Flow, by Kim René, Opens 1st Saturday Art Crawl, November 3rd

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Untitled, Acrylic on Aluminum, 12″ x 12″

Next up, solo exhibition by studio artist, Kim René. Opening reception is Saturday, November 3rd, 6-9pm. Artist talk 7:15pm.

“Flow” is a collection of paintings created out of my desire to accentuate, even zone-in, on the fluidity of nature. When asked, “What inspires you?” I immediately want to shout out–  like from a mountain– “Nature, but of course!” I’m especially spellbound by the motion that happens within waterfalls, icebergs and molten lava. Not only am I moved by natural wonders of the world, the clouds and mist that surround us in our daily atmosphere deeply intrigue me as well. Capturing even the smallest characteristics of this personal obsession with nature’s liquids, drives me experientially and passionately. Experimenting with varied paint viscosity, mediums & canvas substrates helps recreate the expansive and emotional feelings that this aspect of nature provokes within me.  –Kim René

Rhythm and Rush, Best in Show–Noémie Jennifer

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Noémie Jennifer: Onrush

 

Sincerest thanks to all the artists that participated in our 6th Annual Exhibition juried by Catherine Haggarty, “Rhythm and Rush.” Catherine had a record number of images, over 350, to consider for inclusion in this show. She chose 22 amazing artists whose art hangs harmoniously on the walls of Ground Floor Gallery– with the help of Art Handlers, Naomi Barlett, Georganna Greene and Erin Murphy– now through October 20th. Also big thanks to all that came out to the opening and “cast” their vote for Best in Show, so many great works did made it very difficult to choose!

Please help us Congratulate Noémie Jennifer, whose work “Onrush” represents the unnoticeable “shifting, flowing, eroding, firing” of the “mind, body, and natural landscape.” We look forward to seeing what she creates her solo exhibition Summer 2019!

Congrats to Rhythm & Rush Artists!

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image: WAVE, by Gyan Shrosbree 35″ X 25″, acrylic paint, glitter, plastic jewels, thread on canvas, 2017

Help us congratulate the 22 artists, our Juror, Catherine Haggarty, selected for our upcoming 6th Annual Juried Exhibition, Rhythm & Rush:

Padmavathy Rajendran
Benjamin Pritchard 
David McDonough 
Thank you to all the artists that applied, we had a record number of submissions this year!
We are already busy getting the gallery ready to receive and install these works AND have gotten images that were submitted to DropBox to David King at Extended Play so he can begin working on our art book–it’s going to be an amazing gift for Catherine! They are still available for pre-order and purchase here.
We’d also like to thank those that helped us get the word out: Bay Area Art Grind, BURNAWAY, Art and Art Deadlines, Chicago Artist Resource, Glasstire, Entry Thingy, Wooloo, Art-3000, Facebook, Instagram, twitter, NY Crit Club, Catherine Haggarty, NYFA, ArtATL, CAA, Google, and all those friends and family of Ground Floor–Thank you!!
Opening will be Saturday, September 8th from 6-9pm we can’t wait to see who will be our next Soloist!

“My Own Worst Enemy” and Hurry–last day to submit to Rhythm and Rush

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Ground Floor opens another show August 2018 curated by one of our studio mates Matt Christy, see below for more info and don’t forget TODAY, July 15th, is the last day to apply for our open call Rhythm and Rush, juried by Catherine Haggarty

My Own Worst Enemy will run July 25-Aug 18, 2018

Opening Reception: Saturday, August 4, 2018 6-9pm

My Own Worst Enemy, curated by Matt Christy, opens August 4th during the Art Crawl and will feature some of his work and emerging artists Lindsey Campbell, Joe Christy, Kevin Dietz, Chris Worth. The exhibition formally opens with a Reception with most of the artists in attendance August 4, 2018 6-9pm. By appointment otherwise.

My Own Worst Enemy brings together five artists who make paintings with a sense of history’s painful, heavy weight and of the self’s own thin, fragile place inside that discourse. These artists’ narratives and dramas suggest the extreme individualism of our times, along with all its problems and melancholies.—Matt Christy

Lindsey Campbell, Untitled, 16″x20’’, acrylic on canvas

Joe Christy, Bring Your Own, 4’x5’, acrylic on canvas

Art book pre-sale plus Q & A with Publisher RD King

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We are very excited to be partnering with local artist, RD King and Extended Play to create  an original art book that will document all the artists that submit to our 6th Annual Juried Exhibition–Rhythm and Rush. Deadline to submit is July 15th.

We will be presenting this book to our Juror, Catherine Haggarty, as a token of our gratitude and in honor of 2017 Juror Austin Thomas‘ words at the opening of Otherworldliness when she said she “could have created 20 shows” from all the amazing work that she reviewed. It is our hope that future shows, projects and relationships will be cultivated by this book.

Individual copies will be available for purchase through Extended Play, reserve your copy here.

Below is an interview to learn a bit more of David King’s process and inspiration by GfG Studio Artist, Sibley Barlow:

What got you started in publishing?

