Breaking New Ground
EXHIBITION OPENING: THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2022, 5:30 PM
PREVIEW FEBRUARY 15 AND 16, 10:00 AM—5:00 Pm
ART ON VIEW: FEBRUARY 18 — FEBRUARY 27, 2022
1110 2 Ave F2 R200, New York, NY 10022
A FUNDRAISER, ART EXHIBITION AND SILENT AUCTION CELEBRATING
PRESENTED IN ASSOCIATION WITH
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
As part of Fifteenth Annual ABC Gala, presented by the Alexander & Buono Foundation, Stride Arts is pleased to announce “Breaking New Ground,” its newly curated exhibition being held at Stride Arts Gallery February 17-27, 2022.
The exhibition theme is “Women in the Arts” and celebrates female visual and performing artists who, past and present, define and expand the world’s artistic vision through their contributions as performers, composers, painters, and sculptors.
“Breaking New Ground” is made up of works by Janet Goldner, Judi Harvest, Kristina Kossi, Geraldine Neuwirth, Seanna Noonan, and Sarah Walko, each of whom brings a unique focus to their work through their art and choices of materials.
The artists for this exhibition have been chosen because as the title suggests their concepts, unique media, and collective approach create possibilities for viewers to understand, appreciate, and value art in new and exciting ways.
The works in “Breaking New Ground” will also be included in a silent auction, with a preview held at the gallery on Tuesday and Wednesday, February 15 and 16, from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM. A portion of the proceeds from sales will be donated to ABF.
We hope you will take advantage of this unique opportunity to be part of an evening that will combine great art with great music, and all in the name of a great cause.
Artist's Statement
© Janet Goldner.
Image courtesy of the Artist.
My work explores culture, identity and social justice. I make steel sculpture and installations that also include photography, video and sound. Bridging diverse cultures, my work celebrates the unique beauty and genius of each as well as what we have in common. Cultural preservation is important to my work where my research takes the form of immersive fieldwork. Annual visits to Mali, for more than two decades, provide inspiration. The evolution of my art traces my enduring exploration of sculptural form, my ongoing relationship with African culture, and my lifelong involvement in social activism.I engage in long-term collaborations, particularly with Malian artists. We are all, at the same time, researcher and object of research producing dialogue and concrete works of art. Working transculturally unites people from different cultures, education, histories.
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The exchange of perspectives and contexts can highlight global similarities and specific cultural differences as contributors think together, contributing beliefs and strategies from their individual experiences. As the work continues over a long period of time, the result can be an identity that is not exclusively linked to a geographic location or ethnicity but to new cultural and conceptual realms.
My life experiences play an integral part in the development of my work. A master welder, I work in three dimensions as well as on paper, on the floor, on walls, and suspended from the ceiling, indoors and outdoors. My work combines poetry, patterns, forms and African themes that engage in social discourse.
© Judi Harvest
Image courtesy of the Artist.
My work is concerned with the fragility of life and the search for beauty. I am a multidisciplinary artist. I became a beekeeper in 2006 when I heard about Colony Collapse Disorder, the name given to the mysterious disappearance of honeybees. In 2013, I created a garden for honeybees on a former dumping ground for glass in Murano, Italy, behind the factory where I work. This brought awareness to the endangered honeybees and the endangered glass masters, two colonies of beauty on the road to extinction. The exhibition, DENATURED: Honeybees + Murano was part of the 2013 Venice Biennale. Eight years later, the four honeybee hives have increased to eight and the garden is an oasis, yet the glass masters are even more endangered. My artworks and honey sales help support the garden and the honeybees in Murano.
My current series titled NIGHT AND DAY: Bats + Bees is concerned with 24/7 pollination. When the bees go inside at sundown, the bats come out and pollinate the night blooming crops including bananas, chocolate, cashews, coffee, coconuts, agave for tequila, avocados, mangos, plus they eat 1000 mosquitoes each, per hour. Bats and bees are taken for granted and disappearing due to loss of habitat, pesticides stress and misinformation. My goal is to bring awareness through art to their beauty, irreplaceable value to our ecosystem and their complex and fundamental lives which are inseparable from ours. Inspired by nature, I use beeswax in my encaustic paintings and honeycomb sculptures and often shapes, colors and textures from bees, bats and flowers. For me there is no difference between art and life.
