Blake O'Brien

Come to Below Grand’s fundraiser exhibition, Club Bar, organized by @marsgraziano this Saturday from 5-9. Lots of artwork will be raffled off, including this drawing. @samuelcguy made a roulette wheel, @bradleympaintings and @nf_nf_nf_nf_nf made a pool table, and @dan_gausman made a tilt-a-maze game. Entry gets you five raffle tickets and five play tokens, which give you the chance to win more raffle tickets. The vibe will be immaculate. An “illegal basement casino” feeling will be in the air. People might start smoking inside. Anything could happen. All proceeds go to gallery reno help them!! And @tuliomarcino ’s show will be opening on the Orchard st side which will be the LAST show at the Orchard location !! Huge deal Untitled; ink on found Indian ledger paper, book cloth, wood, tinted plexi, nails, string; 18x13”; 2026

Hi me and rob (@painterly_prince ) are participating in Ridgewood open studios this weekend, all day Saturday and Sunday. 556 Onderdonk. Going to grill in the backyard when it’s not raining. Come see a bunch of my unfinished paintings and maybe even some finished paintings if I feel like unwrapping them (I will). There’s a kickoff show Friday night @lorimotogallery which will have the drawing in the 2nd slide. Get a map to visit all the participating artists @ridgewoodopen hope to see you there 🤑

British Museum; oil paint, wood, bleached and dyed cotton, pennies and Merry Christmas to all including the Radical Left Scum

Haleigh Collins Isaiah Schwartz Ellie Lyn Cook Cole Beaune Blake O'Brien Odette Steinert “Perceptions” is the third of three shows planned for this season in the downstairs space. Each exhibition is a group of early-career artists that associate with one another. Last fall the artists Kathleen Kucka and Janis Stemmermann showed their work in the gallery. This exhibit was their second two-person show. The first was at PS 122 in the East Village in the early 1990’s. They have been art friends for over 40 years. An extraordinarily important aspect of being an artist is the close friends that you move through life with. Often these friends have seen almost all of your work. They are your backup memory. They give context and legitimize your history. They are witnesses to your agonies and your joys. They give you support when the process of being an artist is hard and unforgiving. When I am in my studio, and the world is not particularly interested in my personal experiments or thoughts, I think, “My friend is in their studio working on their art.” I have solidarity. I have community. I asked Odette, who is Janis’s daughter, to bring her art friends into the gallery. My hope is that in 20, or 30, or 40, years they will show together again. My larger hope is that they find solace in one another. @col_bon @immaculate__confection @ellielyncook @blake_obrien @odette.steinert @haleighc___

If you’re in the Hudson area tomorrow, please join us at the Re Institute in Millerton for the opening of Perceptions, a group show of painting, sculpture, and poetry organized by @odette.steinert W/ work by Haleigh Collins @haleighc___ Isaiah Schwartz @immaculate__confection Ellie Lyn Cook @ellielyncook Cole Beaune @col_bon Odette Steinert @odette.steinert And me Thank you Odette🌞 @the_re_instititute Pictured: Yamaha Apse; oil, acrylic, Yupo, linen, staples, and wood; 38x69”; 2025

Wunderbett, 80x58”, oil, dry pastel, bedsheet, canvas, wood, bed parts Up now at St. Kate Arts in Milwaukee as part of Signs of Life, curated by @franciscookgallery

Manuscript of spectral debris, 50x40”, oil, watercolor, inkjets, book page, paper, tape, so on

Positive Hand, 50x40”, oil, acrylic, inkjet transfer, reflective Mylar, Yupo, gesso, canvas

Museum (Ladder), 94x33x2”, oil paint, mylar, linen, canvas, wood, and staples, 2021-2024. Hard to photograph—if you want to come by and see it in person lmk

Apse (Britney); oil paint, inkjet prints, staples, linen, wood; 38x69”; 2021-2024 with details and screenshots of its previous states

Manuscript thing

Herma (Anyone Can Grow Roses) on view in A Secret Theater at @greene__house until March 4th. Hermae were Ancient Greek apotropaic columnar sculptures of Hermes’ head and penis and balls and no other discerning features (slide 6). (The genitals were how you knew it was Hermes). They were placed along travel routes and at entryways of cities and homes as protection against evil spirits, etc. Aside from being an interesting form for many reasons, Hermae are one example among thousands of an object that was meaningful and purposeful to its respective culture beyond either practical utility or investment return. My hermae—and most of the rest of my paintings—are an effort to make objects that aspire to this kind of larger purpose but know they can’t achieve it. Rather than spiritual or cultural value, our objects are imbued with market value, which results in an inner life—for us and the objects—too caustic for both to coexist. Culture has been replaced by commodity; the soul by the job; the inner identity by the outward appearance. Culture is cultivation. The museum and auction house are culture’s cemetery. Capital and culture are at odds with one another and capital is winning and humanity is failing. Not to be dramatic