Please join us for First Saturday at Minnesota Street Project. All galleries will be open until 7pm
We are pleased to present an artist talk and Q&A with Joe Ferriso and Steuart Pittman, of Pacific Saw Works. Join us on Saturday, May 2, from 5–6 PM, followed by a 15-minute Q&A session. Join us for a conversation offering insight into the artist's methodologies, influences, and ongoing investigations within contemporary material-based practices. Joe Ferriso's Solo exhibition: Lost & Found is on view now through May 2nd. |
|
|
crypto - so this is kind of funny |
|
Ever Gold Gallery used to be in our gallery space. They had a sign in their office area that said "We take crypto". Bitforms gallery took over the space when Ever Gold moved out and they left the wall text intact. Then we moved in. Hilariously, the "We take crypto" sign has been up all along, for the last 10 years, and I left it up because I thought it was funny. But now we actually do take crypto. Just in case one of you out there needed to know that...
|
|
|
Lost & Found is where things wash ashore. Some are precious, some purposely discarded, all full of backstory. I see everything as a potential medium for expression, and the analogy of searching and finding feels like an apt parallel for my art-making. Wood and paint are materials people surround themselves with. We run to them for comfort and run from them for change. The leftovers of construction are plentiful. Making speculative architectural patterns with them feels celebratory to me.
Driftwood, too, is inherently a castaway. Its original form is often streamlined, reduced, made stronger and smoother. I see the found elements of driftwood and construction waste as related. These fragments of growth and labor are shaped in part by chance, place, and circumstance. In responding to their shape, color, and texture, I seek the placement that reorients the material.
The artworks assembled here grew out of family outings to the beach, solo walks past construction sites, and conversations with neighbors and friends about things they need to get rid of. The backstory matters deeply to me. Where do things come from, and why do we hold onto them? Each time I make a piece of artwork, it becomes a kind of time capsule, bearing witness to events in my life, in our community, and in the world. I like to think that my artwork finds me, and hopefully finds its way to others as well.
|
|
|
 | Joe Ferriso, Fircrest III, 2026, Acrylic on plywood29, ¼ x 36 ¾ X 21 in |
|
|
 | Joe Ferriso, Voids and Endgrain, 2024, Acrylic, sawdust and redwood on plywood, 20 1/2 x 12 1/2 x 1 3/4 in
52.1 x 31.8 x 4.4 cm |
|
|
 | Joe Ferriso, Perimeter IV (violet), 2024, Acrylic on plywood in redwood frame, 12 1/2 x 15 x 1 1/4 in
Joe Ferriso, Perimeter III (lavender), 2024, Acrylic on plywood in fir frame, 14 x 15 1/2 x 1 1/2 in
Joe Ferriso, Perimeter V (landscape), 2024, Acrylic on plywood in painted frame, 18 x 13 1/4 x 1 1/4 in
|
|
|
Joe Ferriso grew up in a household with roots in Dominican, Honduran, and Italian heritage in a middle-class, conservative community on Long Island, NY. His parents were deeply involved in a Christian fundamentalist doomsday cult during his childhood, which guided his development into art making. Drawing during church services and skateboarding after school provided an outlet for processing his experiences with authority and doctrine.
Embracing play, freedom, and optimism, his sculptural and painted works are primarily concerned with how color perception impacts emotion. Ferriso’s subject is the relationship between architecture and nature, expressed in the language of color. His love for tuning color and the sheer energy of color motivates his actions. Like a vine to a lattice, his color enmeshes with the art object, bringing it to life.
Ferriso works in series that emerge and recede at their own pace, driven by his previous experiments. His most recent works are condition-sensitive pieces in pursuit of a sublime experience, generating mystery from the mundane. The materials that he works with are discards or found in nature. Construction waste, building off-cuts, driftwood, found wood, and abandoned paint colors are the starting points of his labor.
|
 |
|
|
Ferriso moved to the Bay Area in 2009 and is a graduate of The Cooper Union (BFA 2003) and Stanford University (MFA 2018). He lives with his wife, two young children, and a dog in Sebastopol, CA. He is an Adjunct Lecturer of Painting and Sculpture at Sonoma State University. |
|
|
Born and raised in the Midwest, Steuart Pittman currently lives and works in Richmond, CA. He earned his MFA from Mills College, where he was awarded the prestigious Jay DeFeo MFA Prize. His work has received numerous accolades, including the Peter S. Reed Foundation Award in Painting and multiple nominations for the SFMoMA SECA Award. In addition to his studio practice, Pittman has held a variety of jobs within the Bay Area art world over the past two decades. He is the Director and Co-Founder of Pacific Saw Works, a curatorial project that showcases contemporary Californian painters.
|
|
|
#elenorharwoodgallery#minnesotastreetproject#sunstormfineartmagazine.com #fineartmagazineblog.blogspot.com#artfunforever, |
|
| |
