Installation shots of Project Space at Harmon Art Lab (Dec/Jan 2012)

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Opening reception/continued events for Harmon Art Lab exhibit

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The opening reception on Friday, December 9th had a healthy turnout. I saw lots of people I knew or knew about, and got to the chance to discuss at length my installation piece and the process involved. It was good for Peter and his work as well - the first exhibit of paintings by this prolific man since May 2010.

More is being done to my site-specific piece since the response from that event. I am committed to bringing the whole project - which covers the walls and floor of a whole room - to the point of being as distilled and clear as possible. Detailed documentation is being conducted all along the way!

It takes a village (of Art hosts)

During the month of November, I attended receptions for nine different art events in the DC area. That's more than what I can remember frequenting previously in a single month, yet it is just a fraction of what's happening. There are plenty of people who have the artist prospect here. Going to art shows on a regular basis (the people, the places, the artist's work) is fun!

Paintings on a new theme are underway

Work for a new cluster of paintings on canvas has begun. They are an assortment of images sprouted from the theme of Place/Memory. They are different to my paintings from the previous 3 years in that they: (A) don't feature characters or prominent figures, just representations of various locations that build a narrative aspect, and (B) are built up exclusively by drawing and texture. One of the ambitions in the production is to combine (in layers) a medley of the techniques which I've explored newly over the past year. We'll know how they look after several of them are complete, so stay tuned.



Finding out where the new idea goes.








After the conclusion of open studio - 10/23/11




Sessions for new work - 10/2011.

"A Happy Ending" features 37 artists online

I have just seen the first online visual art exhibition I like.
'Kudos' is what I'd like to say. 'High five!'

If there's going to be a countless amount of them, well then it's nice to have some favor.

D. Beasley, Curator of Marco Polo arts mag in Atlanta, has just published an exhibition for the literary arts journal. Here is the link.

Scrolling down the page, one finds a single image by each of the 37 artists. In the sore lack of plastic construction in contemporary art, it was a welcome surprise to see many images that had traces of fine visual tactility. That's aside from a bit of kinkiness in some of the subject matter. I liked the piece Untited, by Jieun Kim: a graphite and ink on Korean paper, which created lovely echos of the feelings I have for Persian miniature painting. The theme of the exhibit is connected to the genius film titan Francois Truffaut. Nice tag! (if titled-related only).


Untitled, by Jieun Kim

D.C. artists get Zoë Charlton

Thanks to Zoë Charlton for visiting my 14th Street studio last week. At the time - we recently bumped into each other at the Hamiltonian Gallery, it had been a good few years since we last had a good talk.

We wasted no time in getting into discussion. We talked about community, teaching and the city of Baltimore, as related to artists and art worlds. I shared things about some of my work that's currently on exhibit with Harmon Arts Lab or in New York City. I also showed her my prints from this past winter. The print below struck her. It happened to be one of my juxtaposition images, in this case, combining construction machinery and sculpture. I think she liked the ambiguity of it. Nevertheless, she referred to it in an email as the 'truck print'.

Joren Lindholm
"While We Sleep"
monotype, 2010, 22" x 30"

Crit Participation

CRITIQUE sponsored by The Studio Visit (#4)
July 27, 2011, WEDNESDAY, 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.
Pleasant Plains Workshop
2608 Georgia Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20001

I will be one of four DC artists who will present recent work at this event. Randall Scott of Randall Scott Projects gallery (formerly based in Brooklyn, NY) is scheduled as the guest critic.

Photos and other details are at The Studio Visit's events page. Pink Line Project published a feature on TSV's critique sessions, described as "corporate brainstorming", two months ago.

Print Sessions - Research Done in Spontaneous Mode (video)

On June 2, 2011, I was filmed by photographer Tara Kocourek at the Pyramid Atlantic Art Center in Silver Spring, MD during one of my mono-type printing sessions.

Tara has an interest in artists, and for some time has been one herself. I was asked to be the subject of her documentary right there and then; I accepted and 15 minutes later the filming began. What resulted is a pointed glimpse of my working methods and state, intertwined with some nice shots of the studio space and material. In this instance I was making a draft version of an image interpreting an urban space that I know.

The filming was followed up by an interview which probed the theme of overcoming artistic ruts (which is supposed to be of local interest in DC?). This is heard in the voice-over.

Many thanks to Tara for the collaboration, and for what she brought to the table; she's very dedicated. Created during Bill Gentile's Backpack Journalism Workshop. Filmed on Canon 5D Mark ii, 24-70mm.

Pressed from tarakfoto on Vimeo.

