Past Exhibitions & Events 2021
New Paradigm Tool Company
Work by Peter Dellert
September 8 - October 2, 2021
Artist Reception: Friday, September 10: 5-8 pm
Peter Dellert is a sculptor and mixed media artist living and working in Holyoke MA. Historically a furniture maker and cabinetmaker, he has been exhibiting his sculptures in galleries, museums and outdoor sculpture shows in the U.S. and Japan since 2005. He creates sculptures using diverse materials including wood, steel, concrete, grape vines, recycled automotive catalytic converter covers, Tyvek, recycled plastic and others.
His most recent works comprise an ongoing collection entitled New Paradigm Tool Company. These works utilize legacy tools for manual labor. These tools are refitted with new, surprising, and elaborate wood handles, often laboriously laminated and bent into curves; additional modifications to the tools are also employed. These changes render the tools seemingly non-functional, absurd and surrealistic.
The work focuses on an examination of hand tools. The work seeks to address the place of the worker, especially the hand worker and manual laborer in contemporary Western culture. The relation of labor and capital is embodied in the technology of tools. Tools are the means of production in society, and such means of production create our social relationships. These modified tools ask what kind of social relations would emerge from such absurd means of production? This absurdity is a critique on the un-reflected deployment of technology without the consideration of the resulting change in social relations. What at first might appear as a nostalgic look at a past era is in fact a bold statement on the future of labor in the age of digital transformation born of artificial intelligence and increasing automation of manual work in our future.
https://peterdellert.com/
2021 NHS Honors Art Alumni Exhibition: Homecoming
July 21- August 28, 2021
A.P.E. Gallery is pleased to present the 4th iteration of the NHS Honors Art Alumni Exhibition, honoring NHS Honors Art teacher, Lisa Leary. It will be curated by ‘07 alumna, Zoe Sasson, running from July 21- August 28, 2021.
This is a particularly exciting exhibition, as it will celebrate 25 Northampton High School alumni from over 10 different generations of art students. The artists all come together with one essential commonality: an admiration for the teaching of Lisa Leary, who stresses a lifelong relationship with fine arts practice and an appreciation for contemporary art. Originally scheduled for summer 2020, the exhibition celebrates Leary’s long career as an art teacher, since she is retiring this spring. This exhibition hosts a diverse range of talent, including alumni who have left the Pioneer Valley to live elsewhere, trained in art schools around the country, and those who have built fruitful careers in the arts.
A.P.E. will also be selling exhibition catalogues, featuring artwork by alumni and designed by summer intern Sarah Müllejans, to help with the costs of the exhibition.
The NHS Honors Art Alumni Exhibition could not be possible without the generous support of the Northampton Arts Council, The Art Angels, our exhibiting artists and their families, and of course, Lisa Leary.
Take the Virtual Tour HERE
Art Post Projects is a collaboration between Art Post and the J.F.K. Middle School in Northampton, MA. The show contains the artwork of sixth, seventh, and eighth graders and the artists Jessica Maffia, Mandy Messina, Zoe Sasson, and Lena Schmid.
Art Post is a grant funded project, run by the artists Zoe Sasson and Lena Schmid. In its inaugural year, Art Post was conceived of as a way to provide Northampton public school students with world-expanding and hands-on contemporary arts enrichment during a time when they are largely learning from behind a screen. In 2021, Art Post partnered four teaching artists with the art teachers Michelle Mallory and Emma Mendoker to facilitate remote visiting artists workshops. Students had the opportunity to learn about the visiting artists’ work and practice, and were guided through the creation of an artwork of their own.
Art Post and Art Post Projects are made possible through generous funding from the Northampton Education Fund, the Northampton Arts Council, and the J.F.K. Middle School’s Parent/Teacher Organization.
Find out more about Art Post at artpostprojects.com, which features studio visits with the participating artists and easy to follow directions for students ages 10 and up to make their own artwork inspired by the participating artists.
Art Post is a grant funded project, run by the artists Zoe Sasson and Lena Schmid. In its inaugural year, Art Post was conceived of as a way to provide Northampton public school students with world-expanding and hands-on contemporary arts enrichment during a time when they are largely learning from behind a screen. In 2021, Art Post partnered four teaching artists with the art teachers Michelle Mallory and Emma Mendoker to facilitate remote visiting artists workshops. Students had the opportunity to learn about the visiting artists’ work and practice, and were guided through the creation of an artwork of their own.
Art Post and Art Post Projects are made possible through generous funding from the Northampton Education Fund, the Northampton Arts Council, and the J.F.K. Middle School’s Parent/Teacher Organization.
Find out more about Art Post at artpostprojects.com, which features studio visits with the participating artists and easy to follow directions for students ages 10 and up to make their own artwork inspired by the participating artists.