I’m interested in the personal, one-to-one exchange between artist and viewer. A book allows you to bypass the discomfort of experiencing art in a crowd of people at an art opening or a museum show. Reading an artist book puts you alone with the work, in a personal size that you can explore at your own pace.

I’ve been collecting artist books for a long time, and follow a number of small presses based out of other cities. I felt like a small artists book press was something that Nashville needed. Nashville has a strong history of galleries and independent artist spaces, but the exhibition can only be experienced during the run of the show. A book extends a body of work into a tangible object that can be viewed indefinitely.

Adapting artwork into a book format is a creative collaboration. Reading a book is an interactive experience for the viewer, so I like to include tactile, physical elements. When I was working with Jesse Butcher, I thought about how confrontational and subversive his photography feels. I decided to make a die-cut inset area in the pages of the last third of the book, leaving a hole, as though the book were a hollow Bible. Inside this hole I embedded a second, tiny handmade book of his more intimate line drawings.

Another artist, Jessica Wohl, is currently working with textiles. I designed her book to feel like a fabric swatch book that can be opened expansively, revealing many pages simultaneously as the views of her work zoom in and out.

What are you currently excited about in your art practice?

Book publishing hits an overlap between my interest in art and my interest in rebuilding machines. This comes out in my studio practice as well, I enjoy appropriating industrial machines for creative purposes. I’ve got an industrial plastic vacuum form machine that I’ve previously used to make crisp, white, large-scale work with found objects.

Currently I’m working on a series of original toys inspired by bootleg action figures, which will be encased in original handmade packaging, complete with accessories.

Are there any contemporary artists who are influences for you?

Richard Tuttle and John Gossage are both artists with extensive bodies of work who have also pushed the boundaries of what an artist’s book can be. I’ve also been collecting bootleg toys made by artists, such as ones by Mark Todd.

2018 Juried Show–Rhythm and Rush–Open Call!

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Moon Water, C. Haggarty, 16″ x 20″, Oil and Fluid Acrylic on Canvas, 2018

Click here to apply

Calling all artists, please submit your work to Ground Floor Gallery + Studios’ 6th Annual Juried Art Exhibition–Rhythm and Rush. We will be honored to have those submissions juried by Catherine Haggarty. As always, selected works will be chosen for the gallery show and a ‘Best of Show’ artist chosen from those will receive a solo exhibition. New this year, at least one image of ALL artists that submit will be included in a bound photo book Ground Floor presents to Haggarty as a gift.

–  Rhythm and Rush seeks to find work that provokes movement, atmosphere, and speed in both conceptual and formal ways within all media. The ways in which the picture frame is questioned, expanded or uniquely considered while being provocative, contemporary and personal are elements of this show concept. The juror, Catherine Haggarty is curious about the ways in which the speed of image consumption, and image promotion affects artists today – or the ways in which it does not affect them. Rhythm and Rush is an open consideration to the lens in which we all are living and working in. Slow, fast, static, haptic, and rhythmic can be presented in many ways – we are seeking works that touch on these ideas in very specific, sensitive and strong ways.

Final submission deadline is July 15th, 2018. Rhythm and Rush will run from September 1st-October 20th, 2018. Notification for inclusion in gallery show August 1st. Work needs to be delivered by August 15th, ready to hang.

Catherine Haggarty, b. 1984, is an artist, curator, and writer based in Brooklyn, New York. Haggarty earned her M.F.A from Mason Gross, Rutgers University in 2011 and is currently the co-director of Ortega y Gasset Projects in Brooklyn, New York.

Haggarty’s paintings & curatorial work has been reviewed & featured in Hyperallergic, Two Coats of Paint, Brooklyn Magazine, The New York Times, Maake Magazine, Art Maze Magazine, The Black and White Project (UK), Sound and Vision Podcast and Young Space.

Exhibiting nationally and internationally for a decade, select shows include: Leftfield Slo & Hashimoto Contemporary (CA), The Provincial (MI), Tripp Gallery (London), N2N Gallery (NYC), Bridge Productions (Seattle, WA), CGK Gallery (Copenhagen), Art on Paper Fair (Armory Week), Projet Pangee (Montreal), Paper Paris (France), Geoffrey Young Gallery (MA) and Design Sublime (Miami, FLA).

Solo shows include This Friday Next Friday (NYC), One River School of Art and Design, Proto Gallery (NJ) and Look e Listen in Marseille France.

Teaching experience includes but is not limited to Rutgers University, Abrons Art Center, Princeton Day School, Philadelphia Mural Arts and One River School of Art and Design.

In 2018 Haggarty was a lecturer at Penn State in their Anderson Lecture Series and in 2016 was the juror of The Boston Young Contemporaries New England MFA Exhibition at Boston University and she has been a guest critic at Nars Foundation, Residency Unlimited, The Wassaic Project, Abrons Center for the Arts and Trestle Projects in New York City.

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Select Podcast & Interviews:
Sound and Vision Podcast
Gorky’s Granddaughter
The Conversation Project
YoungSpace

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Click here to apply.

