In the Belly of the Empress at Equity Gallery
"In the Belly of the Empress" is an ongoing series, started in the winter of 2021. It is influenced by the memories of art created outdoors. These small works on paper allow me to move and experiment freely through the drawing and painting process. I’ve used caran d’ache or watercolor pencil for the line and gouache and acrylic paint for the bright solid and sometimes washy colors.
The abstracted forms are organic, and have a sense of a figure present. They feel like botany in an internal space. The colors are lush, rich and regal - with shiny silver color, fitting for an Empress. Many of the paintings have a central composition with forms that grow and radiate outwardly in wave-like patterns.
In the tarot, the Empress card depicts a peaceful woman who has every luxury she needs. In this series, I was imagining what she might be eating. Are there flowers on her meals? What is she digesting? The Empress card can also stand for pregnancy in the physical sense, ideas you are harboring, or, what projects you are giving birth to?
The ‘Empress’ can take ‘mental health days’ whenever she needs. Her life is balanced and free. During this stressful pandemic time, I was worried about family and friends, like everyone. I find myself creating art projects in new places. I started arranging a seashell garden around the trees by the curb, or a two-floor mirrored textile work in the airshaft of my building, and a rustic rooftop garden.
The title of this exhibition was inspired by and pays tribute to Niki de Saint Phalle’s photograph in the ‘Belly of the Empress’ It features a lavish mirrored mosaic dining room she built in her Tarot Garden in Italy.
Online Exhibition
Curator Rebecca DiGiovanna's Lecture on Blurring Boundaries
Happy to be included in Rebecca DiGiovanna’s lecture for the exhibition Blurring Boundaries that is part of the American Abstract Artists traveling exhibition series.
"Captivated by Collage" by Michael Gormley
Farrago
Linnea Paskow, Melissa Staiger and Marianne Gagnier
Curated by Linnea Paskow and Gina Mischianti
Oct. 8th — Oct. 31st
BY MICHAEL GORMLEY
Equity is currently hosting a show of works by three artists that privilege collage as their overriding tool of expression. The results are indeed compelling--both because the artists are astute practitioners of the media and because the media speaks directly to the times we live in.
Its founding impulse, advanced by Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso to depict deconstructed subject matter by piecing together pictorial compositions from disparate components, echoes the interpersonal, political and economic fault lines radiating out past our lives, our homes and our communities and circling a whole world both divided and joined by these selfsame fissures.
Paskow’s work takes on this epic intent with noteworthy scale and, as it eschews the formalist taboo against narrative and representation, assumes a double life by also posing as history painting. “Ballast” for example, appears to show an exploding cylindrical form(be that a decapitated egg or perhaps a downed blimp) spilling forth the detritus of our collective aspirations and memories. “Vamp” similarly bursts forth with explosive and near hysterical color whilst depicting an upside-down figure intimating the suspended animation, surrender and metamorphosis of the Tarot’s Hanged Man. Pointing to a pandemic life on hold, “Vamp” may also be viewed as the divine fool---a figure symbolizing blind leaps into the void without the assurance of safety nets. “Lodge” with its darkly hued swirling masses abutting constricting bands of horizontal and vertical stripes continues the narrative of time and space and recalls the sudden appearance of a chasm or a portal to be traversed. In seeming contrast to the sublime psychological space depicted in “Lodge”, “Quarantine House phase 2” offers an updated Barbie Dream House ---a safe respite to which one repairs.
As does Paskow, Melissa Staiger digs deep with automatic assemblages comprised of paintings and colored papers that reveal an untainted, primitive and naïve engagement with the natural world. Staiger’s collages dance between abstract and representational effects creating scenes more evocative of dreams or memories. One imagines “Grass View” to be a summer night of careless play in an open field aglow with an August moon. “Sway” is a make-believe dive into a tropical fish aquarium and “Shark Fin” a fauvist’s nightmare warning of the shock of too much pink in a carefully composed parlor.