Out - Takes
In - Sights
Carl Caivano - Nancy Campbell
May 5 - 29, 2021
Artist Statement
Carl Caivano
Manipulating meaning through juxtaposing varied references intrigues me. A single element can look either magmatic or cellular depending on where it is positioned within the composition. My aim is to combine various macro- and micro-scaled elements that range from galaxies to subatomic particles into a single unified expression. I want the final result to function as a three-dimensional painting.
https://carlcaivano.com/
Artist Statement
Nancy Campbell
I strive to evoke an Eastern sense of balance between fragility and strength by using a system of highly structured intricate abstraction. Despite exacting and often tedious methods I work for a spontaneous result that inhabits an ambiguous realm between the visible and the invisible, the logical and the intuitive, the representational and the abstract.
https://www.nancycampbellprintmaker.com/
In - Sights
Carl Caivano - Nancy Campbell
May 5 - 29, 2021
Artist Statement
Carl Caivano
Manipulating meaning through juxtaposing varied references intrigues me. A single element can look either magmatic or cellular depending on where it is positioned within the composition. My aim is to combine various macro- and micro-scaled elements that range from galaxies to subatomic particles into a single unified expression. I want the final result to function as a three-dimensional painting.
https://carlcaivano.com/
Artist Statement
Nancy Campbell
I strive to evoke an Eastern sense of balance between fragility and strength by using a system of highly structured intricate abstraction. Despite exacting and often tedious methods I work for a spontaneous result that inhabits an ambiguous realm between the visible and the invisible, the logical and the intuitive, the representational and the abstract.
https://www.nancycampbellprintmaker.com/
April 3 - 27, 2021
Weekend Woodblock Printing Workshop: April 9-11
BIG INK will be exhibiting woodblock prints and hosting a weekend of monumental woodblock printing in April, 2021.
BIG INK will transform A.P.E. Gallery into a print studio featuring The Big Tuna: our custom-designed giant mobile printing press. We'll invite the general public to witness the spectacle of you and other participants printing together.
BIG INK blends elements of a formal class and a maker fair.
See the Virtual Tour HERE
More Info: http://www.bigink.org/
Weekend Woodblock Printing Workshop: April 9-11
BIG INK will be exhibiting woodblock prints and hosting a weekend of monumental woodblock printing in April, 2021.
BIG INK will transform A.P.E. Gallery into a print studio featuring The Big Tuna: our custom-designed giant mobile printing press. We'll invite the general public to witness the spectacle of you and other participants printing together.
BIG INK blends elements of a formal class and a maker fair.
See the Virtual Tour HERE
More Info: http://www.bigink.org/
March 2021 Exhibition
March 4 - 28
Five Who Paint Outside:
Frank Gregory, David Brewster, Ray Larrow, Dave Gloman, & Christine Labich
See the Virtual Tour HERE
This group exhibition features five artists from the Pioneer Valley, each of whom find their subject matter working outside. Frank Gregory is one of the artists and the curator of the exhibition. When the idea for this show began, he looked closely at the work of many painters, trying to put together a cohesive, yet diverse group of artists that all work outside in the Pioneer Valley with the same urgency and commitment. Several he considered only occasionally paint outside, preferring to work from photographs. Others often paint outside, but not in the valley. The four artists Frank chose, plus himself, all work plein air, under the same conditions of light and weather, yet they all have their own specific formal concerns and unique visual vocabularies. This is an exhibition that compares and contrasts these elements and amplifies their particular ways of looking at a familiar landscape.
As we all continue to endure the length and challenge of the pandemic, it is refreshing to be opening the gallery this Spring with a group of painters who have been able to continue their practice of painting outside.
https://www.davidbrewsterfineart.com/
https://www.davidglomanart.com/
http://www.frankgregory.com
https://www.christinelabich.com/
www.raylarrow.com
March 4 - 28
Five Who Paint Outside:
Frank Gregory, David Brewster, Ray Larrow, Dave Gloman, & Christine Labich
See the Virtual Tour HERE
This group exhibition features five artists from the Pioneer Valley, each of whom find their subject matter working outside. Frank Gregory is one of the artists and the curator of the exhibition. When the idea for this show began, he looked closely at the work of many painters, trying to put together a cohesive, yet diverse group of artists that all work outside in the Pioneer Valley with the same urgency and commitment. Several he considered only occasionally paint outside, preferring to work from photographs. Others often paint outside, but not in the valley. The four artists Frank chose, plus himself, all work plein air, under the same conditions of light and weather, yet they all have their own specific formal concerns and unique visual vocabularies. This is an exhibition that compares and contrasts these elements and amplifies their particular ways of looking at a familiar landscape.
As we all continue to endure the length and challenge of the pandemic, it is refreshing to be opening the gallery this Spring with a group of painters who have been able to continue their practice of painting outside.
https://www.davidbrewsterfineart.com/
https://www.davidglomanart.com/
http://www.frankgregory.com
https://www.christinelabich.com/
www.raylarrow.com
In Residence at A.P.E. on Main Street
February 6 - 16
The public may view from the window in the evenings: 4:30 - 8:00 pm
Mary Beth Brooker
Title: THE SET-UP
The Set-Up is a theater setting; a workshop; a campsite; a story book; a song.
These are some of the metaphors for yet another metaphor: the five skandhas described in Buddhist philosophy as five layers of existence that constitute human experience. As an organizing principle, the skandhas suggest a simple, five part structure as well as contemplative, physical practices for focused study.
To turn this esoteric idea into concrete material for a generative art practice, over the course of several days, each day would be dedicated to one of the five skandhas, exploring a specific material that is somehow analogous.
February 6 - 16
The public may view from the window in the evenings: 4:30 - 8:00 pm
Mary Beth Brooker
Title: THE SET-UP
The Set-Up is a theater setting; a workshop; a campsite; a story book; a song.
These are some of the metaphors for yet another metaphor: the five skandhas described in Buddhist philosophy as five layers of existence that constitute human experience. As an organizing principle, the skandhas suggest a simple, five part structure as well as contemplative, physical practices for focused study.
To turn this esoteric idea into concrete material for a generative art practice, over the course of several days, each day would be dedicated to one of the five skandhas, exploring a specific material that is somehow analogous.