SOPAC Unveils New Art Exhibit This Friday 4/12

On view from April 12 – July 31, 2013, is PRIMAL CONVERGENCE, an exhibit featuring paintings, drawings and constructs by three NJ-based artists – the collaborative team of Gerard Amsellem & Mikel Frank, and Dan Fenelon, and is curated by Micha Hamilton of GAS Gallery And Studio. Kicking off the exhibit is a free reception from 6:00pm – 8:00pm on Saturday, April 20^th, featuring a meet-and-greet with the artists.  The artwork on exhibit is for sale with partial proceeds supporting SOPAC.

Invoking the tribal, the transcendental and the mythic, PRIMAL CONVERGENCE is a collection of paintings, drawings, collages, constructs and sculptures.   Simultaneously ancient and futuristic, tethered by their bold, explosive use of colors and immersive scale, the works of these artists exude a sense of the sacred and supernatural, eliciting an instinctual, visceral reaction and engaging the viewer in a transformative meditation of mind, body and spirit. The large expressionist collage/paintings of Amsellem & Frank manifest as multi-paneled works combining the power of action painting with a nod to Japanese Shoji screens and Renaissance altarpieces. Important to these works is the spontaneous working process these two artists have established, allowing their individual creative sensibilities for art and life to translate into a symbiotic vision through process and palette, creating a third artist.

At the same time, the seemingly stream-of-conscious, figurative paintings, constructs and sculptures of Dan Fenelon are iconographic and totemic, and are evocative of talismanic and fetishistic art often associated with shamanic practices of archaic and indigenous cultures. With a range of work alternately playful and profound, deliberate and serendipitous, one should be careful not to dismiss the primal as primitive, as it would negate the highly developed artistic knowledge and skill these artists have acquired through lifelong passion and practice. PRIMAL CONVERGENCE is a celebration of the connective, timeless expressions of the human spirit.

WHAT: PRIMAL CONVERGENCE – New Art Exhibition by Gerard Amsellem & Mikel Frank, and Dan Fenelon

WHERE: South Orange Performing Arts Center (SOPAC), The Herb & Milly Iris Gallery, 1 SOPAC Way, South Orange, NJ

WHEN: On Display April 12 – July 31, 2013; Opening Reception Saturday, April 20^th @ 6:00pm – 8:00pm / Closing Reception Saturday, June 29^th @ 6:00pm – 8:00pm

HOW: FREE. To learn more, visit www.SOPACnow.org or call 973.313.ARTS.