Text and photos by Robert Kokenyesi, Ceramic Artist, Beachfront Pottery, Godfrey, IL USA
The MySlart organization is a collection of artists living in the greater St Louis area, representing every media and styles you can find in the St Louis area. Once a month a juried exhibit is hosted by MySlart at the Old Orchard Gallery in the town of Webster Groves, which is a suburb of St Louis. The exhibit gathers works from 33 artists, so the exhibit is titled 33 and the name of the month.
In the past few years my ceramic pieces have been juried into several of these exhibits, but when I moved to Godfrey in 2014 I stopped applying while I reestablished my studio. To restart exhibiting in the gallery I applied a few weeks ago, and got juried into the 33August exhibit. It was a sort of homecoming for me to drive an hour to Webster Groves. The space was all familiar, and some of the exhibiting artists also looked familiar.
The venue
This is the entry way to the Old Orchard Gallery in Webster Groves, MO. In the old days there was a cupcake store next door, and now it’s a spa. As you enter, the exhibit space is to the right of the door.
New pieces
These are new pieces, experiments you might say, that were juried into the 33August exhibit. The “Shark Valentine” is a wall decoration framed on a canvas panel. I tried to model teeth of the great white shark into a heart shape. The shark teeth on the “Friendly Seastar” represents the surprising nature of some of the creatures in the ocean.
Installation pics
These pictures were taken during the installation. What you see here is that artists take command of their wall spaces, and put up their artworks. I got to borrow for the exhibit two pedestals, because I had two sculptural works, and one wall hanging.
Opening night
Here you see the “friendly Seastar” on the pedestal, and the framed “Shark Valentine” on the wall.
The visitors on opening night; on the right you see my third piece on the pedestal all the way in the back.
Here is my third piece in the exhibit. This is “Ancient Shark, II”. The conical support was a struggle to construct, but now I can exhibit horizontally stretched sculptures on a stable support. That story is coming up in a blog post soon.
The exhibit is on till September 12!!!