#FirstFriday: Must-See August Exhibitions

Every month we highlight exhibitions, events, and workshops that feature WSW alumnx artists! We share the shows near and far that make up our monthly must-see list.

New York

Aurora Brush (Studio Intern ’19 and Fellow ’21) and founder of Cosmic Dog House Press is hosting A Content Release & Summer Celebration at Blackbird Infoshop on Friday August 4th from 5:30 PM – 9:00 PM. Come by and get some fun zines, posters, books and more! and there will be free tarot readings with Shea In The Catskills, as well as poetry readings by The Wassailin Collective!

Damali Abrams (Right Now! Production Grant ’20 and Studio Residency Grant ’22) has work in the exhibition Free Your Mind, an art exhibition conceived and curated by Shenna Vaughn. The show will be on view through September 1st, and the gallery will be open Monday-Sunday 10-6 PM at Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning.

Pennsylvania

There is a Pittsburgh Art Book Fair Preview at The Miller ICA which will be up through September 3rd. The preview show is on Carnegie Mellon University’s campus, at the Miller Institute of Contemporary Art. Concurrently, Miller is hosting the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh’s 109th Annual Show: Transcendental Arrangements, organized and juried by Miller ICA director Elizabeth Chodos.

“The Pittsburgh Art Book Fair (PABF) is a free annual event to celebrate printed matter with local, national, and international exhibitors. PABF will showcase a range of printed material made by Pittsburgh and non-Pittsburgh artists, and connect communities through artist books, zines, small presses, and collective publishing.”

The Pittsburgh Art Book Fair will take place on September 9 & 10. It is hosted and co-presented by the Carnegie Museum of Art. The fair has been put together by 5 Co-Directors: Caroline Kern, Chas Wagner, Emma Honcharski, Mary Tremonte (Studio Residency Grant ’19), and Jacquelyn Johnson.

Missouri

Amy Cousins (SAI Instructor ’23) and Ruben Castillo have a two person show called All Modes Are Open To Us. The exhibition is at the Kansas City Public Library- Central Library 14 W. 10th St. in Guldner Gallery, which is on the 1st floor. There is an artist talk for the exhibition, which can be accessed here.

Vermont

Anina Major (Studio Residency Grant ’21) has a solo show up at the Brattleboro Museum. The show is titled I Land Therefore I Am and is curated by Sadaf Padder. The exhibition will be up until October 9th. When discussing her work, Major says “By utilizing the language of craft to retain a sense of belonging, my work exists at the intersection of nostalgia and identity. It is a continued celebration and reclamation of the creativity of “women’s work.” Layering references to postcolonial realities, cultural commodification, feminism, and migration, the abstract nature of the work straddles the traditional and the contemporary realms.”

New Mexico

Mikayla Patton (SAI Instructor ’23) has a solo show entitled On The Back Road – which opens on August 11th, and will be up through September 9th at the Chiaroscuro Contemporary Art Gallery in Santa Fe, NM. There will be an opening reception of August 18th from 5-7 PM. On the Back Road brings together both two and three dimensional abstract pieces made with handmade paper and assorted mixed media, which navigate a delicate balance between vulnerability and protection, fragility and strength.

Florida

Hannah O’Hare Bennett (Art-in-Ed Workspace Residency ’19) has a solo show up at Dunedin Fine Art Center called Recede. The show will be on view through August 13th 2023. “With a background in printmaking, Bennett’s organic mixed media works may be encountered as weavings, collages and/or sculptures. All reflect a creative curiosity that honors the natural world through her textures, palette and materials.”

California

Beth Fein (Studio Workspace Residency ’17) has work in a group exhibition in Oakland, CA called Summer Salon at the Gray Loft Gallery. The exhibition will be up through August 26th, and there will be a closing reception on Saturday, August 26, from 4 – 6:30 PM.

Virtual

Faythe Levine (Hauser & Wirth Institute Archivist for Women’s Studio Workshop), has a written piece on The MACR Papers, entitled The Dotted Line (Desktop Version). The “MACR is how the MA in Critical Craft Studies, the first low-residency graduate program focused on critical craft studies, was known at Warren Wilson College, Swannanoa, NC. Taking our cue from MoMA Librarian David Senior, we are thinking of “publications [as] archival documents of actual spaces or happenings that become […] emblematic of a certain hospitality to new forms of art and expression.”” To learn more about the MACR Papers, please check out their website here!