craftsmanship and compositional skills as well as individual creative thinking skills.

Sept 9- Oct 9, 2005 : "The New Breed"
New Work from Team Lump from Raleigh, N.C.
Opening: Friday, September 9th from 7-9 PM
Old trees, girls with slight mustaches, malformed animals, hippies, trash, a slew of faces,
pretty things and tinfoil robots are just some of the topics covered by these Team Lump
artists. Paintings, drawings, sculpture, and probably other suprizes will be made by the
likes of Justin Crosby, Stewart Sineath, Gary Smith, Tory Wright, Bob Schatte, Josh Rickards,
Jeremy Taylor and Allyson Mellberg.

Jan 21 - Feb 21 2005
THE FLEETING INSTANT OF NOW:
Recent Works by Karey Kessler
"a timeless region, an eternal presence in complete quiet,
lying beyond human clocks and calendars altogether
the quiet of the Now in the time-pressed, time-tossed
existence of man
this small non-time space is the very
heart of time." - Hannah Arent
"The Fleeting Instant of Now" consisted of a series of drawings that evoked both history
of place and the experience of non-place (space-time, the mystery of the unknown, the
spirit that fills a place).
In Karey Kessler's work, color represents both nature and industry. Paint pigment comes from
the earth - rocks and minerals - and is used in industry for everything from cars to billboards
and houses. Color can create a mood, evoke a memory, or it can represent something beyond
this world, something closer to time than space, closer to feeling than experience --
not nothingness, but everythingness.
February 25 - April 3 2005
EXISTING TO REMAIN: Curated by Margaret Boozer and Claire Huschle

Dina Weston, Dave Snead, Rebecca Murtaugh, Kate Hardy, Claire Sherwood.
Four artists used ceramics and other materials as a point of departure to study transformation
in the artisticprocess - what is lost and what remains. Kate Hardy (DC) examined the slippery
deliniation between art & craft (in public collections). Rebecca Murtaugh (NY) considered the
permanent and ephemeral elements of clay. Claire Sherwood (WV) looked closely at the
transformation of materials like coal and clay over varying conditions and periods of time. Dina
Weston Snead (MD) studied the record of time and touch in an installation that uses
existing architecture.
April 8 - May 15th 2005
Noelle Tan: LATENT
Curated by Paul Roth
LATENT was the first exhibition in Washington of work by one of the city's most promising young artists.
A graduate of CalArts and winner of a prestigious 2005 Creative Capital grant, Tan makes photographs
that are at once conceptual explorations of our current social unease and technical forays to the medium's
outer limits. From dark shapes etched against a cold midnight blackness, to figures shimmering in blasted
territories of white heat, her stunning images suggest a psychic landscape latent under the surface of our
surroundings. This exhibition was organized for DCAC by Paul Roth, associate curator of photography and
media arts at the Corcoran Gallery of Art. Read the Washington Post article on Latent here

May 20 - June 19
SUPERSTITION: Curated by Jefferson Pinder
Art and superstition are both forms of secular spirituality that ambitiously seek to define fate
and environment. Often associated with fear and ignorance, superstitious is a term that society
has used to label folks who choose their own paths and their own sets of beliefs. Bad luck and
good fortune are often connected to a whole series of actions that ultimately are determined by
the rationale of the subscriber. In this delicate existence, a broken mirror could curse an individual
for years or an umbrella opened indoors could spell uncertain doom. Similarly, artists often forge
unique paths while abiding by a personal sense of truth and spirit. In creating myth and illusion,
artists weave enigmatic "real world" elements into objects that become personal relics and icons.

June 24 - July 24
KIOSKdc presents: TRAVELING WITH GULLIVER
The artists' collaborative KIOSKdc (Karen Joan Topping, Ian Jehle, Alan Callander) and Dirtfarm
cartoonist Ben Claassen III present an exhibition titled Traveling with Gulliver which uses the four
lands visited by Gulliver to showcase four original works of drawing, video, installation and cartoon
by the artists. With the help of text provided by writer Peter Donovan, Traveling with Gulliver invites
the viewer to experience the lands of the Lilliputians and the giants, the philosophers and the horses
with the same sense of wonder, good humor and befuddlement as Jonathan Swift's hero.
For more information on KIOSKdc visit www.kioskdc.com |