"Creative Processe: Four Artists' Expressions Through Uniquely Different Mediums"

Sondra Arkin, Patrick Hughes,
Natasha Karpinskaia and Eve Stockton

Long View Gallery
1234 9th Street NW, Washington, DC 20001
June 23 - July 24, 2011: Wed-Sat 11-6; Sun 12-5; by Appnt
Opening Reception: Thursday, June 23, 6:30-8:30

Art viewers and gallery hoppers once again packed the floor space at the Long View Gallery for tonight's opening reception of Creative Processe. In terms of outlook (as well as subject and technique), the work collected for this exhibit really jumps around. That which holds it together, as suggested by the title of the show, was slow to reveal itself. Yet by the time I left (and after a number of zoom-in's), I had quite a few surprises which brought me in to the work of all four artists. Eve Stockton's woodcut prints, however, and possibly due to memetic qualities, had the most immediate impact.


Eve Stockton's woodcuts





Sondra Arkin's newest work

Lottery Winner -- Prints!

For my last Open Studio, I decided to create a lottery - a free monotype print giveaway.

"Being Swayed" was created spontaneously last fall during one of my printmaking sessions; and then months later it was given finishing touches with black gouache, while hanging in the hallway of a Chelsea building, very late at night during my stay in Manhattan for the installation of the PINY no. 5 show. The print is in an addition of five, courtesy of Supreme Digital Services in Brooklyn, NY.

The winner is Justin Orlando Fair of the Gateway Arts Center, Brentwood, MD.

Review of Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez

'Abstractions'

by Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez

"Q" Street Gallery (2015 Q Street NW #2, Washington, D.C. zip: 20009)

It is right here that I make an exception to one of the rules of blogging: avoid writing on past-based events. Alas, I will recommit to that.........after I write about Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez' opening of artworks entitled Abstractions, about which - as I just discovered - nothing has been previously written. Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez, currently based in Washington DC, is having a series of openings in the same location in throughout 2010, of which Abstractions is a highlight. For more info go to: www.carloscreatesart.com

For an artist proclaimed to be proficient in the culinary arts, Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez also knows the ingredients of visual art quite well. The selections (all works on paper) were presented in a private home/gallery located in Dupont Circle; they were available for viewing by appointment and at the reception for the public, which was in June. Nearly one half of them were gouache paintings that were beautiful and dynamic (mostly done in red, purple, blue & black like the one above); the other half were drawings done in black & white media, a wide variety of scale (two of them taking up most of the wall) and in the style of the two works below. The function of Muñoz-Jimenez's work, as cited by the exhibit's press release, is to 'represent the imagination at its most creative and abstract form, inviting the viewer to an in depth conversation'.



An online event announcement mentioned about the public reception that 'the artist will be present for engaging and thoughtful conversation'. That turned out to be accurate, at least the unqualified conversation part. The artist was there making conversation and answering questions. Amidst a dialog with him, a young budding political artist (who also paints) was asking Muñoz-Jimenez lots of questions. This person seemed committed to uncover an agenda/intent, by way of the artist, that could be evidently relayed through information displayed in the work. I think the searcher left unsatisfied. Maybe all the probing had missed an explanation that lies on the surface: abstraction exists by itself with little to no output tailored to our world, yet can resonate with any input we bring to it - from pure tactile sensation to didactic and political reverie.

Exhibits by Carlos Muñoz-Jimenez being held now as well as later in 2010, at Q Street Gallery, include 'Illuminated Concepts' and 'Botanical Illustrations'.

Open Studios at new 'Mid City' Location

Washington D.C.'s Mid City Artists Open Studios took place on Sat, May 22nd & Sun, May 23rd 2010; it featured 27 participants, 5 new members and a whole plethora of work.

(from l to r: Joren Lindholm, David Peterson, Hannah Naomi Kim, Thomas Drymon)

Featured throughout the whole 2nd floor studio was the work of my studio colleagues Thomas Drymon, Hannah Naomi Kim, David Peterson as well as mine. Most of the art I displayed were framed oil colors which I made throughout 2009 and a few new ones from this year. In addition to that there were one or two viewer surprises, including a wall installation of drawings that I had done in different styles. My work has been described as 'surprising humor and irony, and emotive fields of color alternating with lyrical imagery'.

view of 'Isabella Etruscan' and 'Stationary Girl' (photo: Kim Vu)

Among the hundreds of attendees were a number of french families (painting appreciators invited through a local french mothers' network), people from the fitness center, staff members from DC Commission on the Arts, art & culture critics from The Washington Post, fellow area artists and lots of friends and local professionals. Also making the rounds were photographers from ReadySetDC and Borderstan. Within the two weeks that followed, Tom, Hannah, David and myself were each the subject of online artist features. See mine via the Logan-area Borderstan blog, here.

We have been at 1716 14th Street NW #2 (between R & S Streets) since February. Consequently, in conversing with some of the open studio visitors we found out some locals knew more about the building (and former occupants) than we had up to that point.

(photo: Liz Medina Chiomenti)

The event was relief-inducing for me; it completed a period of transition that started in February, when I moved out of my former space at Takoma Park's A.Salon building, subsequently readjusting to and customizing the new one. It was a busy springtime, in the middle of which I was completing and framing the 12 pieces which I contributed to Tom's premier group show at Dupont Circle's Studio Gallery.