Marianne Gagnier is an alchemist—her collages hard won distillations of color, form and texture deployed in a Hofmann-esque triumph to compositional tension. Aptly titled “Repair Series”, Gagnier’s collage surfaces are battle fields; layers upon layers, torn and stacked, pasted and re-pasted and painted all over again. Their very making, the great effort to pull together opposing parts (however fractured) into a compelling and greater whole, embodies what collage does best and why it calls to us so loudly on this day.”
Review on Delicious Line
Farrago
Equity Gallery
Reviewed by Elizabeth Johnson for Delicious Line
Farrago brings together collage artists Marianne Gagnier, who challenges boundaries and resolution, Melissa Staiger, who pursues wholeness in pieces made between different studios, and Linnea Paskow, who reconstitutes deeply felt dreams using magazine fragments.
Countering beauty with brawn, Gagnier's Air series, white cherishes subtle, chance paint on smeared, torn, or trampled paper shards – yes, messier is better. Staiger's El Yerberito balances finger-like paper shapes above a churning, painted vortex. In contrast, Blue Circle defies drama, expressing repose with airy brushstrokes. Paskow's Lodge invents a traversable space from glossy photos. Similarly, Wand contrives a totem from flat bits of roots, forest, and fabric.
Benjamin La Rocco's related but separate outdoor installation Left Out in The Rain both respects and neglects treasured but oft-discarded objects, questioning attachment. La Rocco's liberties amplify Farrago's underlying, carefree materialism.
Meet the Artist, Friday, Oct. 23, 4-6PM
FARRAGO
Artists: Marianne Gagnier, Linnea Paskow, and Melissa Staiger
October 8th — October 31st, 2020
Meet the Artist, Friday, Oct. 23, 4-6PM
Equity Gallery 245 Broome Street, NYC
Curated by: Linnea Paskow and Gina Mischianti
Equity Gallery is pleased to present Farrago, a three-person exhibition featuring the collages of Linnea Paskow, Marianne Gagnier, and Melissa Staiger.
FARRAGO at Equity Gallery
FARRAGO
Artists: Marianne Gagnier, Linnea Paskow, and Melissa Staiger
October 8th — October 31st, 2020
Outdoor Opening Reception: Thursday, October 8th, 6 — 8 PM
Equity Gallery 245 Broome Street, NYC
Curated by: Linnea Paskow and Gina Mischianti
Equity Gallery is pleased to present Farrago, a three-person exhibition featuring the collages of Linnea Paskow, Marianne Gagnier, and Melissa Staiger.
S-T-R-E-A-M-I-N-G.com
Mike Childs and Melissa Staiger are thrilled to start this new online project to be able to serve artists. It started during the pandemic in 2020 to shine a light of hope and support. 100% of sales generated from this project go to the artists. www.s-t-r-e-a-m-i-n-g.com
Julie Torres, Melissa Staiger, Sharmistha Ray, Ben Pritchard, Rafael Melendez, Keisha Prioleau-Martin, Deanna Lee, Mike Childs
The artists represented in this group show all produce works on paper of an intimate scale, not as a plan for larger projects but as a complete idea in and of itself. The work is boiled down, strong and intense. This seems at times to be going against contemporary art with its pension for largeness equated with importance.
Each artist shows a kind of manic drive. An "unable to stop" stream of work that flows from them naturally and compulsively as cataloged on their social media presence. Working on images for them seems as natural as taking a breath.
Color in this group show, either polychromatic or monochromatic, stems from a historically emotive reference. Many of the works are often referring to this history of expressionism. There is an emphasis also to unlock the contemporary expressive possibilities of color, perhaps even as a response to the current struggles in many of their lives. Perhaps color can work like music here, where the artist uses it as a medium to channel their varied experiences of social unrest, conflicts, tragedies, self-care and/or peaceful balance.
The group pays great attention to the actual application of paint onto paper, sometimes via collage. There is a heightened attentiveness and dedication to the specific nature of their chosen medium and the hand that applies it. All have that same dedication to the practice of painting imagery as an activity both current and meaningful.
studioELL FlatFile Launch to help Scholarship Program
studioELL's FLATFILE features artwork for sale from professors and selected artists. Artists retain 50% of sales and have generously agreed to give the remaining 50% to help fund studioELL's Scholarship Program. The FLATFILE is physically located at our offices in East Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NYC. Please look for my ten collages in the “Growth” series.
