for the opening of the latest installment of its popular “Kansas City Flatfile” show.
Scope it out Friday night, and plan to return to peruse dozens of drawings, paintings, prints and photographs housed in flat file cabinets.
It’s a great place to find affordable art and support local talent — selections range from works by established artists including
Johnny Naugahyde, Deanna Dikeman, Larry Thomas and Garry Noland, to recent Art Institute graduates such as Luke Firle, Cory Imig and Matt Jacobs.
A changing selection of works from the Flatfile will appear on the gallery walls. The first group will be chosen by Block Artspace staff; after that director Raechell Smith has invited various regional arts professionals, curators and artists to pick works for display.
“This is always an opportunity for me to get curators to commit some time to looking at art by Kansas City artists,” she said, “and there are some new folks in the region.”
For this year’s Flatfile, Smith has added an exhibit in the second floor resource room. “Flatfile Redux” will feature a selection of works from Kansas City collections that were acquired from previous Flatfiles.
“It’s a fun way to highlight and encourage collecting and see what’s in people’s collections,” Smith said.
The 2012 Kansas City Flatfile will also feature a “Videofile,” of works viewers can choose to screen.
‘Neutral Space’The
Spray Booth Gallery has framed “Neutral Space,” its coming group show of geometric art, with a provocative essay by 2010 Kansas City Art Institute graduate Neil Thrun.
Headed “Neutral spaces, Empty Geometry: Why All Artists Need to Re-engage With Ideology,” the essay examines some of the critical ideas and positions expounded by geometric artists, from Kasimir Malevich to Peter Halley, to the Slovenian IRWIN collective.
It’s an area that Thrun has been interested in since he was in school, where he created works of geometric painting and collage. Now, he said, “I mainly do video and performance-based art involved with the history of the avant-garde and the 20th century.”
“Neutral Space” will include works by 14 artists, including
Emily Sall, Elliot Oliver, Mike Erickson and Nicole Mauser, selected by Spray Booth director Andrew Lyles.
Lyles, a former classmate of Thrun’s, invited him to write two essays for the show.
The artists had not been chosen at the time Thrun wrote his initial essay, in which he contends, “Unlike the history of geometric art in the avant-garde, today no one in Kansas City seems interested in the ideology of their predecessors.”
Thrun argues that “our culture of individualism has killed the will to be ideological (to take a stand),” and that “artists need to re-engage with ideology.”
“Otherwise,” he warns, “we will be stuck making neutral spaces, work that is ideologically empty and without consequence, while drinking free alcohol and half-heartedly congratulating each other.”
The essay in its entirety is posted on the gallery’s website,
sprayboothgallery.com, where Thrun will eventually post his second essay addressing the specific artists — and works in the show.
Kemper at the CrossroadsNew York artist
Petah Coyne’s mammoth sculpture, “Untitled #1336 (Scalapino Nu Shu)” (2009-10), the centerpiece of a recent permanent collection exhibit at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, has a new home. On Friday, it can be seen at its new location — a specially created gallery in the museum’s downtown branch, Kemper at the Crossroads, 33 W. 19th St.
Coyne’s work joins an ongoing exhibit of sculptures, “Here’s Your Hat, What’s Your Hurry?,” by Brooklyn-based
Eric Fertman.That exhibit continues through July 28.
H Block Artspace at the Kansas City Art Institute2012 Kansas City Flatfile
June 1-Sept. 29
Reception:
6-8 p.m. Friday
Hours:
Noon-5 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday
16 E. 43rd St. (816.561.5563)
Leedy-Voulkos Art CenterTerra: Victoria Ann Reed, Shannon Sullivan, and Ellen W. Wolf
Main Gallery: June 1-July 28, 2012
Jane Almirall: Acts of Selfishness and Devotion
Opie Gallery: June 1-July 28, 2012
Walker Kelly: The Small Series
Lower Level Gallery: June 1-June 30, 2012
Joshua von Nonn: Immured by Memories
Front Gallery: Through June 23
Lad: LX-12
Back Gallery: Through June 30
Reception:
6-9 p.m. Friday
Hours:
11 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday-Saturday
2012 Baltimore Ave. (816.474.1919)
Slap-n-Tickle GalleryCabinet of Curiosities: Freaks, Geeks, and Human Oddities
June 1-10
Reception:
6-11 p.m. Friday, with burlesque performances at 8 p.m.
Hours:
Noon-4 p.m. Saturday and by appointment
504 E. 18th St. (816.716.5940)
Blue Djinn GalleryMelanie Myhre
June 1-30
Reception:
6-9 p.m. Friday
Hours:
10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday
1400 Union Ave. (816.518.4649)
Mattie Rhodes Art GalleryMy Dress Hangs There:
Alisha Gambino and Kathy Ruth Neal honor Frida Kahlo
June 1- Aug. 10
Reception and Viva la Frida Block Party:
6-9 p.m. Friday
Hours:
10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday
915 W. 17th St. (816.221.2349)
Krzyz StudioBrent Wheatley: New Impressions
June 2
Reception:
5-9 p.m. Friday
1800 Locust St. (816.472.4999)
The Late ShowThe Last Minute: Paintings by Adam Beris and David Gantay
Cognitive Dissonance: An installation by Diana Newport
Photographs by Wesaam Al-Badry
June 1-23
Reception:
6-10 p.m. Friday
Hours:
11 a.m.-6 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday,
and by appointment
1600 Cherry St. (816.474.1300)
Spray Booth GalleryNeutral Space: Group Show
June 1-July 20
Reception:
6-10 p.m. Friday
Hours:
Noon-6 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; noon-3 p.m. Saturday
130 W. 18th St., inside Volker Bicycles (816.471.5555)
Blue GalleryNude: An Invitational Exhibition
Through June 19
Reception:
6-9 p.m. Friday
Hours:
10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday and by appointment
118 Southwest Blvd. (816.527.0823)
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