View of Tom Drymon out back from my window (photo: Kim Vu)

We do this twice a year.

Our next Open Studios event (in the same location) is November 6th & 7th, 2010.

My Review of Jim Condron

A Space Within: Self as Landscape, Landscape as Self
March 10 - April 8, 2010
Paintings by Jim Condron
Review by Joren A. Lindholm

Post fed at: Bourgeon online on April 26, 2010.

Last month I headed up to the Cafritz Center at Montgomery College’s Takoma Park/Silver Spring campus to view the work of painter Jim Condron. Not knowing the campus and having never heard of the artist, landscape was all I had to go by. It doesn't take long to realize that there is a sea of ordinary landscape painting in the world and that’s how I envisioned this exhibition. As it turned out, however, Condron is no painting monkey. A Space Within: Self as Landscape, Landscape as Self was arresting for me as I recognized aspects of my own experience, startlingly reflected in the paintings of someone else.

Entering the space, I was greeted by many oil paintings, ranging from large to small, hung in several open-ended corridors threading throughout the large gallery space. These paintings are harmonious—direct and clear with a wise use of the elements. They unfold slowly with a sophistication of light and ambiance. Not every one was a winner, yet the smaller works were the show’s highlight. Framing images of gardens that could be the artist's backyard, they were quite moving in their ability to amplify quiet places and assert themselves center stage. Furthermore, the undeniable glow in their illumination, a result of his intelligently-mediated color and tone, reminded me of the sensation of arriving in a new country and taking in what I saw. The pieces depicting environments at night had an equally invigorating kind of light. Not bad for hues assigned to plants, soil, and trees. Could these subjects be the ones at or near his Baltimore home?

Several large canvases featured houses injected into the backyard image which he refers to as “structures” on his website (www.jcondron.com). In these works, Condron's mark seems to take the lead, commanding the surface geometry and employing more dynamics than the charmingly and uniformly limp hand he uses in his small canvases. The ambition with large-scale was nice to see, yet I was disappointed with how the architecture dispelled the transporting effect that the whole show had going for it, leaving those pictures relatively anomalous by their localization.

In the same gallery, there was an exhibition of optical-effect-driven sculpture and painting (mostly with thin stripes, as I recall) by Delaware artist Dennis Beach, titled “On and Off the Wall.” Those works were installed throughout the other end of the space (yes, the Cafritz Art Center was raised in the new millenium, so it is big) and amounted to a sobering glance and go, in stark contrast to Condron’s economy of means.

Next Exhibition - Curated Group Show

It was my pleasure one sunny Saturday afternoon last October to be introduced to quite a number of new faces amongst a DC art-going crowd. Just an hour before I had walked over to Nevin Kelly Gallery, at its then Columbia Heights location, to attend an artist talk for 'Dark Matter', an exhibition of DC artist Ellyn Weiss' most recent work. Before leaving I spoke at length with Thomas Drymon, who a few months later would organize, curate and promote the first in a series of group exhibitions to feature local DC artists. Before Thanksgiving, he gave me a call to ask me if I wanted to be a part of it. I said yes, and through the winter and into spring experienced working with him on very open-minded terms in planning my work selections for the successful group exhibit, 'Only What You Can Carry with You'.

Since premiering at Dupont Circle's Studio Gallery, Tom's venture and first exhibit featuring James Cassell, Peter E. Harper, myself and Zade Ramsey has gotten a great amount of coverage. Ellyn Weiss has written about it for her own blog (www.eweissart.com/index.php/News/) and for the Pink Line Project (www.pinklineproject.com); and the show was covered in the Friday art column of the Washington Post. There were hundreds of first-time viewers at the April 2nd Friday opening reception, which fueled profiles for each artist. Below are some photos of my work taken at the opening.





Tom selected four of my paintings, and eight collages for inclusion. The paintings represented my most recent work, which has bold color, starkly contrasting with the subdued appearances of the collages. Among the works on canvas was my most metaphorically layered piece to date, a two-panel, quasi-diptych developed throughout 2009 entitled 'The Traveler and the Travel'. Jessica Dawson, art critic for The Washington Post writes, "Lindholm's disjointed imagery really works. The panels (of the above mentioned) are united in some ways and not in others, mirroring the ambiguities of contemporary life."




Thomas Drymon is a freelance designer, painter and curator, currently based in Washington DC. Tom states that his aim is to showcase for the public work with a developmental and inquisitive nature, and made by artists who have had five years or more out of school. "Three exhibitions are planned each year at traditional and nontraditional spaces and are intended to introduce low to mid-priced works," he says. To learn more about his ideas and catch his second and third exhibitions for 2010, visit www.thomasdrymonselects.com. To access the original Style section coverage, go to the bottom of this Washington Post article.