DNA Artist Residency
I had a productive and beautiful time at the Freight and Volume DNA Artist Residency. Here are a few shots of the glorious studio space I had to work in and works in progress.
Art Off Screen with Neumeraki
Art Off-Screen is an international exhibition, organized by Eileen Jeng Lynch, of artwork and performances in outward-facing locations, so the work can be viewed from outside by the community. With pause orders during the pandemic, art has moved online and much of it is still behind closed doors. Art Off-Screen provides access to art beyond a screen, inspiring creativity, amplifying voices, encouraging change, and sending messages of hope and healing.
Entire Exhibition Period: July 18 - September 20, 2020 (extended through September 26).
Within this timeline, there is a roll out in phases (every two weeks) of more artists, so opening dates include: July 18, August 1, August 15, August 29, September 12
Meet the Artists
A Zoom call will be set up for each group of artists a few days before the next opening. Stay tuned for dates and times or email [email protected].
Thursday, July 30: Zoom Conversation with Artists from July 18 Opening:
Cecile Chong, Sara Jimenez & Jason Schwartz, Tijay Mohammed, Natalia Nakazawa, Alex Paik, Liz Porter, Yohanna M Roa, Margaret Roleke, Carol Saft, Melissa Staiger, Christine Lee Tyler, and Virginia Inés Vergara
Now, more than ever Exhibition & Publication for Wassaic Project
Now, more than ever Exhibition - my work on 2nd floor of digital exhibition
Now, more than ever Publication
Introduction
Now, more than ever what?
Maybe just that: things feel urgent. Now, more than ever, a new world feels inevitable, and a better one feels, maybe, possible. At the particular now in which we’re writing this (10:56 PM, Sunday, June 7, 2020), it has been exactly 100 days since New York City’s first confirmed coronavirus case, 13 days since the murder of George Floyd, and 5 hours since the Minneapolis City Council announced a veto-proof majority vote to begin defunding their city’s police department.
Three things there.
The first: an experience simultaneously collective and so very, very not collective — novel, yes, but revealing nothing new. What was for some reason seen as a great equalizer has mostly highlighted — and entrenched — preexisting social and economic inequities. That a grossly disproportionate number of the more than 100,000 Americans who have died of COVID-19 come from economically disadvantaged communities is no coincidence. That, in some cities, Black residents died from the virus at twice the rate of white residents is no coincidence, either.
The second: an event neither novel nor revealing of anything new. The murder of George Floyd — along with the murders of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and hundreds more Black men and women across the country — is only the latest consequence of the 400 years of cruel, casual disregard for Black life upon which this country is built. That the protests sparked by these murders have been met with concentrated acts of violence on the part of the police is, likewise, distressingly predictable.
But the third! The third signals the coming of something, maybe, new under the sun. That those protests have placed serious attention on efforts to defund the police and introduce new, community-based models of public safety is remarkable in and of itself. That Minneapolis is poised to do it right now makes us feel, against all odds, hopeful. Whether that hope proves warranted will depend, at root, on the degree to which we can, with care, imagine newness. Which is to say: it is possible that in the coming years we begin to build a country that values service and justice over order and control, but it is very, very possible that we do not. It will take real people — you, reading, included — making efforts both physical and mental, over a long period of time, to change fundamentally the ways they go about seeing and living in the world. It will take, more than anything, an unprecedented act of collective, radical imagination.
