Come one and bring all. We are having the long awaited art opening party for both the Kevin Garcia, “One in Many” show, and the Pedro Sousa, “Traveler” Show. TheRoger Smith Hotelhas been gracious enough to offer a $99 room specialfor the next 10 days starting on Feb 23, 2010. Lily’s will be providing appetizers and a full cash bar, if you are also interested in having dinner we advise that you make reservations before the opening. There is a 10% off dinner special for anyone attending the opening (please notify your waiter when you are seated).
To learn more about the artists and the shows here are some links:
Pedro Sousa and I have an enduring relationship; for a long time he wanted to kill me. His rage towards me wasn’t unwarranted. If you know anything about me, Marlo, you wouldn’t suspect otherwise.
In 2000 we were both attending Stony Brook University. Pedro had a sweet studio on the fourth floor of Staller Art Center. He was sharing the space with several artists and it was no-holds-barred-art-making-central.
Pedro is a photographer, so naturally he kept his tools at his studio space. Why wouldn’t he? It’s not like anyone went back home in those days or took days off from making art-stuff. While other artists prized their brushes and oil paints, Pedro’s payload was about eight cameras and loads of lenses.
On one particular day I remember visiting the collective studio space. A girlfriend of mine hung out with that crew and she probably wanted to see her ex-boyfriend who shared the studio with Pedro. To say I knew these art-folk would be an over statement. I maybe had met some of them once or twice. It’s a good bet I didn’t know anyones’ name. And if Pedro was telling this story, I’m pretty certain he would stress the exclusive nature of those studios. This was a tight knit community to which I wasn’t even worth spitting on. I was a freshman, but i certainly did not regard myself as such.
Back in those days I wasn’t easily impressed. Everything and everyone, that is, besides me, was “pretentious.” Being in a room of older more “established” males was not doing anything positive for my ego. Clearly these were a bunch of pretentious dicks! With a judgment of that caliber I took out a cigarette and lit it.
I almost remember smoking it out the window…
That was it. The rest was related by Pedro in a death threat back to my girlfriend of that time. He accused me of burning down the studio, but in more visceral words than that. To this day no one really knows if the cigarette I was smoking was the cause of the fire. One party believed it was. I believed otherwise.
What’s more, nobody cared for apologies which later morphed into half-excuses. In fact, certain members of that studio still consider me an arsonist and a prick, and I very well maybe a prick. But, I can tell you dear reader, that it was not my intention to create this animosity nor to burn down any studio.
Why am I telling this story here? Well, it’s a testament to Pedro really. He lost the most in that studio and at the same time he was the first to forgive me. After we moved on beyond that mishap, I was able to clearly see that here was a guy that was neither pretentious nor a prick.
Pedro is one of the most driven guys I know. He’s got the skills to rally people for a cause. To get shit done! Straight out of college he opened a gallery in a dead art zone known as Long Island. It is a miracle that his space held out for six years –packing out the house at every opening.
That was almost all Pedro’s work. While others spoke of a vision he executed his. He enabled other artists and himself by having a space to show work. For artists that is a huge deal! Having an art show means that you must produce. If you keep producing your work matures, you build a portfolio worth showing, collectors become interested, etc. Pedro fostered not only this space but its culture as well. He created a community where people could experiment and show those experiments. I was no exception.
Under terms that I would not burn down the gallery Pedro let me into this culture. I felt a belonging and now other people were looking at me as the pretentious dick. It was a great feeling. We were able to pull off all sorts of great events and spectacles: film festivals, experimental video nights, vaudeville art shows and other performances. The space like the people around it were in constant evolution.
When Pedro closed the gallery it was a surprise, but he listed the fact that he was spending too much time doing administrative work and not enough time producing art as a major factor. Sure, now that I am curating both the Solarium Art Gallery and the Lobby Gallery at the Roger Smith Hotel, I can relate. That is why I proposed an art show to Pedro as well as a co-curatorial role.
That is the relevance of community, of friendship, of culture. It is the ability of relation. To be able to relate is far beyond understanding. That is the torch that we carry and pass to each other. Back and forth it goes…
The Exhibit is Open: January 4, 2010- March 12, 2010
Tommolino said that he would let me do the studio visit under two circumstances: one, that we drink a bottle of fine brandy together, two, we play chess. Being an obligatory creature I had no objections to Damons clauses. Then he smiled. That’s what Damon Tommolino is like: a morsel of truth encased in an even finer casing of truth, which is always humor, the heart of the Universe. There was an even more exacting truth all of this that I was aware of. If I stood to produce any coherent work myself I would need to seek out the visionary eye of somebody who I trusted. That’s where Abi Prince came in. Abi is a Panman Production colleague, but more importantly a visionary filmmaker and editor that I knew could handle the surreal nature of this encounter. Regardless we were not about to take any chances so Damon made sure to keep filling Abi’s glass with fine African Shiraz. What was recorded that evening was the delicate, unadulterated, result(s) of the incident of three artists coming together to make sense of the world around them through each others eyes.
I remember one night I had my camera with me at one of Pedro’s parties. Damon was playing on a stand up piano and singing. He looked like he was a world onto himself. Like a moth to light I whipped out my camera and began filming him. I don’t think he knew at that time. Later he asked if I had the footage of that night. Sure I did. Damon laughed. The synesthisthetic events of an artist existence are perfectly matched with the color of music. Are the colors coordinated with the notes? There is very much a musical composition that Damon is painting. Every time, every canvas there is rhythm, there is tonality. Some are solo performances and in others there is an entire orchestra playing. When you look you can see the sound, you can hear the color. That is a relevant accomplishment.
Ill just say it once and then we can all forget about this. Behind every man, this time there being two, there is a great woman. That’s it, now to the main program. Damon, like the line he employs so masterfully in his paintings and sculptures has a tenderness to him. He paints it how he wants it to be. There is a softness to a very harsh exacting structure. There is a cradle for the universe that is not asleep, as maybe you would want it to be. Damon will be the first to admit the aesthetic polarity of his own workings, be they inner and outer. For one thing, he is not a person who is at all afraid, but at the same time he is one of the most hospitable and inviting blokes: who has allowed me the pleasure of dreaming on their couch.
