#nofilter

#nofilter April 15-June 1, 2017. FREE opening reception Saturday, April 15, 6-8 p.m.

Please join Art Saint Louis for our new exhibit, #nofilter, featuring 49 artworks by 41 St. Louis regional artists from Missouri and Illinois.

Graphic design by Emily Amberger

#nofilter is a juried visual art exhibition featuring artworks that are uninhibited and unfiltered and where artists feel completely free to speak their minds via visual artistic expressions. This show features 49 artworks by 41 St. Louis regional artists from Missouri and Illinois. Artworks featured express a variety of ideas, concepts, and themes, including pieces that address nature, the human body and intimacy, animals, and the current political situation locally, nationally and globally. The 49 pieces are in variety of styles, techniques and media including ceramics, collage, drawing, mixed media, paintings, photography, printmaking, sculpture, and textiles.

Exhibition note: This exhibition includes mature imagery with nudity & adult content, and is likely not suitable for children.

The exhibit is presented April 15-June 1, 2017 and is free and open to the public. A free opening reception will be held on Saturday evening, April 15, 6-8 p.m. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday 7 a.m.-5 p.m. and Saturday 8:30 a.m.-4 p.m. Closed Sundays & holidays (closed Memorial Day holiday & weekend).

Our exhibition Jurors are Sarah Hermes Griesbach and MK Stallings. Sarah Hermes Griesbach is Executive Editor and Co-Founder of All The Art, the Visual Art Quarterly of St. Louis. All The Art was created in 2015 and is the only publication devoted to visual art in the St. Louis region. Sarah holds Master of Arts degrees in Art History and Liberal Arts from Washington University in St. Louis, where she also studied Secondary Education. Her BA is in Political Science and Government with certificates in Women's Studies, Peace and Justice Studies. MK Stallings is an educator, art administrator, poet, and founder of UrbArts, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to create platforms & platform creatives for youth and community development. UrbArts is located in St. Louis' Old North neighborhood. MK earned his Master's Degree in Sociology from University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2006.

We invite you to visit our Facebook photo album here with images of all of the artworks featured in the #nofilter exhibition. This album also includes highlights from the opening reception as well as exhibit/gallery installation views. Congratulations to Ken Clay, Kat Douglas and Destin Jacobs aka Loafer Gang on the sale of their artworks featured in this exhibition.

PARKING RECOMMENDATIONS
There are parking METERS on Pine Street and Olive Street & other nearby streets. Parking meters run 8 a.m. until 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Fines are steep ($15-20), so don't let your meter expire. If you park at a meter for the reception, remember that meters operate in downtown until 7 p.m. on Saturday. For additional parking suggestions, download a free Downtown Parking Guide here. You can also download the handy Parkmobile app, whereby you can monitor & pay your parking meter via your mobile phone.

Hourly parking is available in the PARK PACIFIC GARAGE on Olive just West of Tucker. Parking is at your own expense. For garage parking, pay by cash via a machine in elevator bay no more than 15 minutes prior to departure OR the easier way is to pay by credit card upon exiting the garage. Be sure to take your parking receipt/ticket with you when you exit your car to visit the Gallery or you won't be able to get back in to the garage to get to your garage. Your parking ticket is your key to get back in to the garage. Art Saint Louis does not validate parking.

The Gallery is easily accessible by PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION with MetroLink and MetroBus with MetroBus stops on Olive Street and Tucker right near the building.

SPECIAL EVENT
COFFEE WITH THE ARTISTS: SATURDAY GALLERY TALK
Saturday, May 20, 11 a.m.    FREE

Please join us at Art Saint Louis on Saturday, May 20, at 11 a.m. and meet several of the featured artists in #nofilter.

Guests can enjoy complimentary coffee tastings courtesy of Catalyst Coffee Bar while the artists talk about their works on view in the exhibit, discuss the media that they use and the various techniques that they apply to making their form of artwork. The artists may also bring in samples of their other works or also present a demo of their particular media & techniques. Guests will walk with the artists through the Gallery as they talk about their works on view in the exhibition. This event is FREE & open to the public.

Meet the following artists on May 20 and hear them discuss their featured works:
Neil Fitzpatrick, painting
Linda Horsley, painting
Rafi Katz, mixed media
Mia Mendoza, mixed media
 

The 41 featured artists in #nofilter are:

Jurors' Statements

"When Art Saint Louis presented the exhibition title "#nofilter" to MK Stallings and me, we were not sure how artists might interpret that theme. The overarching message I eventually drew from the widely disparate collection of artworks we selected feels like the way this phrase is used when someone says something that they really, really mean but also feel uncomfortable voicing. They may say, “Sorry, I have no filter!” With so much heartfelt emotion around political and social change floating around right now, these uncomfortable truths are everywhere we turn.

