Northport, NY HAMPTONS SHOWCASE Market Art + Design exhibit
This summer Haven Gallery will be exhibiting at the annual Market Art + Design in Bridgehampton, New York. The fair, happening on the grounds of The Bridgehampton Museum, drives collectors in from all parts of the country for a weekend of intriguing contemporary and modern art available from around 70 top galleries. In their booth, Haven has curated an exhibition of figurative paintings that are brimming with mythology.
Gallery owner Erica Berkowitz elaborates, “Haven Gallery is thrilled to be bringing the work of Dan Quintana, Nadezda, Travis Louie, Crystal Morey, Julie Filipenko and Lauren Brevner, all artists who bring forth a narrative rich cavalcade of figurative work laced with mythological tales and contemporary motifs.
Illustrative, emotional and sometimes coy, each artist depicts a world of their own that upon further inspection, tethers the viewer in with relatable aesthetics and devices.”
Louie has been painting “curious” portraits for a number of years. One of his latest is Gary the Frogman, which was derived from a man that Louie met while working at the Naval Exchange. Louie, who was still in art school at the time, says the man had a large mouth and mumbled and smiled a lot. “My friend Raj was convinced that he was part frog or toad,” he adds.
My First Cat, by Filipenko, depicts a young girl holding a giant alligator in her arms—a bow is tied around its neck as if it was a gift, and her face is slightly perturbed. “Life is frequently
unexplainable and absurd,” the artist says. “There’s no sense in trying to control the details of how it manifests, however, what we could do is embrace its absurdity and create our own meaning for it.”
Two artists turn to the swan in their works that will be on view. Of her piece, Nadezda says, “The Swan, The Wave and The Beating Heart is a romantic ode to three primordial elements—the emotional charge of the human heart, the grace of an animal and the power of all-bounding nature.” Morey’s porcelain sculptures often focus on environmental issues as well as how humans relate to the natural world. Her work Leda and the Swan: Sierra Nevada Red Fox, draws on the Greek myth of Leda and the Swan “while also capturing the predator, prey interface of wild creatures and humans, found where urban and rural landscapes meet.”
Market Art + Design will run July 5 to 7.