© Kristina Kossi
Image courtesy of the Artist.
Interpreting the form as a figurative sculptor and showing how grace, form and linear perspective complement each other is what I strive to portray in my work. Working in clay gives me a tactile sense that is very fulfilling, and I love the ability to change directions at any given point! When I have an idea in mind, I will start with an armature and add clay but somewhere along the way I let the sculpture lead the way and tell me where it wants to go when I am working solely from imagination. It is a lesson in getting out of my comfort zone, letting go of control which is something that does not come easily to me. It really is a voyage that leads to some very interesting ideas. Each sculpture must have a flow based on classical sources and observation. I am manifesting the female or male nude figure with strong character whilst giving them a sense of timelessness. I am always looking for the essence and source of the energy and the power and juxtaposing softness versus tenseness.
I have a love affair with the style from the Art Deco period. It is very exciting to create simple yet beautiful lines and understated emotions which also echo the statement of physical power that was so evident in 20th century art. The sensitivity from that era speaks to me so strongly.
My work also takes inspiration from my life as a former professional figure skater. Gliding on ice, my line was the most important thing to present to the audience as much as relating emotion to the music that I was skating or dancing to. I love to listen to music when I sculpt as it draws out the same emotion for me as when I was creating physically with my body but now, I put that life into my sculptures. Being able to capture those feelings in sculpture is what drives me to sculpt. Each piece is an emotional journey for me bringing me right back to all the years of physical training and performing.
© Geraldine Neuwirth
Image courtesy of the Artist.
I started as a figurative painter and found myself interested in philosophy, abstraction, and spiritual concerns. I was attracted to the inner power of forms and how they make a conversation layered with energy and emotional experiences. I have developed a personal vocabulary through layers and layers of drawing, painting, scribbling, tracing, rewriting, constantly adding dimensions, and shaping pieces. This new alphabet speaks of the forever growing ‘thread of existence.’ My work often comes out of chaos, but then it simultaneously reveals a specific personal order that feels very right to me, like the balancing act of allowing the expression to coexist with the external world in the act of creating.
My father worked for Shubert Theatre, and from very early on, I attended many rehearsals, and the notion of a ‘world within a world’ became apparent to me. The life happenings, developing a story, and touching on the philosophy of movement and change profoundly affected me.
The circus entered into my consciousness. My themes of expression presented a stage for the inner reality where what you see is only a small element of what actually exists.
Recently, for the last number of years, I have been working with paper and building with paper to create collages and wall constructions, also developing shapes that exist by themselves with the effect of floating off of the wall. A strong extension of my work has become the actual remnant that appears from making and sketching the larger shaped pieces. It does not need to be defined in any way; it just exists on its own like total unedited energy. I could see myself extending this language in the future, making sculptures and installations.
I have recently begun working on canvases with acrylic paint and have been considering exploring oil on canvas.More Works
Seanna Noonan’s works are inspired by her visual surroundings and situations she finds herself in. She works with acrylic and will occasionally include found materials such as papers and glue to add texture. She has recently gone back to her roots of a relief printing style but created through painting. The piece titled Skin No.5 is inspired by her years of studying printing at SUNY Purchase in Purchase NY and The University of The Arts in Philadelphia, PA.
© Seanna Noonan
Image courtesy of the Artist.
“I love the process of painting. Paint gets poured, scraped, layered and otherwise manipulated onto the canvas to create works that are abundant in both color and texture. Each piece is a process of working out something that has inspired me. It could be a place I was visiting or a person who has triggered an emotion in me. I take this to my studio and work through it.
© Sarah Walko
Image courtesy of the Artist.
Sarah Walko
As a collector, maker and arranger of objects both organic and archaic, I create environments where ephemera from the natural world meet antiquities of a mystical science to tell stories or suggest talismans. I’m interested in the stories contained within and between objects that take on new significance through their proximity and relationships to one another. My work is about the divine side of nature, of the power of imagination, myth, dream and vision and is also inspired by literature and storytelling structure. In my installations I create experiences that allow one’s perceptions to shift from the historical, to the narrative, to the scientific, to the alchemical and to the magical. More Works