Expressing our deeply felt truths, going beyond superficial, polite discourse to get at subjects that court controversy - that takes guts. Many of the artworks chosen for this exhibition are gutsy. Some are flat out audacious. We encourage viewers to be bold in their viewing too. Consider further the media and themes that don’t sit easily. Let the visual messages compiled here poke and prod at your sensibilities.

Along with photographs that might bring a gasp and poignant paintings touching on difficult subjects, this group exhibition showcases artists’ humor. We laughed aloud as we considered several submissions. Not at the artists, but with the artist! Artists are translators of the world around us and the filterless message is easiest to consume when imparted with a witty tease attached. All in all, in this group exhibition, there is a sweet ratio of sincere “This is what I see in the world” art objects and clever “Can you believe what we are seeing in the world?!” type of artwork.

We turned down many really excellent submissions only because we couldn’t see them as part of the larger group context. What we ended up with is a compilation of evocative art works that range vastly in not just message, but also media and technique. Congratulations to all of the artists whose work we selected! And THANK YOU to each of you who submitted your artworks to this process. It was a pleasure to sit with, examine and interpret your unfiltered expressions of your singular time and place.

Thank you to the moon and back to the most patient, encouraging and super-organized Robin Hirsch-Steinhoff and to all of the Art Saint Louis team. It has been a pleasure and a great privilege to participate in this process."

— Sarah Hermes Griesbach
Executive Editor and Co-Founder of All The Art

"Art moves. As someone enters a gallery and views a work of art, that person’s ability to be free of it depends on the work’s capacity to ensnare. Art that somehow holds the viewer does so without hands that grab or without knowing all the possible triggers a person possesses. It exists as a work that reflects the zeitgeist or the feelings of the artist. What I experienced reviewing these works speak to the artist’s ability to grab and have me consider their work fully.
I was honored to be invited to select works that would be included in "#nofilter." After some framing from Art Saint Louis, I allowed the art work to reach me. I heard the critiques of politics and witnessed experimentation. I also viewed art that reflected the patience of its maker, the plans of its designer. With so many strong offerings, Sarah Hermes Griesbach and I still had the job of determining which works would make "#nofilter" show.
Like anyone, I’m drawn to the beautiful. I’m also drawn to bold, daring statements on where art is going. A fundamental part of how I evaluate works is its use for everyday life. What does the art tell me about myself or Sarah or viewers to come? What is it about the technique, the mastery, the novelty, the honesty of the work? How long have I been viewing this work? Does it reveal the reason I stopped moving? Works that grabbed me and offered me questions to consider I selected. Then Sarah and I looked for agreement where we could and shaped this show.
"#nofilter" is a show without apology or explanation, just art that speaks languages understood by some and foreign to others. Perhaps these works will speak to you."

—MK Stallings
Founder of UrbArts
 

Some of the 49 artworks featured in #nofilter:

Janel Peyton, Pevely, MO. "A World Within." 2016. Photograph, Double Exposure, Digital Image on Canvas, 30”x40”. $800.	Eric Baggett, St. Louis, MO. "Rapture." 2016. Photograph, Archival Digital Print on Paper, 25.75”x29.25”. $600.	AWG, Moberly, MO. "KFC." 2015. Spray Paint, Acrylic, Wood, 28.5”x41.5”. $600.
Marlene Lewis, Webster Groves, MO. "Make Cats Great Again." 2016. Mixed Media, 36”x36”. Not for Sale.	Lawrence Duffy, St. Charles, MO. "Trumpkins." 2017. Napkin Dispenser, Label, $10 Bills, 4.5”x7.25”x10.25”. $250.	Neil Fitzpatrick, St. Louis, MO. "Fake News." 2017. Acrylic on Canvas, 14”x11”. $150.
Moonkyung Kim, St. Louis, MO. "Night-landscape." 2016. Mixed Media on Rice Paper, 38”x50”. $1,000.	Marilynne Bradley, Webster Groves, MO. "Je Suis Charlie." 2016. Watercolor on Paper, 15”x22”. $1,900.	Bob Rickert, Chesterfield, MO. "Missouri Penitentiary Number 22." 2016. Digital Photograph, 25”x29”. $350.
John Hanson, St. Louis, MO. "Woman Keeping the Balance." 2014. Acrylic on Canvas, 24”x18”. $640.	Caroline Yoo, St. Louis, MO. "I Am Not Your Asian Fuck Toy: Meelee." 2016. Digital Photograph, 59”x44." Not for Sale.	C. Bryce Ramming, St. Louis, MO. "Elle." Acrylic, Colored Pencil, Ink on Paper, 36”x54”. $1,800.