Which brings us to art (this is, yes, an art exhibition, and we are, yes, an art organization). Because if all art is political (and it is), then there is no useful distinction whatsoever between artistic imagination and political imagination. Whatever imaginative force guides the hand of a painter is exactly the same force by which activists and organizers will envision our new world. Or, at least, it can be. It’s the same problem as before, on a smaller scale: it’s possible — and, we believe, essential — that contemporary artists become integral to the collective social imagination of our country in the coming years, but it’s very, very possible that they do not. It is helpful to remember that, to you viewing this show, the importance of contemporary art is likely self-evident, but that it is by no means self-evident to Americans at large — nor should it be. We are convinced that contemporary art can foster positive social change, but we are also clear-eyed about the fact that — given a commodity-driven art world that disproportionately elevates the work of cis white men — it very often doesn’t. This, too, will require an act of sustained imagination to remedy. For us at the Wassaic Project, we will, as just a start, be increasing the number of no-fee residencies we offer each year to artists of color from eight to ten, making a curatorial commitment to show the work of more artists of color, allocating more of our commissioning funds towards supporting that work, and working to make our board and staff more representative of the artists we show and support. But for those commitments (and the commitments to come) to mean anything will require your imagination, too — a willingness to let in, be affected, and be changed by the work you encounter.
So: this show. It features 161 works by 67 artists, laid out in a way that mimics the physical spaces in and around Maxon Mills — the historic, seven-floor grain mill out of which we host all our exhibitions. Almost all of the work in the show was selected well before the onset of COVID-19 prevented us from hosting a physical show, but, rather than push that work into next year’s show, we’ve taken the opportunity to explore a new medium for exhibition. What we lose by not being able to physically install the work, we hope to gain back in challenging you, the viewer, to engage in the same acts of seeing as the artists did and, in so doing, push yourself out of the frameworks through which you may usually see the world.
To take a few examples: on the first floor (so to speak) Shiva Aliabadi asks you to step right into one such way of seeing, onto the copper foils of her Yield II installation. Invoking her own experiences stepping into Iranian mosques, it’s engulfing to the point of mirage — there, but visibly fraying; the awe, yes, but the agitation, too, over moments that are always already fading. Conversely, on the third floor, Sholeh Asgary’s In Blue Time is more an exercise in witnessing than seeing. The overlapping drips of her water clocks are deliberately impenetrable — they’re “about” Asgary’s memories growing up as a refugee only insofar as they generate, in us, the same quiet wonder of not knowing that those experiences did in her. And on the fifth floor, Aisha Tandiwe Bell’s traps and trapped figures explore the delicate balance between protecting what you have and cooperating in power structures that keep you where you are — and the possibility, too, of evolving beyond those structures entirely.
There are, of course, any number of paths through, and into, the work in this show. But however you arrive there, on the seventh floor, take some time to pause and reflect. Because this show is, yes, about now, in the broadest sense, but it’s also, at root, about what might be, and a testament to the Wassaic community that’s so generously helped make our own what-might-bes happen for the past 12 years. That we’re still around — that we were ever around at all — is thanks to the community members highlighted here, to their willingness to commit to our initial dream for this project. In any and every way possible, we encourage you to seek those people in your own community, and to entwine your life with theirs. Start now, and start where you are.
Trust us: it’s worth doing. Now, more than ever.
Stoop Studio Visit with Renee Riccardo & Melissa Staiger
Flip Through of American Abstract Artists 2019 Monoprints Catalogue
Purple Group Show at Underdonk, Opens Feb. 14 from 6-9PM
I invited Ben Pritchard to show a purple painting with me at Underdonk. Above is Melissa Staiger, Rooted no.9, 2020, acrylic on panel, 24 x 18 inches. Ben’s painting below is Image, 2004-2019, oil on linen, 16 x 16 inches.
American Abstract Artists: Digital Prints, 2012 - 2019
American Abstract Artists: Digital Prints, 2012 - 2019
75th Anniversary Print Portfolio & 2019 Monoprint Portfolio
JANUARY 3 - FEBRUARY 9, 2020
OPENING RECEPTION FRIDAY, JANUARY 3, 6–9 PM
“The AAA created an open and generally egalitarian forum for the exhibition of abstract and non-objective art stressing the common bond between artists who understood form as a vital physical and visual vehicle for content. The AAA has been for most of its history, a remarkably democratic organization tolerant of many points of view…” —Susan C. Larsen, from her introduction to the AAA 50th Anniversary Portfolio
“What binds past and present members of AAA together is a deep respect for the value of visual experience unencumbered by programs and pretensions...their real concern is with the absolute immediacy of visual experience for which abstraction has been the vessel…” —Robert Storr, from his introduction to the 75th Anniversary Print Portfolio
Transmitter is pleased to inaugurate the New Year with an exhibition devoted to two print portfolios published by American Abstract Artists—75th Anniversary Print Portfolio and 2019 Monoprint Portfolio.