 

R&R Opens TONIGHT

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Jazz - MJQ view 1 by Gil Given Acrylic ~ 7' x 14

“Jazz MJQ”

RODS & RIBBONS
Solo exhibition featuring the work of Gil Given

Opens TONIGHT October 7th 6-9pm with artist reception

Ground Floor Gallery is pleased to present RODS & RIBBONS, a solo exhibition awarded to Nashville Artist, Gil Given, after being selected from our 5th Annual Juried Exhibition, Otherworldliness, as “Best in Show” by Austin Thomas, a NYC-based artist and community builder.

His most recent work, the ribbon paintings, leave the two-dimensional scope of the canvas and incorporate sculptural elements.

 

Rods and Ribbons coming soon…

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Jazz - MJQ view 1 by Gil Given Acrylic ~ 7' x 14

“Jazz MJQ”

Rods and Ribbons
Solo exhibition featuring the work of Gil Given

Opens October 7th 6-9pm with artist reception

Ground Floor Gallery is pleased to present Rods and Ribbons, a solo exhibition awarded to Nashville Artist Gil Given after being selected as “Best in Show” by Austin Thomas, a NYC-based artist and community builder.

His most recent work, the ribbon paintings, leave the two-dimensional scope of the canvas and incorporate sculptural elements.

October 2017

BARED opens Tonight

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“Lee’s Lace,” egg tempera on panel, 24″x18″, 2016 by Susan Jamison

“Who am I?” Bronze and etched mirror, 11x6x6, 2014 by Belgin Yucelen

Come see these lovely ladies, and many more TONIGHT between 6-9pm.

BARED based on the anthology, Les Femmes Folles: The Women 2015 curated and edited by Sally Deskins, explores the gendered narratives that clothe and fashion the body as well as gender subversion and the traditional male gaze and will feature the following artists:

Kathy Crabbe, Courtney Kenny Porto, Libby Rowe, Chuka Susan Chesney, Stacy Howe, Teresa Dunn, Cathy Sarkowsky, Bonnie Gloris, Rosemary Meza-DesPlas, Susan Jamison, Susan DetroyEvelyn Katz, Belgin Yucelen, Suzanne Proulx, Lauren Rinaldi, Amy Cerra

 

No. Inc. presents Art of the South 2017

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“d’evils (these MFs)” Lester Merriweather

 

X no.5 (Honey Bees, Honey & Salt) Brent Dedas

 

We are pleased to be hosting our region’s annual Art of the South, presented by NUMBER: Inc., a quarterly visual arts journal hailing from Memphis with coverage throughout AL, AR, FL, GA, KY, LA, MD, MO, MS, NC, OK, TN, TX, SC, VA, or WV.

Join us Saturday, June 3rd, 6-9pm for a show that appears to be a cross-section of the contemporary rippling of art scenes across the southern region.

This show was curated by Mark Scala, Chief Curator at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts. Scala received an MA in in art history and MFA in painting from Virginia Commonwealth University. Having spent the better part of his life painting, Mark is himself an artist. His interests and exhibitions have focused on representations of the body in contemporary art.

There are 28 artists displaying at Ground Floor Gallery + Studios and the L Ross Gallery in Memphis simultaneously.

Artists showing at GfG include:

Amelia Briggs, a painter who has recently been working on bulbous “inflatable” appearing surfaces. Amelia has definite interests in children’s imagery and expression.

Brent Dedas, works in mixed media and recalls the intensity of abstract expressionists. His work explores dichotomies such as science and art, or destruction and creation.

Donald Furst, a printmaker who depicts architectural scenes at night. Many of his compositions focus on interiors that include an opening door.

Jaime Johnson, a photographer currently teaching at Ole Miss. Using cyanotype photography, she explores female identity.

John Jackson, a figural painter drawing from the neo-expressionists. His paintings center around our current relationship with technology. The work represented in this show differs greatly from this and marks his way into abstraction.

Joseph Holsapple, an artist who makes still life paintings of domestic items. He fills his images with childhood objects and leaves bits of the image unfinished, evoking the nature of memory.

Katherine Wagner, a pattern-based painter who takes cues from the loud patterned fashion of the 80’s. Much of her work is based on personal childhood experiences with visual pattern.

Lauren Yandell, an artist who works in graphite, collage, and installation while finding a balance between nature and geometry. She marries realism with the raw quality of drawing.

Lester Merriweather, an artist and curator that works in collage. Lester focuses his attention on racial relationships, capitalism, consumerism, and the myriad of ways these things intersect.

Michael Nichols, creates unearthly portraits using buon fresco, air brush, and silverpoint. His curiosity in introducing old and ancient mediums to contemporary art is reflected in the ghostly images he creates.

Victoria Tinsley, works in both sculpture and painting, creates surreal figures that morph into and out of each other.

Virgil (Cayse) Cheatham, a graduate of Yale University who currently lives in Atlanta, GA. He divides his time between creating erie landscaped-based paintings and working at the Zuckerman Museum.

If you can’t make it to the opening night of Art of the South, stop by during our regular gallery hours to check it out! We will be open Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays, 5-8pm.