American Abstract Artists (AAA) was founded in 1936 as a vehicle to promote greater awareness of US based artists working to advance the language of abstraction. Printmaking was a focus of the group from its inception. The group’s first exhibition in 1937 was accompanied by a portfolio of original lithographs by 30 founding members. From then onward, print portfolios became a platform both to document the work of its members and to serve as milestones for the group (portfolios were created to mark AAA’s 50th, 60th, and 75th anniversaries).
In 2012, in a meaningful shift, AAA chose to embrace digital printing for the 75th Anniversary Print Portfolio. All prior print portfolios had been produced using various forms of lithography. This shift in printing technology represented a conscious decision to situate the portfolio, and the group, squarely within the 21st century. The 2019 Monoprint Portfoliowas created to complement the 75th Anniversary Print Portfolio and allows for a print exhibition that surveys the work of the group’s current members.
Following the exhibition at Transmitter, American Abstract Artists: Digital Prints, 2012 - 2019 will travel to the Gallery at the Visual and Performing Arts Center at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury, CT in October, 2020, and Herron School of Art + Architecture in Indianapolis, IN in January, 2021.
Participating Artists:
2012 Portfolio:
Alice Adams, Siri Berg, Emily Berger, Susan Bonfils, Power Boothe, Henry Brown, Kenneth Bushnell, James O. Clark, Gabriele Evertz, John Goodyear, Gail Gregg, James Gross, Lynne Harlow, Mara Held, Daniel G. Hill, Gilbert Hsiao, Phillis Ideal, Julian Jackson, James Juszczyk, Cecily Kahn, Steve Karlik, Marthe Keller, Irene Lawrence, Jane Logemann, Vincent Longo, David Mackenzie, Stephen Maine, Katinka Mann, Nancy Manter, Creighton Michael, Manfred Mohr, Hiroshi Murata, John Phillips, Lucio Pozzi, Leo Rabkin, Ce Roser, David Row, Edward Shalala, Robert Storr, Robert Swain, Clover Vail, Vera Vasek, Don Voisine, Stephen Westfall, Jeanne Wilkinson, Mark Williams, Thornton Willis, Nola Zirin
2019 Portfolio:
Liz Ainslie, Steven Alexander, Jeffrey Bishop, Jacob Cartwright, Rob de Oude, Laurie Fendrich, Joanne Freeman, Gary Golkin, Pinkney Herbert, Rhia Hurt, Joanne Mattera, Judith Murray, Lisa E. Nanni, Jim Osman, Don Porcaro, Corey Postiglione, Raquel Rabinovich, Irene Rousseau, Anne Russinof, Lorenza Sannai, Karen Schifano, Mary Schiliro, Claire Seidl, Melissa Staiger, Kim Uchiyama
TRANSMITTER
Location: 1329 Willoughby Avenue, 2A, Brooklyn, NY 11237
Hours: Saturday and Sunday 1pm-6pm or by appointment
Save the Date! Curatorial Project with Beatrice Wolert at Underdonk
Bea Wolert: Memories Are Starting Points
Curated by Melissa Staiger
Underdonk
1329 Willoughby Ave #211
Brooklyn, NY 11237
Hours: Saturday - Sunday 1-6pm,
and by appointment
Opening, Friday, Nov. 22, 2019, 6-9pm
On view, Nov. 22 - Dec. 15, 2019
*image Study for The Crown of the Tatry Mountains, 2019
Found rocks, ceramic underglazed pierog and ethylene-vinyl acetate, 10 x 12 x 6 ½ inches
"In the Fountain" Solo Art Exhibition at Pratt Manhattan SCPS Gallery
You are invited to my solo exhibition at Pratt Manhattan's School of Continuing and Professional Studies Gallery, "In the Fountain", Opening reception on Tuesday, May 28, 6-8PM and it is on view until June 30th. The address is 144 W 14th St, NY.
